Strategic and Operational Management Training Course

Duration 5 days 10 modules · 33 contact hours
Level Advanced Certificate on completion
Who attends Business Unit Directors, Senior Managers and others
Fee from USD 1,100 KSh 95,000 for Kenyan organisations
Where 52 cities + online See dates by city
Next start 9 Nov 2026 Course code SD-EM-083

Before you join: Participants should have several years of management experience and responsibility for a team, function, project portfolio or business area.

Dates & prices

Two start dates a month in every city, and live online on weekdays or weekends. Fees are per participant; classroom fees include tuition, materials, lunch and refreshments, and the certificate.

Suggest a date or city

Showing the next six months. Later dates, other cities and private deliveries for your team are available on request.

Course overview

Senior managers are expected to set direction while improving performance now. The difficulty is converting strategic intent into choices about markets, customers, investment, operating models, capabilities, risks and resources. Poorly connected strategy and operations create stalled initiatives, conflicting priorities, cost overruns and weak accountability. This course addresses the management work required to make strategy executable and to govern delivery through clear measures, decision rights and review routines.

Participants examine how to diagnose external and internal conditions, define strategic choices, test business-model assumptions and translate priorities into an operating plan. They use PESTLE, Porter's Five Forces, SWOT/TOWS, scenario planning, Balanced Scorecard, OKRs, value-stream mapping, RACI and risk registers. The course also covers portfolio management, resource allocation, financial performance, change adoption, stakeholder communication and executive decision-making under uncertainty.

Teaching combines focused briefings with cases drawn from public services, banking, manufacturing, infrastructure and international business. Participants work through realistic management decisions, compare alternative courses of action, interpret performance data and develop a strategy-to-execution pack for a current or planned business priority. They leave with practical templates and a 90-day application plan that can be adapted for their own function, business unit or programme.

The course suits experienced managers who influence enterprise priorities, run major functions or lead cross-functional change. It is particularly relevant where leaders must improve service, cost, growth, resilience or delivery confidence while maintaining control of operational risk.

What you will be able to do

  • Diagnose strategic position using PESTLE, Porter's Five Forces and SWOT/TOWS
  • Formulate strategic choices through clear ambition, scope, advantage and capabilities
  • Build a Balanced Scorecard linking strategic objectives, measures, targets and initiatives
  • Translate strategic priorities into OKRs, operating plans and accountable workstreams
  • Design decision rights and governance using RACI, escalation paths and review cadences
  • Evaluate investment options using business cases, financial indicators and sensitivity analysis
  • Improve operational performance through value-stream mapping, capacity analysis and root-cause methods
  • Produce a 90-day strategy execution plan with risks, milestones and stakeholder actions

Benefits of attending

For you

  • Frame senior-level strategic choices with evidence, assumptions and trade-offs
  • Lead planning conversations using shared strategy and performance-management language
  • Present investment recommendations with clearer financial and operational logic
  • Identify execution barriers before they become delivery failures
  • Build a credible 90-day plan for a live management priority

For your organisation

  • Stronger alignment between strategic priorities, budgets, initiatives and daily operations
  • Clearer accountability for cross-functional decisions, delivery risks and benefits
  • More disciplined prioritisation of investments, projects and improvement work
  • Earlier visibility of performance gaps through relevant measures and review routines
  • Greater consistency in translating executive direction into operational action

Course modules

10 modules over 5 days

Participants can frame strategic management as a set of explicit choices about direction, scope and resource deployment.

  • Strategic intent, mission and vision distinguished through executive decision criteria
  • Choice cascade: winning aspiration, where-to-play, how-to-win, capabilities, management systems
  • Corporate, business-unit and functional strategies aligned through explicit strategic themes
  • Strategic assumptions documented using assumption mapping and evidence confidence ratings
  • Trade-off decisions assessed across growth, margin, service, risk and resilience
  • Decision-quality principles applied to ambiguous, high-consequence management choices

Participants can assess market forces and external uncertainty to inform defensible strategic choices.

  • PESTLE analysis separates political, economic, social, technological, legal and environmental drivers
  • Porter's Five Forces assesses industry attractiveness and profit-pool pressures
  • Competitor profiling compares strategic groups, capabilities, positioning and likely responses
  • Customer segmentation identifies needs, value drivers, switching costs and buying criteria
  • Scenario planning tests strategic options against plausible external futures
  • Early-warning indicators connect uncertainty triggers to management response thresholds

Participants can diagnose internal strengths and redesign business-model elements that affect performance.

  • SWOT/TOWS converts internal and external evidence into strategic option sets
  • VRIO analysis tests resources for value, rarity, imitability and organisational support
  • Business Model Canvas maps customers, value propositions, channels, revenues and costs
  • Value-chain analysis identifies margin drivers, handoffs, bottlenecks and control points
  • Core capabilities prioritised against customer value, strategic fit and investment requirements
  • Make-buy-partner decisions tested through capability, economics, control and risk

Participants can formulate strategic priorities and rank initiatives using transparent criteria.

