SMO 641 BUSINESS STRATEGY - University of Alberta

SMO 641

BUSINESS STRATEGY

Fall TERM 2020

Section X01

Thursdays, September 3

^rd

to December 3

^rd

, 2020 6:30 to 9:30 pm

Instructor: Dr. Anthony R. Briggs

Office: BUS 3-40Dor eHUB, 9007 HUB Mall Phone: (780) 492-4993 (office)

Email: [email protected]

Office Hours: Before class and by appointment

Required Materials: SMO 641 Case Pack ($8.50US)

Available @ https://hbsp.harvard.edu/import/xxxxxx Course Web Site: https://eclass.srv.ualberta.ca/portal/

DESCRIPTION:

Business Strategy is intended to be a challenging and valuable capstone course for the MBA curriculum.

The material in this course is designed to help you quickly assess complex situations and decisions. In my mind, the power of strategizing and managing an organization down the road of success makes the course interesting to take and fun to teach. I hope this course will be though provoking and that it will be

instrumental in helping you make more meaningful and successful decisions.

COURSE DESIGN:

The primary objective of this course is to provide you with the tools you need to analyze, formulate and make decisions on strategic problems facing leaders, managers and organizations. This class will focus on both the making and execution of business strategy. The diagnosis of business problems is only a small component of a successful competitive strategy. Making a particular strategy work, for a specific organization in a particular market, is a critical and underemphasized element of strategic management.

You will be encouraged and challenged to work through the decision making and implementation of any prospective strategies. You will learn how to use a broad menu of key tools for strategic thinking and communication, to explore new and emerging issues in strategic management.

Another objective of this course is to provide you with a final capstone experience to your MBA career.

Working in a group environment you will analyze and make strategic recommendations for a “live”

organizational case. In this course you will work with volunteer organizations as a living laboratory complete with history, objectives, problems and potential solutions. Your job will be to understand their objectives, analyze their situation, and recommend a strategic course of action. To help you with this activity, there will be several co-facilitators who will discuss specific issues of strategic management (globalization, market research) and act as mentors for your project.

The last major objective of this course is to improve your teamwork skills and your written and oral communication skills. Contemporary managers are valued not only for their skills at technical analysis and problem solving, but also for their ability to communicate their solutions, persuade others of the viability of their insights and construct creative solutions in a group context. After completing your MBA in general, and this class in particular, you should be able to think critically in new and unfamiliar circumstances through the application of conceptual and theoretical understandings of core business fundamentals. You should also be able to apply qualitative and quantitative techniques to problem solving.

LEARNING GOALS:

The Alberta MBA Program curriculum is based on the following set of learning goals:

Business Fundamentals

Teamwork and Leadership Skills Critical Thinking and Problem Solving Communication Skills

Global Awareness Quantitative Skills

Information Processing Skills Ethical Awareness

EVALUATION:

Evaluation in the course will be based on three sets of assignments weighted as follows:

1. Strategy Presentation and Individual Participation

a. Strategy Presentation 15%

b. Individual Participation 15% /30%

2. Lecture Reflection Paper /10%

3. “Live Project” Development and Peer Feedback

a. Team problem presentation 5%

b. Peer feedback 5% /10%

4. Final “Live Project” Presentation and Written Report

a. Final Presentation 20%

b. Final Written Report 25%

c. Evaluation of team members 5% /50%

Course Total 100%

COURSE OUTLINE

• Required/Reference reading o Supplemental reading

PART 1: STRATEGIC THINKING

September 3 WELCOME AND INTRODUCTION

o Mintzberg, H., Lampel, J. and Ahlstrand, B. 1998. Strategy Safari: A Guided Tour through the Wilds of Strategic Management: New York: The Free Press. Chapters 1 and 12. eClass

o Course structure, ethical guidelines and Live Case projects will be discussed

September 10 PRINCIPLES OF STRATEGY

• Porter, M.E. 1996. What is Strategy? Harvard Business Review, 74 (6): 61-78. eClass

• Hambrick, D.C. & Fredrickson, J.W. 2001. Are you sure you have a strategy? Academy of Management Executive, 15 (4): 48-59. WEB

• Porter, M.E. 2008. The Five Competitive Forces that Shape Strategy. Harvard Business Review.

