Formulating Business Strategy

In essence, a business strategy serves as the organization's master plan. A company's management develops and implements this plan to achieve its strategic goals. A business strategy is a long-term framework that depicts the anticipated strategic trajectory for an organization (What is a business strategy? and how to develop one!. 2023). A synopsis of the tactical and strategic decisions that an organization must undertake to achieve its overarching objectives will be included in this long-term strategy. This firm strategy will then function as the primary management framework. Management needs to embrace this structure from the moment it is established. It facilitates communication across the many divisions of a company and guarantees that every departmental decision is in line with the organization's overarching goals. This lessens the likelihood of teams pulling in opposing directions or operating in silos. I believe that creating a business strategy needs carrying out of situation analysis. The external and internal environments that affect a business's performance is usually examined in a situational analysis. The economy, rivals, laws & regulations, and government policies are examples of external forces (Brex., n.d.-a). Internal elements that impact a business include cash management, personnel, company culture, and corporate resources. With this in mind, rich picture was my best choice while developing business strategy ideas for PK Sports Horse’s report. Although, I also considered Porters’ Five Forces in my report, I believe that to present a comprehensive visual summary of a business scenario in developing business strategy, the rich picture technique should be employed. Thus, my essay aims to examine the advantages of rich picture as an approach for formulating business strategy compared to Porters’ Five Forces. 

According to Rich picture. MSP Guide (2022), rich pictures are useful tools when examining, identifying, and explaining a situation; they are frequently used in conjunction with diagrams to help the viewer form an internal model. This model acts as a conversation starter, encouraging a thorough understanding of the problem that is driven by consensus. It is made up of words, pictures, icons, and symbols that are all used to depict the situation graphically (Rich picture. MSP Guide, 2022). The reason it's called a rich image is that it captures the depth and richness of a given circumstance.  From the rich picture, I understood the complexity of an entire situation at PKSH. The idea behind a rich picture is that "a picture speaks a thousand words." It also expands on the idea that perceptions and symbols are the primary means by which our intuitive consciousness communicates, as opposed to spoken words. Drawings have the ability to capture and elicit insights into a situation. We can see links and linkages in a rich image that we might otherwise overlook while carrying out situation analysis. Finding one or more themes that participants might like to investigate and address further is helpful. For this reason, rich images are always employed during the pre-analysis stage when coming up with business strategy. 

Employing rich picture in developing up business strategies help reveal interactions and issues unique to the company that might not be shown by other analytic techniques. This tool is especially helpful for recording the human aspects of the company, such as the culture of the organization, which may include people's beliefs and interactions between them (Rich picture analysis. CONTENTdm., n.d.-a). For instance, through a rich picture, I observed that Pippa's conventional, passion-driven approach is in contrast to Chris's technology-driven, profit-driven ideas. Notably, this conflict may impair decision-making and the organization's ability to adapt to changing market conditions. As such, when starting a project, rich visuals are an excellent approach to get as much information down on paper as possible in a style that makes sense to you. Then, as the project develops, it may be expanded upon and reviewed again to make sure you have taken everything into account. 

Rich picture facilitates stakeholder cooperation and communication. Rich Pictures support a more inclusive and collaborative approach to strategy building than the likes of Porter's Five Forces, which takes a stricter and data-centric approach. Porter's Five Forces technique is used to identify and analyze five competitive forces that have an impact on every sector. Several factors impact a business's profitability, including the quantity and quality of a company's competitors in the market, potential new entrants, suppliers, customers, and substitute products (Team, n.d). The Five Forces model is a commonly employed tool for determining the composition of an industry and developing business strategies within it. Porter's framework facilitates the understanding of industrial competitiveness in any given economic sector, which in turn promotes the long-term profitability of a corporation. 

Nonetheless, despite Porter’s Five Forces ability to capture the external forces influencing a company, businesses can obtain a range of viewpoints and insights by incorporating several stakeholders, such as staff members, clients, vendors, and local communities, in the creation and interpretation of Rich Pictures. Rich picture’s cooperative approach guarantees improved buy-in and alignment within the company in addition to aiding in the identification of viable strategic solutions (Rich picture analysis. CONTENTdm., n.d.-a). By promoting a common knowledge of the intricacies and interdependencies among the players in the business ecosystem, it makes plan implementation more efficient and harmonious. The inclusive nature of rich picture recognizes opportunities and challenges that may not be apparent through a structured framework. A rich picture, for instance, might show how customer behavior is impacted by societal trends, technical developments, and legislative changes. This behavior then affects market dynamics, which in turn determines a company's strategy. This thorough understanding supports the creation of flexible strategies that take a variety of factors into account, enhancing long-term competitiveness and sustainability. 

On the other hand, Porter's framework, because of its structure, offers a methodical study that makes competitive dynamics within a sector easier to understand and more narrowly focused (Team, n.d). In some circumstances, this specificity may be advantageous, particularly for organizations that need a succinct assessment of current risks and opportunities as compared to rich pictures. Furthermore, while rich picture may range greatly in their style and interpretation, creating potential ambiguity or subjective biases, Porter's Five Forces offer a consistent approach that can be easier to understand and implement across diverse industries. 

Notably, in my view, rich pictures offer a more inclusive and comprehensive approach to creation of business strategy, whereas Porter's Five Forces provide an organized analysis vital in understanding competitive dynamics within industries. With rich picture, stakeholders understand each other better and facilitate more flexible and cooperative strategic decision-making processes by capturing the complexity and interconnectedness of various aspects driving corporate environments. By merging the strengths of both strategies utilizing rich pictures' complete visualization and Porter's framework's structured analysis businesses may gain a more comprehensive perspective that will increase their resilience and strategic agility in fast-paced marketplaces. 

Reference 

bywageningenportals, P. (2022, March 18). Rich picture. MSP Guide. https://mspguide.org/2022/03/18/rich-picture/#:~:text=A%20rich%20picture%20is%20a,to%20illustrate%20graphically%20the%20situation. How to perform a situation analysis for strategic planning. 

Brex. (n.d.-a). https://www.brex.com/journal/situation-analysis#:~:text=A%20situational%20analysis%20should%20examine,factors%20that%20affect%20a%20business. Rich picture analysis. 

CONTENTdm. (n.d.-a). https://ebrary.ifpri.org/digital/collection/p15738coll19/id/32#:~:text=A%20rich%20picture%20helps%20us,and%20symbols%20than%20in%20words. 

Team, T. I. (n.d.-a). Porter’s five forces explained and how to use the model. Investopedia. https://www.investopedia.com/terms/p/porter.asp What is a business strategy? and how to develop one!. 

IMD business school for management and leadership courses. (2023, January 27). https://www.imd.org/reflections/business-strategy/