Sustainable development is becoming more and more essential in the way companies behave and perform. The concern regarding the environment and the society reflects a broader concept and perception on how business should be conducted. The continuous demand for all kind of resources makes it vital and almost inevitable for a company, government and even physical person to embrace and embed in their culture and strategic goals the sustainable development dimensions. In the perspective of project management, the integration of sustainability requires particular attention especially from the decision-makers involved in the field of project management and more precisely in the project selection process. This research aims to examine how this process is achieved by organizations in a sustainable manner, by proper integration in effective tools such as Environmental and Social Impact Assessment. The exploration of theories and models regarding project selection and ESIA helped me in building and elaborating further on a sustainable framework that enhances the need for proper integration and incorporation of environmental and social issues in projects. This paper concludes that the most efficient way to benefit from the opportunities that the surrounding environment brings in a project area is to assess such impacts and integrate them since the corporate strategy crafting and the initial phase of project selection process

Since the late 20th century, people extended to over-consume and over-discharge all kinds of resources and made the resources decreased hugely. The resources in the earth are not unlimited. Emissions and pollutions brought human all kinds of crisis. Social-trended management becomes the main stream of business operation in the 21st century, and it is not countable for the corporations that were incapable to follow this change. The awake of limit of the Earth resources had made the corporations start to respect the importance of resource reclamations as well as resource application, which means, in the recycle society, they started to create the new economical added-value of resources by 3R: Reduce, Reuse and Recycle. Now, more and more corporations are awaken of the damages environment pollution made to humans, and this is not a ignorable power. To research how the corporations combine their management strategies with the concepts of keeping a sustainable environment is the main target of this study. How do the corporations set up their management strategies by keeping the environment sustainable? In this study, we will discuss this topic by 3 dimensions and procedures: 1¡B Influences on business management made by the direct and indirect benefit parties of the corporations. 2¡B The Corporations¡¦ application of Green Management brings the corporations themselves more Green Values. 3¡B Use the past capability to develop a dynamic ability and create a competitive advantage of the corporation. Normal corporations emphasize on the development of single strategy, and ignore how to set up ¡ustrategic agendas¡v and ¡ustrategic target¡v, and plenty of them are lack of thoughts of integration. According to the point of resource-based view, each corporation shall understand its own value, its special property and its un-imitate resources to create its advantage. In the quick-varying environment, the corporations shall own its ability to increase its advantages by using the point of view of resources to develop a dynamic ability and create its continuing competitive advantage. This study takes 7 corporations which execute sustainable environment effectively in Taiwan by preceding a Qualitative Research, interview and collect every kind of documents and news, to analyze each of their Green Strategies.

<p>Strategic management has long been viewed as the concept and process that link an organization</p><p>and its environment together (Leibold, Probst & Gibbert, 2002). It consists of the</p><p>analysis, decisions and actions an organization undertakes in order to create and sustain</p><p>competitive advantages (Dess, Lumpkin & Taylor, 2005).</p><p>Within the history of strategic management research there has been an unbalance between</p><p>the internal and the external perspective. During the 1980s Michael Porter, one of the most</p><p>prominent strategic management researchers, and his Five Forces model focused strictly on</p><p>the external competitive environment (Mintzberg, Ahlstrand & Lampel, 1998). Further, in</p><p>the 1990s the focus shifted from external to internal along with Jay Barney’s development</p><p>of the resource based theory in 1991 (Barney, 1991). The issue of excluding one or the</p><p>other perspective has now started to be acknowledged and researchers today are striving</p><p>for developing models integrating both perspectives. However, theoretical models existing</p><p>today that combine the two perspectives are complex and hard to apply in practice for</p><p>managers within the business world.</p><p>In order to address the complexity of the strategic management concept we have chosen to</p><p>develop a model with the purpose to connect and relate the external and internal perspectives</p><p>by conducting an in-depth analysis of a chosen company. The model also strives to be</p><p>easily communicated, applicable and understandable for managers and employees on different</p><p>levels within the organization. This leads us to the purpose of this thesis: “to develop</p><p>a simplified model that combines the external and internal perspective of strategic management</p><p>and apply this to a chosen company”.</p><p>The research was conducted through a case study based on the authors’ participation in a</p><p>PBM (Project Based Module) - project. The model was tested on the company in question</p><p>by analyzing the company’s internal and external environment with the means of analysis</p><p>tools such as PEST-analysis, strategic group analysis, threshold analysis and the SWOTanalysis.</p><p>To conclude it is important to balance an organization’s internal efforts with the external</p><p>market conditions and avoid excluding one or the other from the strategic management</p><p>process. Combining the two perspectives results in identifying the current capabilities and</p><p>competences and the direction of how to use these in order to meet market demands and</p><p>gain competitive advantage.</p>

