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Measuring the performance of strategy

Patrick Hoverstadt (Fractal, Lymm, UK and Centre for Business Performance, Cranfield School of Management, Bedfordshire, UK)
Lucy Loh (Fractal, Lymm, UK)
Natalie Marguet (LJMU, Liverpool, UK)

Measuring Business Excellence

ISSN: 1368-3047

Article publication date: 30 June 2020

Issue publication date: 30 November 2023

380

Abstract

Purpose

This paper aims to look at the problems of measuring the performance of business strategy. The authors look at the problem using two classical performance management paradigms and suggest a third approach which treats strategy as a stochastic network of actors and manoeuvres between those actors.

Design/methodology/approach

This has been developed using action research in a number of strategy projects with a range of organisations in the private, public and third sectors.

Findings

The two normal paradigms in use for performance measurement and management both struggle when applied to strategy. The problems are not merely ones of execution, they are much more fundamental and sit at the level of conceptual design. Modelling strategy as a series of manoeuvres between different actor organisations is both a more useful way to develop strategy but also provides a simple way to develop measures of strategic performance that can tell us not merely whether the strategy is being executed but also whether it is working.

Originality/value

The paper describes a totally new approach to measuring strategy – both its execution and also its effectiveness which contrasts with both the two prevailing paradigms commonly used in the field of strategy.

Keywords

Citation

Hoverstadt, P., Loh, L. and Marguet, N. (2023), "Measuring the performance of strategy", Measuring Business Excellence, Vol. 27 No. 4, pp. 521-530. https://doi.org/10.1108/MBE-03-2020-0042

Publisher

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Emerald Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2020, Emerald Publishing Limited

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