M.Com. (Business Management) / The objective of this dissertation is to provide a general, functional and business oriented model for strategic alignment. The development, measurement and implementation of strategic alignment play a major part during the positioning of an organisation in order to obtain and maintain a competitive advantage. Business conditions (internal and external) are now changing and creating new competitive situations due to factors such as (Beer, Eisenstat & Spector, 1990a:158): • Increased internationalisation of the entire value chain from vendors and producers to customers; • the extended need to measure strategic positioning and alignment; • increased customer demands for quality, lead times and delivery performance; • the need to invest in technology and competence development in respect of both products and processes. Successful organisations are those that evolve rapidly and effectively. Yet innovative organisations can not evolve in a vacuum. They must attract resources of all sorts, drawing in capital, partners, suppliers, and customers to create cooperative networks. The motivation of this study lies first of all in the economic and strategic importance of strategic alignment (internal and external) for an organisation. Secondly, it lies in the importance of network creation, not only for network competition but also to enhance total quality management (TQM), customer satisfaction and continuous organisational improvement. There has been much speculation about such networks, under the rubrics of strategic alliances, virtual organisations, and the like. But these frameworks provide little systematic assistance to organisations and managers that seek to understand the underlying strategic logic of change.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:netd.ac.za/oai:union.ndltd.org:uj/uj:10991 |
| Date | 08 May 2014 |
| Creators | Van der Westhuizen, Cornelius J. |
| Source Sets | South African National ETD Portal |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
| Rights | University of Johannesburg |
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