LD9634 - Designing and Implementing SME Business Strategy

You will learn through an approach in which your learning can be used to enhance your future potential as a strategic leader within an SME or wider organisational setting. As such a mixture of lecture, seminar and workshop sessions will be delivered in block mode. Lectures will be used to introduce the key topics and using a research led approach. These lectures will be followed by seminar activities in which you will apply the theories, models and frameworks through a range of activities. This will include reflecting on your own leadership experience and experience of leaders you have worked with. Workshops will be used to enable you to interact with leaders of SMEs who will share with you their experiences of the challenges of developing strategies for their own enterprises.

In order to develop your capacity and confidence as an effective learner, you will also engage in a substantial amount of independent learning. This will be supported by tutor-guided activities reflected in a learning plan, including prompted reading, activities to undertake and questions to address. Independent study requirements also entail reading beyond the learning materials/reading list provided, reflecting on its potential relevance for your own development.

An initial workshop will introduce you to the module, assessment and core topics. Subsequent to this you will be guided through a range of subject specific topics delivered over the period of the module. Key messages from these sessions will be available by video/podcast to support your learning outside of the classroom.

The e-learning portal will be used to encourage individual and group contributions to critical debate on key topics and issues. Materials and discussion group work will be available on the e-learning portal to support and engage you. To support and embed the learning, provide the opportunity for reflection and encourage effective communication, you will engage in discussion forums via the University’s e-Learning platform.
This will include posing and answering topic specific questions posed by the tutor and peer group and providing peer group formative feedback. You will also be encouraged to use email and discussion board tool to clarify issues.

Learning Sets (Self-Help Groups):
This is a way of gaining peer support. Early in the course, you will be established into learning sets with other students to enable shared learning. You will be able to communicate to discuss key learning points or work collectively on workshop, seminar and discussion board tasks.

How will I be supported academically on this module? (SRS 0003) Please provide a brief overview of the academic support available to students, including any support that may be accessed outside formal scheduled teaching.

Prior to entering the programme you will be given a learner journey. This outlines the nature of each module, the learning objectives, indicative content and a summary of how the module is assessed and contributes to the development of the Northumbria Graduate.

Furthermore, for this module, you will receive a detailed teaching and learning plan (TLP) which sets out

• Learning outcomes and overall module aims
• Teaching, learning and assessment strategy
• Teaching schedule
• Directed reading references (text and journals) and core texts for the module

E-Reading Lists The module will also have an e-reading list which directs learners to specific reading for each session. This includes direct access to e-books, journal articles and other academic sources.

You will also have opportunities to receive formative feedback from your tutor in response to opinions you express and issues you raise during seminar and workshop sessions. These formative feedback sessions are formally scheduled at key points throughout the module.

All modules at Northumbria include a range of reading materials that students are expected to engage with. Online reading lists (provided after enrolment) give you access to your reading material for your modules. The Library works in partnership with your module tutors to ensure you have access to the material that you need.

Knowledge & Understanding:

MLO1 Your appreciation of the uncertainty, ambiguity and limits of knowledge related to business strategy in an SME context.

MLO2 Your critical understanding of the dynamic nature of the business environment and how SMEs can position themselves within their global markets and competition.

Intellectual / Professional Skills & Abilities:

MLO3 Your ability to apply strategic management tools and frameworks to a given SME context.

Personal Values Attributes (Global / Cultural awareness, Ethics, Curiosity) (PVA):

Formative Assessment
Formative assessment of your knowledge and understanding is a key component of the assessment strategy. It forms an integral part of the formal scheduled teaching programme and will be an integral part of the asynchronous discussion board forums on the Blackboard course. Formative assessment feedback will enable you to undertake self-reflection and to feed-forward newly-acquired knowledge and understanding in order to refine your tutor-guided and self-directed independent learning and enhance your performance during final summative assessment.

Summative Assessment
You will be summatively assessed by a 3000 word strategic management report. This report will provide an analysis and reflection of the strategic position of the case study based organisation that will be issued to you by the module leader. (100%)(MLO1,MLO2,MLO3)

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As part of the programmes aim to develop your knowledge and competence to lead and manage in an SME environment, this module builds on Entrepreneurship, Creativity and Marketing and specifically aims to develop your knowledge of business strategy as well as your skills and confidence to enable you to engage with, and contribute to, the implementation of an SMEs strategic decisions.

In addition, it aims to develop your methodological and synthesis skills in order to evaluate strategic choices in accordance with your previous external analysis activity/ The module will also consider corporate social responsibility and sustainability agenda expectations.

Additionally, the module is designed to develop your capacity and confidence as an independent learner through your engagement with the module learning activities and sources of support and materials you will have access to from the module team and wider sources available from the university.

The module will culminate in the development of a research informed strategic plan for your own enterprise or an SME of which you are familiar.