Sol China

When his youngest son, Jayson, graduated Chemical Engineering, Mr. Tan was very much elated. His wife was happy that they are now finally relieved of educating their children. He may now proceed with his dream of expanding his business.

Mr. Tan is now 55 years old and he has been in the business of " shoe making" in the past eight years. Before that, he was in the grocery business. Although market for " shoes" is steadily increasing in his area, he wants to produce other foot products like " sandals and slippers". He is at a loss, however, on how he will proceed to realize this.

His daughter Pei Pei a Business Management Graduate and currently working in a company, counseled him about the wisdom of seeking the opinion of all the children regrading his problem. His son Dash, A mechanical Engineer, and John a budding businessman agreed with Pei Pei’s preposition.

Mr. Tan is not worried about financing the expansion because he has enough savings in the bank. His greatest worry now is that he can also be successful like them. One of his classmates is an ambassador of China. Another is the president of a big trucking firm. His best friend in college is a Civil Engineer with contracts for high rise buildings in Taipei and Indonesia.

Business operate with the use of limited resources. This forces management to adapt an outlook that will provide guarantees for the successful conclusion of its various activities. In turn, the guarantees will require sufficient information about what is happening in and out of the business.

Provided with a reason for the guarantees, the small business operator must now find a way to realize its objectives. The identified way is called strategic planning which prescribes the strategy to be adapted. Whether such strategy is correct or not will depend on the skill of the decisionmaker.

Strickland has a comment about the said skill. He said, " the test of good entrepreneurship is whether the chosen strategy produces the desired levels of performance and culminates in the achievements of the target objectives.