Designing and Implementing a Strategic Management Concept in an High-Tech SME (PDF)

Bachelor Thesis from the year 2019 in the subject Engineering - Industrial Engineering and Management, grade: 1,7, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), language: English, abstract: Although extant literature on small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) suggests that strategic management positively affects organizational outcomes, evidence supporting this suggestion is limited to a few qualitative case studies. As many SMEs struggle with limited access to resources and with it no opportuni-ty to enact a large and complex strategic management concept. This thesis develops a strategic management concept that considers these limitations. Drawing on resource- related arguments this study presents a frame-work for how a strategic management concept can be designed and implemented at a high-tech SME.

Methods: A single case study at a German technology company was applied, in which the strategy was formu-lated with the strengths-, weaknesses-, opportunities- and threats- (SWOT) analysis and further, the strategy was employed with the Balanced Scorecard. Therefore, an expert interview with the chief execution officer (CEO) was conducted, and a team out of high-level employees of the enterprise was assembled to discuss the steps of the developing processes.

Results: As it was possible to design and implement a framework that includes strategy -formulation and -implementation with limited resources of the case company, this study extends the literature by providing a reference case for other companies, especially SMEs. Furthermore, the paper provides evidence how the SWOT analysis and BSC theories can be applicated in a practical case.