Week 21

      1)  What is an emergent strategy?

An emergent strategy is a pattern of action that develops over time in an organization in the absence of a specific mission and goals or despite a mission and goals.

It is also sometimes called a realized strategy, Mintzberg argues that strategy emerges over time and intention collides with and accommodates a changing reality. The emergent strategy states that the organization is learning as well as working.

  2)    What are the benefits and drawbacks of taking an emergent approach of strategy making?

·         The emergent strategy basically arises from the individuals working in the organization which responds directly to the market forces.

·         The decisions of the individual do reflect the shifts in the taste of the customers.

·         The emergent  strategy gives an idea  about what the market actually wants

·         Emergent strategy does not necessarily needs an organization to be very flexible.

·         It encourages informal communication network in an organization and helps in the flow of creative thinking and ideas within an organization.

                        The draw backs:

·         Might have technical errors due to less research activity.

·         They work just with anticipation and it is not necessary the end result will be perfect the result can be worst.

·         It  normally happens by  chance so  it leads to uncertainty   

33)    Did Honda’s  entry strategy  demonstrate the characteristics of logical  incrementalism.

Ø  Logical  incrementalism  is the  evolution of strategy as a result of experimentation and consensus  (Johnson, 2011). Logical incrementalism  allows strategy to be synthesised and co-ordinated  into a single coherent direction by  using as  many  multi dimensional  input as possible in  the conceptualisation process to shape   the overarching  goals. (kippenberger).

Ø  Yes, I  belive Honda’s entry  strategy  demonstrate the characteriscitc of logical  incrementalism  because  they basically  analysed  the US  (American market)  environment and  also developed the marketing strategy accourdingly  and  they  also  followed  a policy  of the US market region  by region.  Honda  did not  come  up with  a big screen plan,  it  came up with specific goals  and tried  achieving it slowly. US being a big market for  motorcycle,  it  has  already established brands like Harley  Davidson and many  other established ones.  But Honda however being the first timer in  the huge international market came  up wit h very  specific strategy and the applied strategy  did work  for the company  as a  whole and it was able to beat the costly and branded  bike’s market in a very short spam  of time,  very  good quality,  light weight bikes in a  low cost compared to others. They took the risk and  faced the   challenge and  was innitally  change  the image of motorcycle  to the people who had a bad  impression  for bikes.  It’s  not that   they were successful  in the first time   it self there were many problems in the bike’s clutch  failure,  oil leakage  but they  redesigned the bike again  in japan and finally  were able  to  satisfy the customers. Adding up to its collection  of bikes it came up with the idea of big bikes which  the Americans preferred and then launched the 500  CC supercubs.

Questions:

1 4)     Was Honda’s entry  strategy  in the US more  deliberate  or emergent?

I think  Honda’s entry  to  the US market was mostly  a deliberate one rather than a emergent one, because they had researched and analysed about the market beforehand  and also differentiated itself  from other  bike manufacturing giants.  Japanese manufacturer had a normal philosophy that high volumes per model  provide  the potential  for high  productivity   as a result  of using  capital intensive and highly  autpmated techniques which  makes it a deliberate  strategy.

If we look  at the other side of the coin,  we  could  see the company  faced several problems such  as  oil leakage and  clutch failure,  which deployed  the Honda’s image  but giving up was  not their  way and came   up with many more new  strategies  to overcome  the problem in the near future.

Hondas’s  main  entry to the US market was when they saw the emerging motorbike market in  the US market and wanted to test if  the Honda bike would turn  out to be people’s favourite, here they  practiced  emergent strategy, they just had a made up strategy for a certain period of time and  moved  alonged  with it  like goinging with the flow. Eventually,  in 1963  a student did a Honda advertisement assignment  and from then the brand  has been inseperable.

45) Do  you  think Honda would have been more  or  less successful if they  had  adopeted a more formalized strategic  planning  approach to the launch.

I think Honda  would have been  more  successful if it had adopted  a  more  formalized strategic planning   approach.  If   I have to have my  say  then I would say that a lot of planning before hand  can  sometimes lead  to  failure as  well because  everything is pre planned and if  one plan does  not work then  the whole  of the idea  can  fail  and become  a flop one and that might have also resulted in  the kick  out of the Honda bikes from  the  markets itself. 

2  6)Which of the accounts  seem  more accurate  and why?  Why do you  think the two differ so  much?

The  second Idea  to me seems more accurate because it is based on the real life  interview with the Honda executive  by pascale, they  have clearly mentioned everything everything  from the start of their establishment in the United States. They have mentioned the smallest details from their visit,  researching  about the market,  the language barriers, the currency  problem, sleepless nights       on  the floors etc  and  all of the facts a real. Entering  into a big market like US market  was not like  getting a candy from the store,  they entered with their front foot first  prepared for all  the challenges and taking full risk  as well always having the fear  of being  a failure  and at  the same time also being hopeful for  a  better prespective  not having  a specific goal but definitely  worked  towards achieving their ultimate goal.

The two accounts differ from  each  other because the first  one states that they had a planned  vision  to  enter the  US market and working towards achieving  their goal where as the second one stated that they happened to enter the market coincidently.