The aim of this thesis is to explore the diversification of a major oil company into the. petrochemical business and then through thorough analysis to recommend the appropriate corporate strategies to be followed by the petrochemical subsidiary of such a company in the 1980's and the 1990's. The petrochemical industry has undergone great changes during the last decade. In the early 1970's it entered a new era of maturity, however due to the misplannings of the late 1960's extending to the early 1970's the industry was suddenly faced with significant overcapacity which has persisted to the present date and is expected to last well into the 1980's. The 1974 oil crisis caused a further decline in the growth of demand, hence exacerbating the situation. During the seventies the industry has had to operate under increasing material prices, unlike the past, which when coupled with the problem of overcapacity and the resulting deterioration of prices, has caused considerable decline in the financial ability of the companies to finance their capital expenditure programmes through internal cash generation (which was the case in the industry's 'golden era'). This situation is threatening the long term viability and survival of the petrochemical businesses. A System Dynamics model for a hypothetical petrochemical subsidiary of a major oil company has been constructed which embodies all the policies inherent in such a system. The dynamic behaviour of the model closely resembles that expected from the real system such as the declining financial ability, which is mostly due to the inflationary conditions. Through thorough analysis, the impact of varying inflation level on the performance of the system was explored, and the need for adopting suitable accounting policies which would take account of the replacement costs of assets, during periods of high inflation, was proposed. The adoption of a number of policies led to a certain degree of improvement in the financial performance of the system, and these are recommended concerning the corporate strategy of the company for the next two decades. Finally it was discovered that due to the low level of growth of demand (compared to the past), the large economic sizes of the petrochemical plants and the market share consensus, the companies will have to go into joint ventures in the future.

Multimarket competition has become a substantial part of the modern economy. As such, it has drawn the attention of academics in both economics and strategy fields. Many studies have found empirical evidence of mutual forbearance in several industries, but despite its importance, its behavioral roots have not been explored. In my dissertation I integrate the reality of boundedly-rational decision makers into the mutual forbearance hypothesis. I apply an outgrowth of the behavioral theory of the firm – the shifting focus model of risk taking – to the study of competitive behavior. I propose a behavioral model of multimarket competition that focuses on corporate strategic decisions - market entry and exit decisions, regardless of entry mode (e.g. acquisitions) or exit mode (e.g. divestitures). This approach provides a granular view of changes in the business scope of the firms in terms of product and geographic markets served. I test my hypotheses in the U.S. property liability insurance industry over a 12-year period (1998-2008). I argue that firms follow the mutual forbearance logic as long as their performance goals are satisfied. However, under conditions of adversity, firms shift attention to recovering from the performance shortfall and their actions deviate from the mutual forbearance predictions. This dissertation shows that underperforming firms with abundant slack take longer to forbear, and underperforming firms with limited slack start forbearing sooner, as predicted. By bridging behavioral and competitive perspectives to the study of market entry and exit decisions, I underscore the value of cross-fertilization in strategy research.

Multimarket competition has become a substantial part of the modern economy. As such, it has drawn the attention of academics in both economics and strategy fields. Many studies have found empirical evidence of mutual forbearance in several industries, but despite its importance, its behavioral roots have not been explored. In my dissertation I integrate the reality of boundedly-rational decision makers into the mutual forbearance hypothesis. I apply an outgrowth of the behavioral theory of the firm – the shifting focus model of risk taking – to the study of competitive behavior. I propose a behavioral model of multimarket competition that focuses on corporate strategic decisions - market entry and exit decisions, regardless of entry mode (e.g. acquisitions) or exit mode (e.g. divestitures). This approach provides a granular view of changes in the business scope of the firms in terms of product and geographic markets served. I test my hypotheses in the U.S. property liability insurance industry over a 12-year period (1998-2008). I argue that firms follow the mutual forbearance logic as long as their performance goals are satisfied. However, under conditions of adversity, firms shift attention to recovering from the performance shortfall and their actions deviate from the mutual forbearance predictions. This dissertation shows that underperforming firms with abundant slack take longer to forbear, and underperforming firms with limited slack start forbearing sooner, as predicted. By bridging behavioral and competitive perspectives to the study of market entry and exit decisions, I underscore the value of cross-fertilization in strategy research.

Partial Strategies of an Enterprise - marketing, sales, business, economic, financial, personnel, investment and other strategies

This master thesis combines corporate culture, corporate strategy, motivation and education of employees. Furthermore, there is also a focus on their interconnections. A real company Unicorn a.s. is presented in the second part -- owner's (Vladimír Kovář's) vision, goals and strategies. Moreover, there is introduced Unicorn's corporate culture, education of employees and human resources management. To check if the culture seems to be friendly and motivational to employees there was used a questionnaire among them. On the other hand, a few managers were interviewed -- if they are satisfied with the education level of their employees. The conclusions are summarized at the end.

Paper comprehensively summarizes the context and background of retail brokers on the Czech market and successfully leads through the various stages of setting corporate strategy on practical case, the company Directa Czech. The theoretical part provides basic information about the retail broker area, most traded instruments and describes differentiation between categories of retail brokers. In the practical part priority was given to situational analysis because it was necessary to establish a firm foothold for determining the appropriate corporate strategy. Chapter about analysis of the development potential properly extended and detailed knowledge of this situation analysis, which was used especially in determining the appropriate steps for implementation of the corporate strategy.

Climate change is an environmental issue that has actual or potential strategic impacts on many companies. The research problem emanates from the scientific work on climate change and the vast health effects that would pose as implications within the healthcare industry. The aim of the research was to explore the strategic response of private healthcare funders in South Africa to global climate change. By means of a case-study based research design, the stimuli for strategic response, risks and opportunities related to global climate change and strategy and an overall strategic organisational posture under the RDAP continuum scale framework had evolved. Evidence from the results and analysis brings light to the fact that global climate change as a strategic concern to private healthcare funders remains a point of scepticism. Although some of the organisations from the sample have considered climate change as a strategic concern, there are others that do not. The study showed that global climate change continues to remain an issue of complexity and uncertainty in the external business environment such that strategy formulation and implementation and acting proactively on the matter remains complicated. Copyright / Dissertation (MBA)--University of Pretoria, 2010. / Gordon Institute of Business Science (GIBS) / unrestricted