Description
MGT/498
Read the Strategic Management Project Background document.
Review the resources listed at the end of this assignment, along with the terms and concepts discussed this week, to prepare for this assignment:
Strategic management
Competitive advantage
Strategic plan
Mission statement
Vision statement
Core values statement
AFI
Create an APA formatted Microsoft® Word document and title it “Strategic Management Research Journal Part 1.”
Write a 500- to 700-word response to the following prompts as your journal entry:
Justify the guiding principles required for preparing effective statements that describe the mission, vision, and the core values of an organization as covered in the assigned reading. Please note that guiding principles in this instance are the guidelines, (not moral principles) that specify the proper content of mission, vision, and values statements discussed in your text. Your text is fairly general, so you may wish to research this further. You are being asked to support the guidelines and the statements’ strategic importance.
Compare whether Caterpillar Inc.’s mission, vision, and core values conform to the guiding principles in the text and support organizational strategic planning principles as justified in prompt #1. Refer to the Caterpillar Inc. website listed in the Resources section below or access the website directly.
Assess what Caterpillar Inc.’s current competitive advantages and disadvantages are by considering their business partners, allies, and general operations. Research the assignment resources listed below. Based on your research, evaluate Caterpillar’s current competitive advantages and disadvantages.MGT/498 v6
Strategic Management Project
Background
Overview
The intention of the Strategic Management Project is to provide you practical experience with the
elements of strategic management. The project is spread across the 5-week period of the course. Weeks
1-4 provide an opportunity to put key terms into practice by appraising the strategic planning elements of
Caterpillar Inc. through documentation in the Strategic Management Research Journal. The Week 5
concluding assignment showcases your understanding of strategic management and improvement in the
formulation of a presentation to Caterpillar Inc.’s leadership team.
For purposes of the Strategic Management Project, you will operate as if you are a new hire at the
Caterpillar Inc. headquarters in the role of Assistant Strategic Development Analyst.
Assistant Strategic Development Analyst Job Description
•
•
•
Maintain a Strategic Management Research Journal in which you:
o Appraise Caterpillar Inc.’s corporate data, competitors, and associated business information.
o Document background information to include previous and current strategic management of
Caterpillar Inc.
Assess the strengths and weaknesses of strategic management of Caterpillar Inc., based on your
analyses, and provide information in a presentation to Caterpillar Inc. leadership.
Recommend strategic management actions to ensure future success in a presentation to Caterpillar
Inc.’s leadership team.
About Caterpillar Inc.
The following is derived from the Caterpillar Inc. website:
Caterpillar Inc. is a leading manufacturer of construction and mining equipment, diesel and
natural gas engines, industrial gas turbines, and diesel-electric locomotives. Caterpillar’s
enterprise strategy focuses on solutions to help customers build a better world and allows the
company to deliver profitable growth for their shareholders. The company’s corporate governance
program ensures they serve the interests of stockholders and other stakeholders with the highest
standards of responsibility, integrity, and compliance with all laws. Caterpillar’s global presence,
product breadth, and financial strength enables the company to be competitive in today’s global
marketplaces.
Copyright 2020 by University of Phoenix. All rights reserved.
1. Read the Strategic Management Project Background document.
Review the resources listed at the end of this assignment, along with the terms and concepts
discussed this week, to prepare for this assignment:
o Strategic management
o Competitive advantage
o Strategic plan
o Mission statement
o Vision statement
o Core values statement
o AFI
Create a Microsoft® Word document and title it “Strategic Management Research Journal Part
1.”
What is a journal format?
A journal is a simple double-spaced document (it does not have to follow APA rules) but I
highly suggest you include a reference page (which you will need for the Week 5
presentation). Please include your name, and the date. A simple header should be placed
for each of the numbered prompts from the list below. As an example, the first prompt
might be titled, “Justify Guiding Principles” or it might be shortened to just prompt “1”.
To earn the most points, be sure you fully answer each of the prompt as it is written.
Write a 500- to 700-word response to the following prompts as your journal entry:
o Justify the guiding principles required for preparing effective statements that describe
the mission, vision, and the core values of an organization as covered in the assigned
reading.
o Compare whether Caterpillar Inc.’s mission, vision, and core values conform to the
guiding principles in the text and support organizational strategic planning principles as
justified in prompt #1. Refer to the Caterpillar Inc. website listed in the Resources
section below.
o Assess what Caterpillar Inc.’s current competitive advantages and disadvantages are by
considering their business partners, allies, and general operations. Research the
assignment resources listed below. Based on your research, evaluate Caterpillar’s
current competitive advantages and disadvantages.
