Deck 1: The Nature of Strategic Management

Question 1

Strategic thinking is:

A)An organizational-level activity.
B)An individual intellectual process.
C)An element of long-range planning.
D)Not needed to capitalize on change.

Answer 1

B

Question 2

Health policy

A)Is a very broad strategy.
B)Is the result of strategic thinking, strategic planning, and strategic management.
C)Determines the rules of the game that apply to all consumers and providers in the field.
D)Does not involve governmental activity.

Answer 2

C

Question 3

Define the major activities of strategic management.

Answer 3

The major activities of strategic management are: (1) strategic thinking, (2) strategic planning, and (3) strategic management. Strategic thinking is an individual intellectual process, a mindset, or method of intellectual analysis that asks people to position themselves as leaders and see the "big picture." Strategic planning is the periodic process of developing a set of steps for an organization to accomplish its mission and vision using strategic thinking. Strategic management is the actual work to accomplish specific objectives.

Question 4

Explain the role of leadership in strategy development.

Question 5

Why is managing strategic momentum important?

Question 6

Describe strategic management in the health care industry.

Question 7

An organization may create a new, unintended strategy by:

A)Applying effective leadership.
B)Rethinking the relationships among systems in the organization.
C)Implementing the strategy created by its strategic planning process.
D)Applying portfolio theory.

Question 8

Corporate-level strategies address the question: "What business(es) should we be in?" Such strategies consider multiple, sometimes unrelated, markets and typically are based on return on investment, market share or potential market share, and system integration.

Question 9

The result of the strategic planning process is:

A)More luck than the result of a thoughtful process.
B)Strategic thinking.
C)A formal document of at least 10 pages.
D)A plan or strategy.

Question 10

As a decision-making activity, strategic planning is based solely on quantitative data.

Question 11

The use of the systems approach requires strategic managers to:

A)Focus on short-term results.
B)Define the organization in broad terms and identify the important variables and interrelationships that will affect decisions.
C)Become leaders.
D)View the organization as a set of mutually exclusive sets of work units with separate goals and objectives.

Question 12

A clear specification of organizational level and orientation determines:

A)The type and range of decision to be made in strategic planning.
B)The quality of strategic thinking.
C)Organizational success.
D)The individual or organizational unit that is responsible for developing organizational strategy.

Question 13

Unit operational strategies may be developed within departments of an
organization such as clinical operations, marketing, finance, information systems, human resources, and so on.

Question 14

The three stages of strategic management are:

A)Plan, implement, and revise the plan.
B)Leadership, professionalism, and management.
C)Strategic thinking, strategic planning, and managing strategic momentum.
D)Thinking, planning, and doing.

Question 15

Strategy development has never been primarily a staff activity.

Question 16

Strategic planning for organizations is typically:

A)The sole province of the chief executive officer (CEO).
B)The work of the strategic planning department.
C)Something that requires consultants to be successful.
D)A group process.

Question 17

Strategic management is NOT:

A)A "quick fix" for organizations with fundamental problems.
B)A process of completing paperwork.
C)A process of extending the organization's current activities into the future.
D)All of the above.

Question 18

Analyzing and understanding the situation is accomplished by three separate strategic thinking activities: (1) external environmental analysis; (2) internal environmental analysis; and (3) the development or refinement of
the organization's directional strategies.

Question 19

The dissolution of formal planning staffs is associated with:

A)The management theory termed "Theory Z."
B)Systems thinking.
C)The general decline in economic activity in the USA and Europe.
D)Organizational learning that strategy development cannot take place in relative isolation.

Question 20

The use of the systems approach requires strategic managers to define the organization in broad terms and to identify the important variables and interrelationships that will affect decisions.

Question 21

Strategic management is demonstrated in an organization if it has evolved into a process of filling in endless forms, meeting deadlines, drawing
milestone charts, or changing the dates of last year's goals and plans.

Question 22

Managing strategic momentum is how an organization constructively manages change, evaluates strategy, and reinvents or renews the organization.

Question 23

Strategy is driven by a common mission, common vision, and common set of organizational values and goals - the directional strategies.

Question 24

Strategic management is a technique that will provide a "quick fix" for an organization that has fundamental problems.

Question 25

"Strategic thinking maps" are designed to initiate strategic thinking and strategic planning.

Question 26

Many of the management methods adopted by health care organizations originated in the business sector.

Question 27

The objective of long-range planning is to predict for some specified time in the future the size of demand for an organization's products and services and to determine where demand will occur.

Question 28

Strategic planning is the periodic process of developing a set of steps for an organization to accomplish its mission and vision using strategic thinking.

Question 29

Strategic thinkers examine assumptions, understand systems and their
interrelationships, and develop alternative scenarios of the future.

Question 30

Much of the legitimate work in an organization does not contribute to the accomplishment of the strategic plan.

Question 31

The implementation of Medicare's prospective payment system in 1983 initiated dramatic changes in the health care industry.

Question 32

Strategies are long range in nature and thus, the time span is the principal focus of strategic planning.

Question 33

Management rather than leadership is required to deal with rapid, complex, and discontinuous change.

Question 34

Strategic thinking is an individual intellectual process, a mindset, or method of intellectual analysis that asks people to position themselves as leaders and see the "big picture."

Question 35

In order to effectively deal with a complex situation, the leader must redouble efforts to become involved with every detail of the situation.

Question 36

Managing strategic momentum concerns the day-to-day activities of managing the strategy to achieve the strategic goals of the organization.

Question 37

Developing implementation plans is not an essential part of strategic planning.

Question 38

Decision making is expedited and consensus more easily reached when everyone in the organization is involved in the strategic planning process.

Question 39

Strategic management is a unique perspective that requires everyone in the organization to cease thinking solely in terms of internal operations and their own operational responsibilities. It insists that everyone adopt what may be a fundamentally new attitude - an external orientation and a concern for the big picture.