Chapter 9 Quiz
Which statement below is FALSE? A. Mintzberg's notion of "crafting" strategies embodies the artistic model, which suggests that strategic decision making be based primarily on holistic thinking, intuition, and creativity. B. Proponents of the artistic view often consider strategic-planning exercises to be time poorly spent. C. Mintzberg refers to strategic planning as an "inevitable" process, whereas strategy scientists use the term "absolute" process. D. This textbook rejects the Mintzberg philosophy.
Mintzberg refers to strategic planning as an "inevitable" process, whereas strategy scientists use the term "absolute" process.
As described in Chapter 9, what is the first strategy-evaluation activity?
Review the underlying bases of strategy.
Which statement below is FALSE? A. Strategy evaluations should be simple but cumbersome and restrictive. B. Small companies do not need extnsive evaluative reporting systems. C. Complex strategy-evaluation systems often confuse people and accomplish little. D. No department should fail to cooperate with another in evaluating strategies. E. Managers in small companies often communicate daily with each other and their employees
Strategy evaluations should be simple but cumbersome and restrictive.
Which statement below is FALSE? A. Successful companies have a voracious hunger for facts. B. Successful companies maintain loose financial controls. C. The people at successful companies don't regard controls as an imposition of autocracy but as the benign checks and balances that allow them to be creative and free. D. Successful companies treat facts as friends and controls as liberating. E. Successful companies see information where others see only data.
Successful companies maintain loose financial controls.
The strategy-evaluation process includes three basic activities. Which activity(s) below is not one of the three?
Develop a clear vision and mission.
Which statement below is FALSE regarding the strategic-planning process?
Executives should keep assignments, team memberships, and meeting formats constant for a year.
Which publication annually publishes the "World's Most Admired Companies," which provides helpful strategy-evaluation information?
Fortune
When evaluating strategies, GAAP stands for what term?
Generally accepted accounting principles
When evaluating strategies, GAAS stands for what term?
Generally accepted auditing standards
______ is the characteristic of ensuring that long-term strategic objectives and plans are established and that the proper management structure is in place to achieve those objectives, while at the same time making sure that the structure functions to maintain the corporation's integrity, reputation, and responsibility to its various constituencies.
Goverance
When evaluating strategies, IFRS stands for what term?
International financial reporting standards
What is the second of the three strategy-evaluation activities?
Measure organizational performance.
Advantages of keeping the strategic-planning process secret include which statement below?
Participants in a visible strategy process become more attractive to rival firms, that may lure them away.
Four reasons to be completely open with the strategy process and resultant decisions are given in the chapter; these reasons include all of the following except which one?
Participation and openness lead to conciseness and accuracy.
_____ is the third strategy-evaluation activity.
Take corrective actions.
Which statement below is FALSE? A. The Chinese warrior Sun Tzu and military leaders today strive to keep strategies secret, because war is based on deception; but for business organizations, secrecy may not be best. B. There are good reasons to keep strategies hidden from all but top-level executives. C. Keeping strategies secret from employees and stakeholders at large could severely inhibit employee and stakeholder communication, understanding, and commitment; likewise, maintaining secrecy could mean forfeiting valuable input that employees and stakeholders could offer regarding the formulation or implementation of the strategy.. D. Strategists must decide what is best for their firms. E. There are no good reasons to keep the strategy process and strategies themselves visible and open rather than hidden and secret.
There are no good reasons to keep the strategy process and strategies themselves visible and open rather than hidden and secret.
Contingency plans should be established if _____.
a new technological advancement makes a new product obsolete sooner than expected
Developed in the early 1990s by Harvard Business School professors Robert Kaplan and David Norton and refined continually since then, the ______ is a strategy-evaluation and control technique.
balanced scorecard
The basic premise of ______ is that firms should establish objectives and evaluate strategies on criteria other than using only financial measures.
balanced scorecard
Linneman and Chandran report that contingency planning gives users like DuPont, Dow Chemical, Consolidated Foods, and Emerson Electric three major benefits. It enables _____.
rapid responses to change, prevents panic in crisis situations and make managers more adaptable
Does this textbook advocate a top-down or bottom-up approach to strategic planning?
Bottom-up
Which statement below is FALSE? A. Strategic management must not become ritualistic, stilted, orchestrated, or too formal, predictable, and rigid. B. Words supported by numbers, rather than numbers supported by words, should be the medium used to explain strategic issues and organizational responses. C. Strategic management should be a self-reflective learning process that familiarizes managers and employees in the organization with key strategic issues and feasible alternatives for resolving those issues. D. Numbers supported by words, rather than words supported by numbers, should be the medium used to explain strategic issues and organizational responses. E. R.T. Lenz says a guideline to follow in strategic planning is to welcome bad news and encourage devil's advocate thinking.
Numbers supported by words, rather than words supported by numbers, should be the medium used to explain strategic issues and organizational responses.
Which statement below is FALSE? A. Firms need to systematically assess their external and internal environments, conduct research, carefully evaluate the pros and cons of various alternatives, perform analyses, and then decide on a particular course of action. B. Mintzberg's notion of "crafting" strategies embodies the artistic model, which suggests that strategic decision making be based primarily on holistic thinking, intuition, creativity, and imagination. C. This textbook is consistent with most of the strategy literature in advocating that strategic management be viewed more as a science than an art. D. The Mintzberg strategic-planning approach insists on informality, whereas strategy scientists (and this text) insist on more formality. E. This textbook is framed primarily on the fact that strategic planning is an art rather than a science.
The Mintzberg strategic-planning approach insists on informality, whereas strategy scientists (and this text) insist on more formality.