Note: You will use information from this entry in your Strategic Management Research Project
Presentation due in Week 5.
A SafeAssign originality report will automatically be generated on your submission. Only
those SafeAssign originality reports returning a “green” or an “orange” symbol will be
accepted. Those receiving a “red” symbol must be rewritten and resubmitted until an
acceptable symbol is received.
Submit your assignment.
Resources
o Strategic Management Project Background
o Caterpillar Inc. website
o Research Caterpillar’s Annual Report
o
o
o
o
Research CATERPILLAR public information, such as news releases, financial reports,
and marketing analyses.
Center for Writing Excellence
Reference and Citation Generator
Grammar Assistance
Copyright 2020 by University of Phoenix. All rights reserved.
Submission Content
Submission Content
Strategic Management Research Journal, Part 1
The Analysis, Formulation, and Implementation or (AFI) strategy framework helps organizations
identify the steps to create a strategic management plan. These tasks support each other and outline
specific steps to integrate the planning process in order to achieve superior performance and
competitive advantage. The first step of the framework is analyze. Within this step organizations will
first identify how they develop strategy. External analysis will take place after that to identify what
external forces will influence the organizations strategy. Following that organizations must account for
what resources and capabilities they can leverage in order to formulate the strategic management plan.
This is known as internal analysis. Using the information from the external and internal analysis
organizations will determine how to gain competitive advantage. The formulation stage of the
framework guides organizations to create business, corporate, and global strategies to meet the goals
set forward in the competitive advantage portion of the analysis phase. All three portions of this
framework may be independent but they all work together to facilitate strategic management planning.
Organizations must clearly define the vision, mission and core values in order to provide guidance to
every employee at every level. The vision statement should always be the starting point as it defines
what the organization wants to achieve in the end state. Vision statements can either be direct to what
the organization hopes to achieve or more aspirational and visionary. Either way the vision statement
should be meaningful and help employees know why their contribution is impactful. The mission
statement defines how an organization will achieve the vision. An effective mission statement should
include strategic commitments that drive action. The core values statement as defined by (Rothaermel,
2018) is “a statement of principles to guide an organization as it works to achieve its vision and fulfil its
mission, for both internal conduct and external interactions; it often includes explicit ethical
considerations”. In order for this statement to be effective it must consider the organizational vision and
mission as well as the environment in which the organization operates. The mission statement of
Caterpillar Inc. is to provide the best value to customers, grow a profitable business, develop and reward
people, and encourage social responsibility. This mission statement does not conform to the description
of a mission statement from the text (Rothaermel, 2018). The text states that a mission statement should
define how an organization intends to accomplish its vision. In this case the mission statement above
seems more geared towards what goals Caterpillar Inc. hopes to achieve and is therefore more of a
vision statement. The second half of the mission statement addresses developing and rewarding people
as well as encouraging social responsibility which more closely align with the idea of how to achieve the
corporate vision. Researching Caterpillar’s vision statement provided some clarity however. The vision
statement of be the global leader in customer value is far more visionary than that of the mission
statement. With both products I would say that the mission statement does conform to the text
description, but alone I would not. Research into publicly available information shows that Caterpillar
has in fact aligned with their vision and mission statements. The first part of the Caterpillar mission
statement is to grow a profitable business. In 2018 CAT reported 54.7 billion in sales and revenues. This
is up 9 billion from the 2017 report. This trend shows profit growth from year to year in line with the
mission statement. It could be assumed that this growth also supports the statement of providing the
best value to customers. The statement of developing and rewarding people is supported by the 104,000
full time employees that Caterpillar employs. Finally the last section of the mission statement addresses
how the company intends to support and encourage social responsibility. In 2018 Caterpillar
Foundation invested 27 million into global communities. In addition to this Caterpillar is introducing
new and more efficient construction equipment in order to remain at the forefront of social
responsibility in a market segment that is often seen as environmentally unfriendly. The newest
offerings from Caterpillar are not only 35% more efficient in fuel usage, but also feature increased
operating efficiencies as well as lower maintenance costs. These efforts show that the entire
organization is following the vision and mission statements with great success.
Rothaermel, F. T. (2018). Strategic management: Concepts (4th ed.). New York, NY: McGraw-Hill.
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