Gurus on business strategy

Strategy is a much used, but much misunderstood, concept in management.In this introductory chapter we therefore begin by using the gurus to answer the question ‘What is strategy?’ We then look at what the main gurus say on managing the external environment. Our next port of call is the notion of competitive advantage – what is this and why is this important?This is followed by a section on strategic decision-making.Another important area is implementation and change management. Many good strategies fail because they are badly implemented and not because they are not robust. In the final phase the monitoring of the strategy needs to be considered, through learning and control.