According to Henry Mintzberg in his 1994 book “The Rise and fall of Strategic planning” focused on strategy being used by people in different ways. The commonly used strategic ways are as follows:

• Strategy is a Plan: This describes the word “How” which allows achieving your target/ goal from one end to the other.
• Strategy is a Pattern: It is a pattern in terms of actions delivered for example a company uses high end strategy to market expensive products to maintain standard, Quality and supersede competitors.
• Strategy is a Perspective: a vision that provides direction to achieve outcomes.
• Strategy is a Position: it reflects the decisions involved in the deliverance of the organization’s service/product in a particular market.

Concept of strategy according to Michael Porter

Michael Porter in his 1996 Harvard Business Review article and 1986 book, Competitive Strategy points out that competitive strategy is all about being different and unique. He added, “It means deliberately choosing a different set of activities to deliver a unique mix of value”

The basic concept of strategy comes from a military background and it is now widely practiced in a variety of business. The adoption of the strategic concept from that of the military into the business was considered to be easy as it was modest. As in the military and likewise in the business, strategy is bridging the gap between tactics and policy.

Being very specific in defining strategy is not easy as the different perspectives on strategy vary. Thus a very broad conception of strategy according to De Wit and Meyer in their book (2010), Strategy, Process, Content, Context, is,

“A course of action for achieving an organization’s purpose”

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STRATEGY PROCESS

Strategic Management is a process which is lead by different ways. According to many other text books including De Wit and Meyer (2010) the Strategy process is a linear progression trough a number of distinct steps. As in this competitive market organizations tend to go through a process in order to achieve best outcomes. This process is divided into different stages which includes, strategy analysis, strategy formulation and implementation stage.

The report evaluates the three strategy dichotomies of the strategy process contained in the following perspectives:

• Strategic thinking
• Strategic formation
• Strategic renewal

Figure -1: Strategy process and its Aspects.

STRATEGIC THINKING (Logic vs. Creativity)

A lot goes on in the mind of a strategist prior to the process of strategy implementation. Strategists are constantly engaged with problems during the strategic process. These paradoxes that arise during the strategic process can be challenging in different situations and the right type of action taken to resolve them. According to the Rational or logical reasoning perspective the demand and need of constant market analysis and its capacity assumed to gain advantage from the market should be based on actual facts. Logical thinking will provide a better understanding of the opportunities and threat