Unit 8: Personal Strategic Plan

Chapter 3

Strategy and Your Career

The competitive advantage pyramid provides a way for you to quickly document and understand a company’s sources of competitive advantage, and it allows you to make some judgment about how durable and sustainable that advantage might be. As you approach decisions about where to work, you would be wise to invest the time and effort into creating a pyramid for each company you might like to work for. If you use the rigorous research methods described earlier in the chapter, you should be able to create an accurate and useful picture of the company. If you can do interviews or site visits, you may be able to create personal relationships that will give you good information and some positive recommenders within the company. The pyramid can help you prepare for interviews as well, as you’ll be able to couch your answers in terms the company will value, and the pyramid tells you where to focus your research so you learn more about the company.

The real value of the competitive advantage pyramid model in your job search, however, comes when you create one for yourself, or You, Inc. There is an end-of-chapter exercise that describes how you can create a personal pyramid. Take the time to collect data on your own activities, strengths, and weaknesses. You may get some uncomfortable feedback, but it will help you identify where you can add value. Catalog your resources and capabilities and think deeply about your core values and priorities. This deep level of the pyramid should help you clarify what you care about most, in your work and throughout your career.

With a thoughtful personal pyramid, you can compare yours with those of target companies. You can identify areas, and jobs, where you may be able to create value for a company, and see where you can add to their resource base as well as grow your own. Finally, and most importantly, you can make sure that potential employers share your priorities and align with your values. These pyramids, both company and personal, can help you make better choices about where to work.

Chapter 5

Strategy in Your Career: What Is Your Unique Value?

As you contemplate what career path is best for you, ask yourself: What is my unique value? Hopefully it’s clear that you don’t want to be a cost leader—you don’t want to convince a business to hire you because you will work for less money than anyone else. You want to be a differentiator. So what differentiates you? What skills (capabilities) do you have (or can you develop) that will convince a company that you are the best person for the job? Of course, the first step is to see if there is a fit between your skills and a particular career. For example, if you want to get a job in management consulting, with a focus in strategy, you will need to have strong critical thinking skills and be good at case analysis and structured problem solving. Most management consulting firms ask job candidates to solve a business problem during the interview. Candidates who perform well on case interviews typically do a lot of practice solving business problems before the interview. Moreover, junior consultants are asked to do a lot of data analysis. As a result, job applicants that are experts at Excel and other data analysis software programs like Tableau, R, Stata, or Sequel can use those capabilities as a differentiator in an interview. In addition, management consultants must interact with clients and give presentations—so interpersonal and linguistic skills are also important for success. By understanding the skills that are important for success in a particular career (this is your choice of “where to compete” for a job), you can determine whether your skill set will allow you to differentiate yourself. Some business careers (such as in Accounting and Finance) require you to be organized, good with numbers, and skilled at paying attention to detail. Other business careers (for example, in advertising, marketing, or product development) require that you have creative ideas and a flair for experimenting and trying new things. Still others (for example, sales) place a premium on interpersonal skills, extraversion, empathy, and persistence. If you apply the strategy principles you are learning in this book to your career, you are more likely to secure a job in a career that is a good fit for you.

Chapter 9

Strategy in Your Career

Why should you develop a deep understanding of international strategy? What good might it do you in your career? Some points to consider:

1. Companies are looking to hire and promote those with a global outlook.

2. It used to be that few employees spent time overseas. Now being transferred abroad for a period of time is much more likely to happen.

3. Understanding and supporting your company’s international goals will help you further develop your skills and may also generate a lot of goodwill from those above you if those goals have to include transferring some company operations overseas.

4. Companies are increasingly likely to have a diverse, international company culture. And if they don’t, they likely deal with suppliers and/or buyers who do. Companies these days are less hierarchical and accomplish a lot more with teams. If you have a global outlook and can work with people from different cultures, you will be more successful.

Chapter 12

Strategy and Your Career

How to Use Line of Sight to Advance Your Career

The main idea behind the line of sight concept is to create a strong link between an individual’s behavior and organizational goals. You can use line of sight to help you find and advance in your first posting, as well as to manage your long-term career. The line of sight principle, along with the Personal Diamond you developed in Chapter 3, can contribute to your personal competitive advantage.

As you look for jobs, and when you land that first position, make a line of sight map that connects you with the company. When most people begin working, they are overwhelmed with the day-to-day work they have been assigned to do. It’s easy to lose focus on which tasks are most important and focus on those tasks that are most urgent. A line of sight map will help you avoid this problem and be more productive. You should identify the company’s competitive advantages and key resources (a Company Diamond will prove quite helpful here). Then ask, what activities in my division (and eventually work group) contribute to that competitive advantage? Which activities build and strengthen resources and capabilities? The next step is easy: What activities should you focus on to contribute to competitive advantage, or to deepen the firm’s resources and capabilities?

Once you have identified the three or four critical activities, make sure these get attention every day you are at work. You will find yourself on the road to improved performance and you’ll be more valuable to your organization. They’ll pay you more, promote you, and work to keep you employed.

As you think about your career, use the Personal Diamond model to identify your personal competitive advantages, and the resources and capabilities you have, or ones you need to develop, in order to grow and sustain that competitive advantage. Make a list of the key personal activities you need to engage in to deepen your own resource-base. This will probably include your work tasks, but it may suggest other projects or jobs you ought to consider within your current organization to enhance your skills. This list will almost certainly include activities that occur outside of work, or outside your current organization. This may be spending time learning spreadsheet or data analytics skills, or it may involve volunteering at a local non-profit.

When you identify these activities, make a plan to engage in them every week, month, or quarter. These activities, when engaged in consistently over time, will strengthen your personal resources and capabilities in ways that are most important to you. As time passes, you’ll find yourself qualified for your “dream jobs,” the ones that allow you to leverage your strengths and grow.

Dyer, Jeffrey, H. et al. Strategic Management: Concepts and Cases. Available from: MBS Direct, (3rd Edition). Wiley Global Education US, 2019.