Write about 250 -300 words introducing your chosen leader. Include his or her role in the organisation, brief information about the organisation itself, plus background information - perhaps key achievements and relevant biographical information. You might also briefly discuss why you have selected this leader to critique.
Strategic Leadership (400-500 words)
Discuss your leader's strategic leadership at the organisation. This might involve discussing how well you think the leader implements and manages the strategic planning processes. For example is it clear that the leader is involved with all six components of strategy:
- Vision
- Mission
- External analysis
- Internal analysis
- Financial analysis and forecasting
- Quality assurance
Other factors you might discuss include stakeholder input into forming strategy, i.e. are employees and others encouraged to contribute. Consider other 'best practice' strategic planning processes, is a formal, structured process used, what tools might be used such as SWOT, Porter's 5 Forces etc.
Strategic Direction (400-500 words)
For this aspect, discuss the strategic vision for the organisation. What evidence is there that the leader has had a strong influence in developing the vision and / or leading the organisation towards the vision? Is the leader 'visionary'? Does he or she inspire others?
Response to Environmental Challenges (400-500 words)
Here you should discuss how well you think the leader copes with and manages the environment within which the company operates. Is there evidence that the leader really understands the firm's market, do they know their competitors well, do they bench mark their performance with similar firms?
Strategic Positioning and Adaptability to Change (400-500 words)
Here is where you might discuss the leader's influence on the strategic position the firm has taken. For example, what's the firm's point of difference, do they have cost leadership, or a differentiation strategy? How strong is the brand, what PR and communications support the brand, and does the leader have influence here? Lastly, you will need to discuss how well you think the leader manages change. Do they adopt a planned changed approach or an incremental change approach? How well does the leader cope with change.
These are just some prompts for each of the four headings, please feel free to discuss other relevant issues for each heading. Do not worry about exceeding the word count as I suspect you may need to write more than 2000 words to do a good job. I am not worried about a specific report format, so it is not necessary to use a tabulated report style.