Untitled

oader macroenvironment �demographic, economic,
sociocultural, technological, ecological and
political/legal) influence the application of these
principles at any point in time.
Strategic marketing plans connect the organisation's
present competitive position to its desired
future state in a deliberate, planned execution of a
coordinated set of specific steps. It recognises the
organisation's unique competitive advantages and
resources, and deploys them in a way which
ensures that it can sustain these competitive
advantages over the long term. In short, it deals
with where, how and when the business is to
compete. Strategic marketing has become vital in
today's aggressive, rapidly changing business environment,
such as in tourism, where consumer
tastes are dynamic, competitors are quick to
respond to market opportunities and the array of
different needs evident in a more heterogeneous
market, and environmental changes seem to be
occurring more frequently.
See also: corporate strategy
Further reading
Cravens, D.W. �1987) Strategic Marketing, Chicago:
Irwin.
Day, G.S. �1984) Strategic Market Planning:The Pursuit
of Competitive Advantage, St Paul, MN: West
Publishing Company.
Luck, D.J., Ferrell, O.C. and Lucas, G.H., Jr �1989)
Marketing Strategy and Plans, Engelwood Cliffs, NJ:
Prentice-Hall.
strategic planning
GEOFFREY I. CROUCH, AUSTRALIA
As the tourism market becomes saturated and firms
attempt to adapt and succeed in an increasingly
dynamic and turbulent competitive environment,
there is an increased emphasis among managers on
the use of strategic planning and decision making.
To some scholars and practitioners, the term
strategic planning connotes a process that represents
part of strategic management. The latter
refers to the broad overall process, while strategic
strategic planning 561
planning involves the formulation phase of total
management activities.
Strategic planning becomes one of top management's
major tools for coping with changes in the
environment, to gain a competitive advantage
and to achieve long-term survival and
success. Through this process, an organisation
determines its objectives, generates and evaluates
alternative strategies, develops and maintains an
optimal `fit' or `co-alignment' between the deployment
of an organisation's resources and structure
and the opportunities in its changing environment,
and monitors the results of the implemented plan.
The nature of strategic planning is for the long
term, usually three to five years. It is not a static
process; it evolves as the size and structure of the
company changes. Thus, to achieve the ultimate
goal of a firm, the devised strategic plan should be
continuously evaluated and revised as it is carried
out.
The concept of strategy can be traced back to
the Old Testament and the Art of War by the
Chinese strategist Sun Tzu, which is still widely
read, especially by military personnel. The adoption
of the concept by the business community
came after the Second World War. The `rise' of
strategy can be traced to the 1960s, when scholars
at the Harvard Business School articulated the
concept of strategy as a tool to link together the
functions of a business and to assess a company's
strengths and weaknesses against competitors.
Strategic planning came to prominence and
became a feature not only of the corporate
organisation but also of the business school
curriculum.
However, in the early 1980s, facing global
competition, companies turned away from strategic
planning and began to focus on operational
improvement and total quality management. By
the late 1980s, corporate America began massive
downsizing and re-engineering of operations to
increase efficiency and productivity. In the 1990s,
after years of downsizing, companies began to
focus on how to grow. This time strategic planning
came back, but with a difference. It is no longer
perceived to be an abstract, top-down approach
with corporate-level top management initiating the
strategy formulation process by calling upon
divisions and functional units to formulate their