Strategic management is an important and defining process in the life of an organization that wants to differentiate itself. However, there are several issues in an organization that make it difficult to implement this strategic management. Many of these difficulties are directly linked to an organization's cultural factors, which are often not noticed by leaders, or are not taken into sufficient consideration when implementing the strategy.
It's not just the creation of a strategy that means it will be carried out, there are a series of actions that are necessary to get the strategy off the ground. The website administraçãoegestão.com.br provides us with a list of 8 possible problems in implementing strategic management in organizations:
- People don't understand what needs to be done
- Resistance to change
- Limitations of existing systems
- Lack of management commitment
- Lack of management training
- Unrealistic expectations
- Lack of cooperation between teams
- Schedules with very demanding and unfeasible milestones
Many of the problems presented stem from organizational culture. Not understanding what needs to be done, for example, is linked to how communication takes place within the organization, the use of language, channels, among others. Resistance to change is also linked to the culture and behaviour of a group in the organization.
Culture is a social inheritance and is formed from a set of elements such as: local history, morals, behavior, knowledge, ideas, symbols and social practices that are passed down from generation to generation in a given place. A culture is what distinguishes one people from another, because for each group there is a considerable variety of elements that define them as unique. Therefore, a way of communicating can be an important behavioral element of a culture.
Organizational culture is the application of the concept of culture in the organizational context. Just as a country or region has its unique characteristics that define its local culture, every organization has elements in its culture that differentiate it from other organizations and that are part of its history.
A process of change, the implementation of something new, all of this has a tendency to be accompanied by either the difficulty of acceptance by the people and the environment in which you find yourself, or on the contrary, the ease of change if the organization has a culture that values change. All of this can be better dealt with if the culture of the place where new changes are being implemented is more deeply understood.
While culture is the definition of elements that characterize a certain group, it is also not a closed definition, and this is an important issue because a culture is dynamic, it changes over time and is influenced by situations that happen every day. If an organization discovers today that its environment is more resistant to change, in the future it can create strategies and plan ways to change this behavior within the organization. In this case, anything is possible if it is done well. A company can use its culture to realize its visions and adjust ideas in order to influence behaviour and ideas within the organization.
The Stratec interviewed Dalila Saurine, administrator and current manager of the Centre for Standardization and Quality in Management at TJMG, to better understand how this process takes place within a public body. She explains that culture determines the way and speed with which strategic management can be implemented in the institution, highlighting the importance that organizational culture has for the effectiveness of strategic management, and that in public bodies this process can be slower due to bureaucracy and other restrictions unique to these bodies. Check out the full interview at the end of the article.
The cultural factor can be a difficulty or a great ally when it comes to implementing strategic management in an organization. As long as you know and understand the culture of that environment, you can identify in advance how to break down the barriers created by the culture and also how to use its strengths to enhance this process. Organizations today must be aware of this point in particular; it is the first step towards a more effective implementation of strategy in organizations.
Source:
http://www.administracaoegestao.com.br/planejamento-estrategico/dificuldades-na-implementacao-da-estrategia/
http://pt.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cultura
Interview with Dalila Saurine:
- How important is organizational culture for the implementation of strategic management?
The culture of the organization, or the set of norms, values, history, organizational structure, type of people, work processes, communication and exercise of authority, has a fundamental influence on the implementation of strategic management. Culture determines the form and speed with which strategic management can be implemented in the institution. - What are the main cultural difficulties that hinder the smooth implementation of strategic management?
A complex organizational structure makes communication and the adoption of changes very difficult. Other challenges are the centralization of the decision-making process and administrative discontinuity, which imposes less speed on changes and slows down the flow of management. Finally, the managers or those responsible for the areas have little knowledge of management methodologies and this makes it difficult to accept and implement strategic management. - What steps do you take to overcome this challenge? What do leaders do?
Firstly, the adoption of a medium-term strategic plan (five years, for example) and its approval by senior management, also involving future managers in this process, if possible. In addition, the use of communication to define strategies and multiply them makes it easier for everyone to get involved. - For the public sector, why is it sometimes more difficult than for the private sector? What are the cultural characteristics that differentiate the public sector from the private sector?
In addition to the characteristics already mentioned, in the public sector bureaucracy and less mobility of people make the implementation of strategic management more difficult. The public sector also has to deal with budgetary and financial restrictions (Fiscal Responsibility Law, for example) which, in some cases, can significantly interfere with the outcome of actions related to strategic management. strategic management.
Dalila Saurine is an administrator who works as a judicial technician and administrator at the TJMG. She currently manages the Centre for Standardization and Quality in Management, an area belonging to the Executive Secretariat for Planning and Quality in Institutional Management. She was also appointed to the CNJ as the institution's strategic planning advisor.
The Court of Justice is the highest body of the Minas Gerais Judiciary, with administrative and financial autonomy, headquarters in the capital and jurisdiction throughout the state. Its core activity is the provision of justice, which involves both the decisions of magistrates - judges and justices - and the procedures necessary for the processing of legal proceedings and the resolution of conflicts of interest. http://www.tjmg.jus.br/portal/