86(1): 78-93. eClass

• Barney, J.B. 1995. Looking Inside for Competitive Advantage. Academy of Management Executive, 9 (4): 49-61. WEB

• Ghemawat, P.J. and Rivkin, J.W. 2006. Creating Competitive Advantage. Harvard Business School Case. HBSP

DUE January 16^th – Interest statement for Live Case September 17 COMPETITIVE DYNAMICS

Research Facilitator – Janet Williamson, Business Librarian

• Christensen, C.M. and Raynor, M.E. 2003. The Innovators Solution: Creating and Sustaining Successful Growth. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Business School Press. Chapter 2. eClass

• Kim, W.C. and Mauborgne, R. 2007. Chapter 1. Blue Ocean Strategy: How to Create

Uncontested Market Space and Make the Competition Irrelevant. Boston: Harvard Business School Press Chapter 1 (p.3-23). eClass

o Roberts, E.B., and Berry, C.A. 1985. Entering New Businesses: Selecting Strategies for Success.

Sloan Management Review, 26 (3): 3-17.1998. WEB (see also Corporate Strategy) September 24 MEANINGFUL WORK AND SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY

• Christensen, C. 2010. How Will You Measure Your Life? Harvard Business Review. 88 (7/8), 46-51. eClass

• Fink, L. 2018. A Sense of Purpose. BlackRock Annual Letter to CEOs. WEB

• Bradach, J. L.; Tierney, Thomas J.; Stone, N. 2008. Delivering on the Promise of Non-Profits.

Harvard Business Review, 86 (12,): 88-97 eClass

o Garrad, L. and Chamorro-Premuzic, T. 2017. How to Make Work More Meaningful for Your

• CASE: New Resource Bank: In Pursuit of Green HBSP DUE (Soft Target) January 30^th – Scope document

PART 2: PRACTICE OF STRATEGY

October 1 LEADERSHIP and GOVERNANCE

• Kotter, J. P. 2001. What Leaders Really Do. Harvard Business Review. 79(11): 85-96. eClass

• Doerr, J. 2018. Measure What Matters. London: Penguin Random House. Ch. 1-2:3-34. eClass Team. Harvard Business Review. eClass

• Schmidt, E., Rosenberg, J. and Eagle, A. 2019. Trillion Dollar Coach. New York, NY: Harper Collins Publishers. Forward and Ch.: 31-51 and 73-78.

o Hamm, J. 2006. The Five Messages Leaders Must Manage. Harvard Business Review. 84(5):

114-122. eClass

o Sonnenfeld, J., Kusin,M. & Walton, E. 2013. What CEOs Really Think of Their Boards. Harvard Business Review, 91 (4) 98-106. eClass

o Kawasaki, G. 2008. Reality Check. London: Penguin Group. Ch. 6-9: 27-39. eClass

October 8 STRATEGY PRESENTATION DISCUSSION October 15 CORPORATE STRATEGY

Guest Facilitator(s) – Jason Ding, Managing Director, Edmonton Corporate Finance Leader and National Biotechnology Leader / Alyson Quan, Vice President, Deloitte Canada (TBC)

• Roberts, E.B., and Berry, C.A. 1985. Entering New Businesses: Selecting Strategies for Success.

Sloan Management Review, 26 (3): 3-17.1998. WEB

• Bower, J. L. 2001. Not All M&A’s Are Alike and that Matters. Harvard Business Review, 79 (3):

92-101 eClass

o Christensen, C. M., Alton, R., Rising, C., & Waldeck, A. 2011. The Big Idea: The New M&A Playbook. Harvard Business Review, 89 (3), 48-57. eClass

PART 3: FRONTIER TOPICS

October 22 EXPONENTIAL ORGANIZATIONS

• Diamandis, P. and Kotler, S. 2016 Goodbye Linear Thinking: Hello Exponential. Rotman Magazine, 38-43. WEB

• Lee, KF. 2018. AI Superpowers. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. Ch. 1&2: 1-50. eClass o Subramanian, S. and Rao, A. 2019. How to Build Disruptive Strategic Flywheels. Strategy &

Business. 96 (Autumn). WEB

October 29 TEAM FEEDBACK SCHEDULED SESSIONS

November 5 INNOVATION AND ENTREPRENEURSHIP PANEL DISCUSSION o Tentative: Building an Entrepreneurial Ecosystem in Edmonton

November 12 READING WEEK – NO CLASS November 19 GLOBAL COMPETITIVENESS

Guest Facilitator – Prof. Barry Scholnick

• Lee, KF. 2018. AI Superpowers. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. Ch. 1&2: 1-50. eClass (see also Exponential Organizations)

