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Back to SAI Home page Important Elements for this Strategic Alignment component. What are the Challenges? Some of the Questions one should ask... Explore the Possibilities! Contact SAI for more Ideas and Information

Strategic Elements
The SAI Model - Click on any SAI Model component for more detail. SHARED VISION - This is your clearly articulated, desired, measurable and shared destination that incorporates customers, business results, unit offerings and peoples' aspirations. (Click here for more detail.) ORGANIZATION - These are the units outside of yours, that is, the rest of the organization. (Click here for more detail.) STRATEGIC ELEMENTS - These are the business fundamentals of your unit which include: defining what business you are in, how you differentiate yourself, what short and long term business results you want to achieve, how you are going to realize them and how you will get everyone in the unit committed to getting there. (Click here for more detail.) CULTURE - This is the sum total of all the shared, taken-for-granted assumptions or mental models, values and behaviours that people in your unit have learned throughout their history in the unit that have led to them and the unit being successful. (Click here for more detail.) KEY BUSINESS PROCESSES - These are the primary cross-functional chain of activities that deliver your products or services to your customers (either internal or external). They deliver the customer products or services required to achieve your unit's shared vision. (Click here for more detail.) UNIT STRUCTURE - This is the design for how your resources, human and other, are organized and linked to enable the realization of your unit's shared vision. This includes defining your critical operating mechanisms necessary to ensure your structure realizes the potential of your design. (Click here for more detail.) ENABLING ASSETS & SYSTEMS - These are your unit's core competencies (skills and capabilities), all tangible assets (including what you own) and systems, such as performance management, and policies and procedures, which are key to achieving your unit's shared vision. (Click here for more detail.) STRATEGY ENGAGEMENT - This is the method you use to get the required engagement, commitment and alignment of behaviours of everyone needed to achieve your unit's shared vision. (Click here for more detail.)
(Click on any component for more details.)

STRATEGIC
ELEMENTS

These are the business fundamentals of your unit which include: defining what business you are in, how you differentiate yourself, what short and long term business results you want to achieve, how you are going to realize them and how you will get everyone in the unit committed to getting there.

The following seven strategic elements are sequential and yet interconnected to form a comprehensive strategic approach to your business. Not one can stand on its own or by itself achieve the potential of your unit.



The Elements
The seven key Strategic Elements are:

Mission This is the business (services and/or products) that you provide to your customers (who may be internal) and how it is that you provide it to them that creates your unique mix of value.
Key Business Assumptions These are the assumptions you have made about your market, customers, competitors, capital, economic cycle, people, capabilities, regulatory issues and suppliers.
Strategic Position This is how you position and differentiate your unit, i.e., your unique mix of value, with customers in the market in order to achieve your vision.
Shared Vision Components The three components of shared vision are: vision building blocks, vision statement and day-in-the-life. They work together to create a vivid, meaningful and inspiring picture for the organization of where you want your business results to be in 3-5 years.
Strategies These are the methods that are linked to your strategic position, the current state of how you will achieve your vision and usually hard decisions about what activities you will and will not do.
Strategic Initiatives These are the specific macro projects, outside of the usual scope of your day-to-day activities, you will undertake to align your organization to achieve your strategies.
Integrated Business Plan This is the first year plan that integrates all functions on how the day-to-day functional activities will align to Strategies as well as the strategic initiatives. A strategic scorecard with measurable annual targets is developed to track progress.
 
(Click on any Element for more details.)




Challenges

 The Challenges facing you include...
Consider The Challenges:

Rarely are all seven strategic elements defined, linked or aligned.
Rarely do they have a shared understanding among your senior leaders.
Rarely are they all completed.
Rarely are they implemented in an organized, data-driven results orientation.



Questions

 Some Questions that arise...
Ask Yourself:

Which of the seven strategic elements does your unit have?
Are they aspirational and do they provide direction and have measurable milestones?
What linkages are there among the elements?
Who has accountability for developing and implementing them?
Do you have measurable milestones? Are they being monitored and celebrated?
When was the last time the strategic or operational plan involved more than the financials?



Possibilities

 Visualize the Possibilities...
Ponder the Possibilities:

All strategic elements are developed, integrated and shared by your senior leaders and key stakeholders.
Alignment of strategic elements will result in levels of performance and business results beyond your expectations.
Levels of productivity will be higher than ever before.





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