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ACCA Strategic Professional · Strategic Business Leader · Concepts of strategy

Corvane Pharma is preparing a five-year plan. The board commissions detailed industry analysis, sets quantified objectives, ranks options on financial return, and issues a plan for divisions to implement. A non-executive director warns that the process assumes the environment is predictable and that managers will implement without alteration. Which statement correctly identifies the lens and its main limitation?

This is the design lens, which treats strategy as a rational, top-down, analytical planning process. Its main limitation is inflexibility: it assumes a predictable environment and faithful implementation, and underplays emergent change, organisational politics and cultural influences on how strategy actually unfolds.

  1. ADesign lens; it may be inflexible and underplay the emergent, political and cultural aspects of strategyCorrect
  2. BExperience lens; it overstates the influence of rational analysis on top management
  3. CVariety lens; it neglects the role of top management in setting direction
  4. DDiscourse lens; it ignores quantified analysis of options

Explanation

The described approach of analysis, objectives, option evaluation and top-down implementation is the design lens. Its recognised weakness is that it assumes predictability and rational control, ignoring emergent strategy, politics and culture. The other options mismatch lens and criticism.

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