• Gupta, A.K. & Govindarajan, V. 2001. Converting global presence into global competitive advantage. Academy of Management Executive, 15 (2): 45-56. WEB

o Chand, M. and Tung, R. L. 2014. The Aging of the World’s Population and its Effects on Global Business. Academy of Management Perspectives, 28(4): 409-429. WEB

November 26 Live Project PRESENTATIONS December 3 Live Project PRESENTATIONS

DUE December 7^th – Live Project Report and Team Member Evaluations

DESCRIPTION OF COURSE REQUIREMENTS:

1. Strategy Presentation and Class Participation

•

Strategy Presentation (15%) – DUE October 8

^th

You will have the opportunity to showcase your interests, presentation skills and strategy knowledge through a two person small presentation about an organizations that you are interested in. The organization can be a for-profit or a not-for-profit, public or private, and from anywhere in the world. The presentation will be structured specifically to address these five components:

1. What is the organization and why is it of interest to you?

2. Does the organization have a strategy? What is it?

3. What is the most important problem this organization is facing?

4. What model would be the most useful to explain this problem?

5.

How should the organization solve this problem? Can they implement this change?

This assignment will be a 4-5 minute recorded presentation. To do this well you will need focus and judgement. It should NOT go over time. To ensure organizations are unique, students will claim the organization of their choosing on a first come, first served basis on a central google drive folder made for this purpose.

Individual presentations are graded out of fifteen points and converted to a percentage. The quality of the content for the five items above will each be graded out of two. The remaining five points will be assessed on the quality of the presentation, the use of visuals and good mechanics on presentation structure,

coherence and timing. This evaluated component seeks to achieve the business fundamentals, critical thinking and problem solving skills, and communication skills learning goals.



Class Participation (15%)

Class Participation is a very important part of the learning goals of this course. In strategic settings, where performance is often an outcome new ideas and communication, it is encouraged to engaged with the material and learn to synthesize different perspectives.

The participation grade will be evaluated on the QUALITY of your questions and insights.

Good comments can be (1) different and insightful perspectives, (2) build on other’s perspectives, and/or (3) advance the discussion to new and interesting areas.

Discussion will generally be fluid, but the instructor will aim to call on each student twice over the semester. Class discussions are meant to be fun and interesting, but if you are uncomfortable engaging in class, please come and talk to me and to develop this skill. This evaluated component, though the varied nature of topics, seeks to achieve the all of the requisite learning goals.

2. Lecture Reflection Paper (10%) – DUE the Monday Prior to the Lecture

Choose a week on ONE topic that most appeals to you.

A. What were the key insights of the readings?

B. Beyond the readings, what else would you like to explore about this topic? Does it have relevance to your capstone project? Why or why not?

C. Then consider (1) Hambrick and Frederickson’s “Do You Have a Strategy?” or (2) Bradach’s

“Delivering on the Promise of Non-Profits” or (3) Christensen’s “How Will You Measure Your Life” and address how the week informs your organization objectives and/or your individual goals.

This assignment, 3 pages maximum, gives you a chance to more fully prepare for the class discussion to your interest. This will be graded on (1) the breadth and quality of use of readings and examples and (2) the information richness of your arguments. I encourage you to be creative, but also rigorous, with this exercise. This evaluated component addresses critical thinking, problem solving and communication skills learning goals

3. “Live Project” Selection, Scope and Peer Feedback Sessions

Individuals (with strong guidelines from the instructor) will work in a group of 3 to 5 members. The project will vary by the sponsoring organization, but all sponsors were told that: (1) their project has to be strategic in nature, (2) has to be integrative across multiple functional areas (finance, operations,

marketing, human relations, etc.) and (3) should be able to be completed in 10-12 weeks. Teams should expect three meetings with their sponsors during the semester. We will have a formal check-in at least two times during the semester where you will get a chance to discuss aspects of your project in class.

Project teams will be chosen and developed in the following way:

1. Decide which projects are of most individual interest to you. You should choose projects which will have the greatest personal or future work-related benefit to you.

2. Once you have prioritized your projects, email me a one or two paragraph statement of interest on the top three projects you would like study and why, DUE no later than September 12^th. 3. Teams of about 3-5 students will be formed based on these interests. Students are assigned by

a combination of the strength of their statements and the priority the statements are submitted.

4. Once teams have been chosen, and groups finalized, you will need to make contact with the organization. Per the ethics requirements, do not contact your organization until your group has permission from the instructor to do so.

