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Strategy

 defines the future direction and actions of an organisation or part of an organisa-

tion. Johnson and Scholes (2006) define corporate strategy as:

the direction and scope of an organization over the  long-  term: which achieves advantage 

for the organization through its configuration of resources within a changing environment 

to meet the needs of markets and to fulfil stakeholder expectations.

Lynch (2000) describes strategy as an organisation’s sense of purpose. However, he notes 

that purpose alone is not strategy; plans or actions are also needed.

Digital business strategies share much in common with corporate, business and market-

ing strategies. These quotes summarising the essence of strategy could equally apply to each 

strategy:

● 

‘Is based on current performance in the marketplace.’

● 

‘Defines how we will meet our objectives.’

● 

‘Sets allocation of resources to meet goals.’

● 

‘Selects preferred strategic options to compete within a market.’

● 

‘Provides a  long-  term plan for the development of the organisation.’

● 

‘Identifies competitive advantage through developing an appropriate positioning relative 

to competitors defining a value proposition delivered to customer segments.’

Johnson and Scholes (2006) note that organisations have different levels of strategy, par-

ticularly for larger or global organisations. These are summarised within Figure 5.1. They 

identify corporate strategy which is concerned with the overall purpose and scope of the 

organisation, business unit strategy which defines how to compete successfully in a partic-

ular market and operational strategies which are concerned with achieving corporate and 

 business unit  strategies. Additionally, functional strategies describe how the corporate and 

business unit strategies will be operationalised in different functional areas or business 

processes. Functional or process strategies refer to marketing, supply chain management, 

human resources, finance and information systems strategies.

What is digital business strategy?

Strategy

Definition of the future 

direction and actions of 

a company defined as 

approaches to achieve 

specific objectives.

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Chapter 5  Digital business strategy

Figure 5.1

Different forms of organisational strategy

Business unit

strategies

Functional

strategies

Regional

strategies

Corporate

strategy

Typical digital business

planning

Where does