What is the relationship between Strategy, implementation and organisational structure?
A company’s strategy describes how its targets are to be met. For example, at NewsUK, The Times aims to reach 1m digital subscriptions. Its strategy is to develop premium products that match the brand’s market positioning to attract more of its target customers.
Strategy is often abstract and does not prescribe the detailed steps the business can follow to reach its targets. Implementation is vital to strategy but does not form part of the strategy. If in doubt, ask the following questions, ‘Are we doing the right thing?’ and ‘Are we doing it right?‘. The former is about strategic choices, and the latter is about implementation matters.
The organisational structure must be designed to align with the strategy implementation needs, not vice versa. Strategy determines if a business function will likely succeed in a competitive environment and whether it will get the funding. My old department at News UK was disbanded for this very reason. The new CTO’s strategy differed from the old one - build vs. buy, innovation vs. maintaining status quo, and the initiative we were working on was not where the new plan wanted to play.