5. After meeting with the organization, you will submit a formal scope document (detailing the deliverables of the project), for feedback and approval. This is not graded and will be used to help organize your project. Aim for a target deadline of October 3^rd.

• Team Problem Presentation (5%) – DUE Week October 31^st

In a traditional consulting environment, teams will seek help from their peers to identify problems and solutions. To improve the quality of Live Projects, each team will develop a draft, a non-confidential 10-20 slide presentation on their project to present to an assigned peer team. These slides will address the existing strategy of the organization, the situational analysis of the organization, key issues and initial approach to address them. The idea of the presentation is to communicate the key problems faced by the organization, and show key data and visual frameworks, so others can understand your project and offer help.

Teams should provide a digital copy to an assigned peer team and the instructor. The peer team will provide feedback on the presentation, both in a live setting and as written feedback, to identify potential problems and/or recommend potential solutions. Time will be scheduled in asynchronous or in scheduled class time for paired teams to walk through their presentations and have discussion.

• Peer Feedback (5%) – DUE November 14^th

Following the team problem presentation, peer teams will provide feedback to the team of (1) a markup of the original slide deck, and (2) up to one page in comments, all copied to the instructor.

4. Final “Live Project” Presentation and Report

•

Live Project Presentation (20%) – DUE November 26

^th

or December 3

^rd

Each group with make a formal presentation based upon their project. The presentation should be 20 minutes long and allow for 5 minutes of questions (25 minutes in total). I encourage students to read Guy Kawasaki’s (2008) notes in “Reality Check” on high quality presentations. You will want to design your presentation so that we are convinced of your analysis and recommendations!

Your team will present your recommendations on one of the above days. These will be presented to the project organization, the instructor and often one guest judge. Presentations will be open to the class but, in some circumstances, may be closed at the request of the project organization. With special permission, the presentation may be outside of the scheduled time, but this will be only in very rare circumstances, with consent of the whole team, and to the needs of the project organization.

For the presentation days, just like in regular businesses, there will be a need to share a lot of information with limited time. You will need to be judicious about what you present and to respect the other students.

Teams must stay within one minute of their allotted time or will be interrupted and receive deductions.

The presentation will be evaluated using the following criteria:

Content (10%)

1. Tells the story of the organization

2. Defines a clear problem and strategy for the organization 3. Uses strategy concepts, and frameworks well

4. Provides a strong rational for key issues and recommendations

5. Provides a clear decision forward, including implementation and effects on performance Form (6%)

1. Professional and within time

2. Creative and persuasive presentation of information 3. Coordination and effective, full use of team

Questions from the Audience (4%) 1. Question 1

2. Question 2

This is a team grade. Everyone should speak to some aspect of the presentation. Teams should bring 5 physical copies of the slides, “note” format with 3 slides/page. Use your team effectively!

•

Live Project Report (25%) – DUE 10pm December 7

^th

The project report should be no more than 30 pages of text (double-spaced), not including the appendices.

You should discuss the current strategies and potential relationships using multiple frameworks from this class. The report should be submitted via email to me, cc’ing the project sponsor. After the deadline above, I will immediately deduct 10% per day for each day it is late. The paper will be assessed as follows:

Use of Strategic Frameworks (10%)

1. Clear narrative for the report including an executive summary, organizational background, scope and context, the key problems and key findings

2. Organizational strategy and objectives identified, assessed and/or addressed 3. Good use of organizational examples, illustrative data and figures

4. Effects on firm performance are clear and well-defended

Strategic Plan (10%)

1. Creative/clever ideas about potential strategic choices

2. Clear priorities and strategic decision with pros and cons discussed 3. Implementation and risks considered

4. Coherent narrative that connects analysis, depth and breadth of analysis to recommendations Writing Quality and Information Richness (5%)

1. High quality/creative appearance

2. Good grammar, well-organized, with nice flow 3. Information richness in Tables/Appendices

Note: All projects must follow research ethics board guidelines found at

http://www.business.ualberta.ca/Research/ResearchEthicsBoard/PoliciesProcedures.aspx

•

Team Member Evaluation (5%) – DUE 10pm April 7

^th

Sixty percent of your grade is determined based on working in a group setting and there needs to be consideration for varying contributions from group members. To account for individual differences, each group member will provide a confidential/anonymous evaluation to me, via email, of themselves and their group member’s performance throughout the semester.

