STR 581 Wk 1 – Practice: Knowledge Check

Types of actions and approaches that often characterize a company’s strategy do not include actions to

Multiple Choice

• strengthen market standing and competitiveness by acquiring or merging with other companies.
• enter new product or geographic markets or to exit existing ones.
• upgrade, build, or acquire competitively important resources and capabilities.
• capture emerging market opportunities and defend against external threats to the company’s business prospects.
• improve ethical standards, ensure employees’ commitments, and continuously develop new talents.

A company’s strategy

Multiple Choice

• is mostly proactive and consists of strategy elements that are both planned and realized as planned.
• tends to be a combination of both proactive and reactive elements, with certain elements being abandoned because they have become obsolete or ineffective.
• consists of initial and developing approaches aiming to ensure long-term growth.
• is mainly affected by a reactive approach because uncertainty is high.
• generally consists of new strategy elements and strategic moves that emerge as changing conditions warrant.

Gerard’s Paella, a tapas bar and paella restaurant, offers healthy, sustainably sourced, as well as veggie and vegan, cuisine at higher prices than its competitors in the market and has a drive-through and indoor seating casual dining operation. What strategy is Gerard’s Paella using to gain competitive advantage?

Multiple Choice

• a focused low-cost strategy
• a low-cost provider strategy
• a focused differentiation strategy
• a broad differentiation strategy
• a best-cost provider strategy

Sustainability does not

Multiple Choice

• concern a firm’s relationship to the environment and its use of natural resources.
• serve to meet the needs of the present without compromising the world’s ability to meet future needs.
• consist of deliberate actions to protect the environment, provide for the longevity of natural resources, maintain ecological support systems for future generations, and guard against ultimate endangerment of the planet.
• have a close association with corporate social responsibility.
• require that shareholders be prepared to accept lower returns to support environmental protection.

Socially responsible strategies that create value for customers and lower costs

Multiple Choice

• can improve profits and shareholder value at the same time that they address other stakeholder concerns.
• are invariably difficult to achieve.
• are usually linked to a company’s production activities.
• support the moral case for socially responsible business practices.
• rarely benefit shareholders.

Which company in the list below is not noted as an example of firms that pursue sustainability strategies?

Multiple Choice

• Johnson & Johnson
• Keurig Green Mountain
• Staples
• Unilever
• Wells Fargo Bank

A commonly used and easily understood strategic objective is

Multiple Choice

• attaining an X percent increase in annual revenues.
• winning X percent of market share.
• increasing a company’s shareholder value—in the form of an upward-trending stock price.
• paying out an annual dividend increase of X percent.
• cutting costs to assure profit margins remain at or better than X percent.

Which are the primary components of a strategic plan?

Multiple Choice

• a vision of where it is headed, a set of core values, and a strategy to achieve it
• a set of performance targets, a balanced scorecard, and a strategy to implement both
• a strategy and management’s specific, detailed plans for implementing it
• a vision, a strategy, and a specific financial plan as to how to support the execution
• a vision of where it is headed, a set of performance targets, and a strategy to achieve them

An effectively worded strategic vision statement is?

Multiple Choice

• achievable, profitable, and ethical
• realistic, customer-focused, and market-driven
• balanced, responsible, and rational
• challenging, competitive, and “set in concrete”
• flexible, focused, and directional

An effectively worded mission statement does not

Multiple Choice

• describe the company’s current business and purpose: who we are, what we do, and why we are here.
• express that making a profit is the company’s true business purpose.
• specify the buyer needs that the company seeks to satisfy and the customer groups or markets it serves.
• identify the company’s products and/or services.
• specifically mention the enterprise’s present business and purpose.