ABSTRACT
The importance of competitive advantages has already been emphasised. Building a capacity for satisfying customer demand is mainly a matter of competence and means. An adequate supply efficiency, as such, can usually be obtained with a high degree of certainty. Far more uncertain is a firm’s ability to prevail against competitors and correspondingly high the risk of its failure for lack of competitive strength. Therefore, the central principle of strategic planning is gaining, and maintaining, competitive advantage. Figure 4
70 The Base l I I Ra t i ng
The formulation of your strategic plan requires three steps: Step one Specification of your corporate mission in terms of the principles and goals that
will guide your strategic actions. Step two Specification of the major thrusts of your strategy, that is, the currently most
important strategic goals and the directions in which they are to be pursued. Step three Specification of the measures required to attain those goals and a time-critical plan
of implementing them.
