Strategic Audit

The strategic audit system is a diagnostic tool to pinpoint an organization’s strengths and weaknesses. Use the Strategic Analysis Framework and other tools in order to conduct a strategic audit. You might consider using a SWOT analysis for both companies to analyze each of their situations.

For this assignment, a mini strategic audit will be conducted for two companies with an overall goal to compare how each company differs in the strategy management and implementation, while identifying the importance of strategic management.

• Conduct a Strategic Audit on two companies of your choice that are within the same industry. During this audit, you will be comparing each company, to do so be sure to create a SWOT analysis for each company.
• In addition, visit each company’s website and conduct research to identify key strategies that each company has. List a brief introduction of each company, to include the Mission Statement and compare key aspects of each company.
• Be sure to include the concepts identified in the readings for this week’s topics.

The requirements below must be met for your paper to be accepted and graded:

• Write between 750 – 1,250 words (approximately 3 – 5 pages) using Microsoft Word in APA style, see example below.
• Use font size 12 and 1” margins.
• Include cover page and reference page.
• At least 80% of your paper must be original content/writing.
• No more than 20% of your content/information may come from references.
• Use at least three references from outside the course material, one reference must be from EBSCOhost. Text book, lectures, and other materials in the course may be used, but are not counted toward the three reference requirement.
• Cite all reference material (data, dates, graphs, quotes, paraphrased words, values, etc.) in the paper and list on a reference page in APA style.

References must come from sources such as, scholarly journals found in EBSCOhost, CNN, online newspapers such as, The Wall Street Journal, government websites, etc. Sources such as, Wikis, Yahoo Answers, eHow, blogs, etc. are not acceptable for academic writing.

A detailed explanation of how to cite a source using APA can be found here (link).

Download an example here.