Paper Example on Business Strategy Misalignment

Business strategies refer to the goals that a business sets in line with its vision and the mission (Meredith & Mantel, 2015). Mainly, strategies serve to give the company a sense of direction. However, these strategies are often misaligned with execution, which means that the business never achieves its forecasted business results. To put it into context, strategy misalignment occurs when the strategic goals differ with the operations and execution processes. Therefore, this paper seeks to explain why corporate strategy and execution get misaligned. It also describes the impact of this misalignment to project planning, execution and business results.

First, strategies get misaligned with performance because of poor communication. In most cases, the initiatives and goals are set, but those executing the plan do not receive adequate communication (Callahan, Stetz & Brooks, 2011). Consequently, employees do not understand the set expectation efficiently. Notably, it is necessary to communicate objectives throughout the organization to ensure people are aware of how to execute the plans. Additionally, it is essential to use appropriate communication channels to facilitate efficient comprehension of the set objectives. However, communication should also be in the form of actions. Sometimes management does not do as they say but expect those executing the plans to do what is expected, which results in misalignment (Project Management Institute, 2013).

Second, poor leadership within an organization leads to misalignment. Notably, when the leadership is weak, people become unmotivated to execute the set personal and organizational objectives, which limit the attainment of the overall corporate strategy (Meredith & Mantel, 2015). Often, leadership fails because the organizations managers lack adequate knowledge of applying appropriate leadership behaviors in distinct situations. Moreover, different situations within the organization call for unique leadership style. Therefore, it is necessary that leaders are highly skilled in steering the group forward.

Additionally, execution is misaligned with the strategy due to low levels of employee motivation. When employees lack the necessary motivation, often caused by the failure of management to delegate duties, acknowledge their contributions and poor communication, the strategy remains unexecuted. Moreover, the strategy can be misaligned with execution when the management is overambitious with setting the goals (Meredith & Mantel, 2015). If management does not consider the consumers while setting the goals, particularly in what to produce, it may set unrealistically high strategies that are difficult to execute. Therefore, it is necessary that the management carries out research on forecasted consumption to ensure it set realistic goals. Similarly, there is sully the issue of lack of a strategic plan behind the idea. Sometimes businesses will set the strategic goals, but they do not have a clear plan on how to achieve these goals hence translating to the gap between strategy and execution. If there is no governance and proper planning, then there is no accountability, which results in misaligned policies.

Impact of Misalignment

Notably, misalignment of strategies affects the planning process. Planning involves setting a strategic process on how the firm will achieve the set objectives (Meredith & Mantel, 2015). Mainly, planning gives the organization a strategic sense of direction. Typically, the entity adjusts the plan with time as it works towards achieving the set objectives. If the strategy is misaligned with the execution, then firm encounters challenges in the planning process since the management will have to readjust the plan to cater for the unmet goals. Consequently, the company will never plan forward due to the failure of the strategies.

Moreover, when policies are misaligned, execution is affected. Furthermore, the employees will not know the significance of the corporate strategy neither how they are supposed to implement it. Moreover, employees will not execute the strategic goals as expected due to lack of communication, low motivation and poor leadership, which leads to unmet business results. Misaligned strategies lead to conflicts and challenges in resourcing, which limits the success of execution. Consequently, the organization performs poorly. Notably, markets are bound to shift with time hence the need to manage the performance of the strategy to ensure the firm does not suffer from poor performance because of executing wrong plans (Callahan, Stetz & Brooks, 2011). If the program is not executed accordingly, the firm fails to grow. Furthermore, the management lacks the ability to align its actions to set objectives. Consequently, the company experiences a decrease in revenue and profitability and if not corrected, these poor results can lead to the complete failure of the business.

Conclusion

To conclude, it is clear that in most cases, many businesses fail because they fail to align their strategies to execution despite having robust and efficient strategies. Mainly, misalignment of the strategy with execution affects the strategic planning and the execution operations in a firm. Consequently, the performance of the organization is affected evidenced by reduced revenue and profitability, which halts the growth of the entity. Therefore, there is the need to ensure proper communication, experienced leadership, employees motivation, and to instill governance, which empowers employees with a sense of responsibility and facilitates high performance for the firm to ensure proper alignment.

References

Callahan, K. R., Stetz, G. S., & Brooks, L. M. (2011). Project management accounting: Budgeting, tracking, and reporting costs and profitability. Hoboken, N.J: Wiley & Sons. ISBN: 978-0-470-95234-4

Meredith, J. R., & Mantel, S. J. (2015). Project management: A managerial approach. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley & Sons. ISBN: 978-1118947029

Project Management Institute. (2013). A guide to the project management body of knowledge (5th ed.). Newtown Square. 978-1-935589-67-9