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Peter F. Bronfman Business Library > 601 Strategy Studies

601 Strategy Studies

Library Support for Strategy Field Study Groups – aka The 601 project

The Bronfman Business Library  workshops in early June  to support  601 groups with secondary research as they embark on Phase 2 of the Strategy Field Study: Research and Strategic Assessment.  Resources and strategies shown assist in diverse areas including company research, industry research, market research and financial research.   Full details and dates.

Slides, guides and checklists prepared in support of these 601 Library Research Workshops can be downloaded.

The Strategy Field Study represents the culmination of a student’s work in the Schulich School of business MBA program.  For six to eight months, groups of up to eight students work with a company or organization to do a thorough strategic analysis and make actionable decisions. Students must draw on the knowledge acquired through their core and elective courses.  The 601 provides an opportunity to integrate, apply and test their knowledge in a real setting.

“Unlike a 20-page study where the decisions have been made, students have to decide what’s important, find the problem and come up with the answer”, … We don’t set the structure. The students have to self-organize and learn the realities of that business, make decisions, justify their actions to the company and convince them to apply what they’ve learned.”  Quote from Prof. Theo Peridis, SSB

When it comes to gathering information and data related to a 601 study, there is no ideal or even preferred way to do this.  It would be great if there was a common way that you could search in the many databases and Internet search engines that are available but as we are painfully aware, this just isn’t the case.

For assistance in developing your research questions, please see the following:

Defining the Problem

The workshops will be designed to help groups with their research questions. In order to maximize the benefit to your group of these workshops, it will be helpful if group members attend them having developed an overview of their research needs and specific research questions. But initially, often the most difficult part, is how to define the problem. A technique that may be useful is the Lotus Blossom. Here’s how to do it!

Start with the central question or basic assumption.List secondary questions or assumptions based on the centre of the blossom. Now repeat the process by listing the tertiary questions or assumptions.These questions or assumptions should serve as the basis for identifying the information you need, to answer your questions and/or to verify your assumptions. The following diagram illustrates the technique.

Planning the Strategy Study

There are many approaches one can take in conducting strategy studies but two of the most popular are: On Competition by Michael Porter and Strategy Safari by Henry Minzberg, Bruce Ahlstrand and Joseph Lampel. An article that compares them is Tale of two strategies , by Raymond Suutari in CMA Management Jul/Aug 1999.

Identifying the key elements

These elements will be different for each strategy study but there are generic categories which you may wish to consider as starting points for the company or organization you are researching..

  • Internal environment , e.g. organizational structure, marketing, human resources, production, financial aspects. location, facilities, stakeholder demands, philosophy/mission, etc.
  • Operating environment – e.g. competitors, suppliers, customers, reputation, market share, etc.
  • General environment – e.g. economic conditions, government regulations, legal issues, technological developments, social responsibility, developing trends (social and economic and political), etc.

Basic questions to ask

The following are basic questions which may help you to define your project:

  • What business is the company/organization in?
  • What are it’s products or what service does it deliver?
  • What are its’ goals?
  • Who are the customers?
  • What are the strengths and weaknesses of the company/organization?
  • What is unique about this company/organization?
  • Who are the competitors or what threatens the company/organization?
  • What are the opportunities?

 

Revised January 2013