For the evaluation of team members, you will be given a hypothetical $10,000 for each member in your group (i.e. with 5 members you will have $50,000 to allocate). You are asked to split the money based upon contribution each team member made to the group (including yourself) and provide a brief rationale consistent with your evaluation. An individual with an average allocation of $10,000 will receive the full 5 points. If the average is different, students will receive bonuses or deductions of 1 or 2 points (i.e. 3 of 5 points, or 7 of 5 points) at the discretion of the instructor.

Overall, the “Live Project” assignment seeks to achieve the business fundamentals, teamwork and leadership skills, critical thinking and problem solving, communication skills, ethical awareness and quantitative and information processing learning goals.

COURSE POLICIES:

Materials

All materials are digital, either available through the course pack, the library as an online resource, or through eClass. Recommended reference texts, while not required include Strategic Management and Competitive Advantage (Barney and Hesterly 5^th Edition, 2014), Strategic Management Concepts (Hitt and Ireland, 2014), or Contemporary Strategy Analysis (Grant, 2013).

Class Format, Slides and Notes. The main lectures of the class will be prerecorded. The lectures, slides and guiding discussion questions will be posted one week in advance to the class on eClass under SMO 641. The class will meet synchronously on Zoom most Thursdays to follow on from the lectures, discuss concepts and address student questions. To make the class more interactive and interesting during classroom discussion, some slides may be omitted until they are presented in class.

Format for Assignments

All written assignments should be 11 or 12-point font, one and a half or double-spaced with one inch margins all around. Title pages, reference sections and appendices are not included in page count.

Diagrams, figures and tables are encouraged, and key figures should be presented in the body of the paper.

References should be cited using APA Style. Unless arranged on eClass, assignments are to be submitted by email (as a PDF or MS Word attachment) by 10:00 pm.

Grading

The instructor will grade most assignments. The final presentation grade will consider feedback from ASoB visitors. The final report will be graded by the instructor and a PhD candidate. Detailed grades will be posted on eClass as soon as they are computed. Please review them and send any feedback about any potential errors. You are welcome to discuss your class performance and standing in the course by appointment. On e-mail request, I will provide detailed comments on the final paper.

Grade Distribution

Policy about course outlines can be found in Course Requirements, Evaluation Procedures and Grading of the University Calendar. Grades will be calculated using a combination of the recommended distribution and absolute measures. If the class as a whole is highly engaged, lower grades will be rare and the class distribution will be higher than guidelines.

Late Policy

Late assignments, such as the Final Report, will lose 10% of the final grade immediately for every day that they are late. Papers will not be accepted five days past the deadline.

UNIVERSITY PROCEDURES AND POLICIES

Policy about course outlines can be found in Course Requirements, Evaluation Procedures and Grading of the University Calendar.

Missed Assignments: Approval for an excused absence from term work is at the discretion of the instructor as per §23.3(1) of the University Calendar. Any student who is incapacitated because of illness, is suffering from severe domestic affliction, or has other compelling reasons (including religious conviction) may apply for an excused absence for a missed assignment. If you have a conflict please discusses it with me beforehand and I will be happy to find a good solution with you. In fairness to other students, I will rarely accept excuses once an assignment deadline has passed.

Appropriate Conduct: My goal in this course is to create a supportive environment for learning based on open, constructive debate. This requires all of us to be engaged with the material and with each other in a professional manner, with courtesy and respect for each other’s individuality. Discrimination, malicious criticism, and disruption of class are examples of conduct that are not acceptable.

Audio and Video Recording: Audio or video recording, digital or otherwise, of lectures, labs, seminars or any other teaching environment by students is allowed only with the prior written consent of the instructor or as a part of an approved accommodation plan. Student or instructor content, digital or otherwise, created and/or used within the context of the course is to be used solely for personal study, and is not to be used or distributed for any other purpose without prior written consent from the content author.

Academic Integrity: The University of Alberta is committed to the highest standards of academic integrity and honesty. Students are expected

to be familiar with these standards regarding academic honesty and to uphold the policies of the University in this respect.

Students are particularly urged to familiarize themselves with the provisions of the Code of Student Behaviour (online

at www.governance.ualberta.ca) and avoid any behaviour which could potentially result in suspicions of

cheating, plagiarism, misrepresentation of facts and/or participation in an offence. Academic dishonesty is a serious offence and can result in suspension or expulsion from the University.

Note: This syllabus may be subject to minor modifications (August 17, 2020).