Supporting Strategy

Frances O'Brien is an Associate Professor at Warwick Business School. her research interests include the development and use of approaches to support strategy development, in particular scenario planning and visioning methodologies, and the practice of combining OR & strategy tools by management teams. She holds a BSc (Joint Honours) in Mathematics and Classical Studies from Surrey University and an MSc in Operational research from Southampton University. She previously worked for the Operational research Group of Ford of Europe as a consultant providing modeling support on simulation, manpower planning and allocation studies. She is an active member of the UK Operational research Society for which she chairs the OR and Strategy Special Interest Group. Robert Dyson is Professor of Operational research at Warwick business School. He has served as Dean of the Business School and Pro-Vice- Chancellor of the University of Warwick. He has also been Chair of the Committee of Professors of Operational research and President of the Operational Research Society. He researches and publishes in data envelopment analysis, performance measurement and OR and strategy, and is an Editor of the European Journal of Operational research. Prior to joining Warwick he worked for Pilkington plc.

• Preface ix About the Contributors xiPart I Introduction 1Chapter 1 The Strategic Development Process 3Robert G. Dyson, Jim Bryant, John Morecroft and Frances O’BrienPart II Setting Direction 25Chapter 2 Visioning: A Process for Strategic Development 27Maureen Meadows and Frances O’BrienChapter 3 Achieving Strategy Coherence 55Jim Bryant and Nigel HowardChapter 4 Problem Structuring and the Building and Negotiation of Strategic Agendas 87Alberto Franco, Jim Bryant and Giles HindlePart III Creating Strategic Initiatives 115Chapter 5 Strategy Creation – The Resource-Based View 117Abhijit MandalChapter 6 Methods for Creating Strategic Initiatives 137Robert G. DysonPart IV Rehearsing Strategy 155Chapter 7 System Dynamics Modelling for Strategic Development 157Martin Kunc and John MorecroftChapter 8 The Impact of Organisational Complexity in the Strategy Development Process 191Adrián A. Caldart and Fernando S. OliveiraChapter 9 Creating and Using Scenarios – Exploring Alternative Possible Futures and their Impact on Strategic Decisions 211Frances O’Brien, Maureen Meadows and Martin MurtlandPart V Evaluating Performance 249Chapter 10 Decision and Risk Analysis for the Evaluation of Strategic Options 251Gilberto Montibeller and Alberto FrancoChapter 11 Performance Measurement 285Efstathios Tapinos and Robert G. DysonChapter 12 A Financial Perspective on Strategic Investments 313Robert H. BerryChapter 13 Flexibility, Robustness and Real Options 343Robert G. Dyson and Fernando S. OliveiraPart VI Combining Approaches to Support Strategic Development 367Chapter 14 Gone Fishing: A Case Study 369Jim Bryant, Maureen Meadows, John Morecroft and Frances O’BrienAuthor Index 395Subject Index 401