Portfolio Analysis Conclusion
Portfolio approaches provide a useful tool for strategists. Granted, these approaches have limitations, but all these limitations can be overcome with a little imagination and foresight. The real concern about the portfolio approach is that its elegant simplicity often tempts managers to believe that it can solve all problems of corporate choices and resource allocation. The truth is that it addresses only half of the problem: the back half. The portfolio approach is a powerful tool for helping the strategist select from a menu of available opportunities, but it does not put the menu into his or her hands. That is the front half of the problem. The other critical dimension in making strategic choices is the need to generate a rich array of business options from which to choose. No simple tool is available that can provide this option-generating capability. Here only creative thinking about one's environment, one's business, one's customers, and one's competitors can help.
For a successful introduction of the portfolio framework, the strategist should heed the following advice:
1. Once introduced, move quickly to establish the legitimacy of portfolio analysis.
2. Educate line managers in its relevance and use.
3. Redefine SBUs explicitly because their definition is the "genesis and nemesis" of adequately using the portfolio framework.
4. Use the portfolio framework to seek the strategic direction for different businesses without haggling over the fancy labels by which to call them.
5. Make top management acknowledge SBUs as portfolios to be managed.
6. Seek top management time for reviewing different businesses using the portfolio framework.
7. Rely on a flexible, informal management process to differentiate influence patterns at the SBU level.
8. Tie resource allocation to the business plan.
9. Consider strategic expenses and human resources as explicitly as capital investment.
10. Plan explicitly for new business development.
11. Make a clear strategic commitment to a few selected technologies or markets early.
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