  • Strategic themes translated into measurable outcomes and bounded management priorities
  • Ansoff Matrix compares market penetration, development, product development and diversification
  • Portfolio matrices distinguish invest, protect, improve, partner, exit and stop decisions
  • Initiative scoring weights strategic fit, value, urgency, feasibility and risk
  • Benefits maps connect projects, capabilities, outputs, outcomes and measurable value
  • Strategic roadmaps sequence dependencies, decision gates, investments and benefits realisation

Participants can align structure, processes, capabilities and governance with strategic priorities.

  • Operating model components: processes, people, technology, governance, data and partners
  • Target operating model defines service boundaries, accountabilities and delivery principles
  • RACI matrices clarify decision rights, handoffs, approvals and escalation ownership
  • Organisation design matches spans, layers, roles and interfaces to work
  • Shared services and decentralisation assessed through service, cost, control and speed
  • Capability heat maps identify critical skills, systems and process gaps

Participants can identify operational constraints and select practical improvement actions.

  • Value-stream mapping exposes delays, rework, queues, handoffs and non-value-added activity
  • Theory of Constraints identifies bottlenecks, exploitation actions and flow improvements
  • Process measures distinguish efficiency, quality, service, throughput and compliance
  • Root-cause analysis uses five whys, fishbone diagrams and evidence validation
  • Capacity planning balances demand forecasts, staffing, assets and service-level commitments
  • Standard work documents critical tasks, controls, exceptions and escalation triggers
  • PDCA cycles convert performance gaps into tested improvement actions

Participants can create performance systems that link strategy, operations and corrective action.

  • Balanced Scorecard links financial, customer, process and capability objectives
  • Strategy maps show cause-and-effect relationships between outcomes and enablers
  • OKRs translate priorities into measurable objectives and time-bound key results
  • KPI design specifies definitions, owners, data sources, targets and tolerances
  • Performance dashboards distinguish leading indicators from lagging outcome measures
  • Management review cadences drive decisions, action tracking and exception escalation
  • Variance analysis separates price, volume, mix, productivity and timing effects

Participants can evaluate strategic investments and allocate resources against expected value and risk.

  • Business cases define problem, options, costs, benefits, risks and recommendations
  • Net present value compares investment returns across different timing profiles
  • Internal rate of return and payback period inform capital prioritisation
  • Sensitivity analysis tests assumptions affecting revenue, cost, timing and adoption
  • Zero-based budgeting challenges inherited spend against strategic priorities and evidence
  • Driver-based planning links resource requirements to demand, capacity and productivity
  • Benefits realisation plans assign owners, measures, baselines and review dates

Participants can govern strategic risk and lead change adoption through structured stakeholder action.

  • Risk registers record causes, events, impacts, controls, owners and treatments
  • Risk appetite statements set thresholds for financial, operational and reputational exposure
  • Bow-tie analysis maps preventive controls, consequences and recovery measures
  • Business continuity priorities identify critical services, recovery objectives and dependencies
  • Stakeholder mapping assesses influence, interest, concerns and engagement approaches
  • ADKAR structures change actions around awareness, desire, knowledge, ability and reinforcement
  • Communication plans align executive messages, channels, timing, feedback and sponsorship

Participants can establish an execution rhythm and a 90-day plan for a strategic management priority.

  • Execution governance defines sponsors, steering groups, workstreams and decision forums
  • Milestone plans link deliverables, dependencies, owners, dates and acceptance criteria
  • Issue logs distinguish risks, assumptions, dependencies, decisions and delivery blockers
  • Executive reporting combines progress, forecast, benefits, risks and required decisions
  • After-action reviews capture outcomes, lessons, corrective actions and accountable owners
  • Ninety-day plans prioritise immediate actions, stakeholder commitments and review points

Exercises and examples are adapted to each cohort's sectors and roles.

What you take back to work

  1. Strategic position analysis template
  2. Strategy-to-execution scorecard
  3. Initiative prioritisation matrix
  4. Target operating model canvas
  5. Executive performance dashboard specification
  6. 90-day execution action plan

Who should attend

  • Business Unit Directors — align strategic priorities with operational delivery and financial results
  • Senior Managers — convert enterprise strategy into accountable departmental plans
  • Heads of Operations — improve performance while managing capacity, cost and service commitments
  • Programme Directors — govern strategic initiatives, dependencies, risks and benefits
  • Functional Leaders — coordinate cross-functional decisions, resources and operating measures
  • Public Sector Managers — connect policy objectives to service delivery and performance controls

Skills and tools covered

Strategic analysisOperating model designPerformance managementPortfolio prioritisationFinancial decision-makingExecution governance

Tools and standards

PESTLE analysis, Porter's Five Forces, Balanced Scorecard, OKRs

How the course runs

Training methodology

The course uses short instructor briefings to establish methods, followed by facilitated case analysis, small-group decision work and management simulations. Participants interpret market, financial and operational information, make prioritisation choices and test the consequences of alternative operating responses. Cases reflect regulated services, commercial organisations and complex delivery settings. Structured peer review helps participants challenge assumptions and clarify executive messages. Individual application planning connects each method to a live priority, with instructor feedback on logic, measures, risks and accountabilities.

Requirements and prerequisites

Participants should have several years of management experience and responsibility for a team, function, project portfolio or business area. They should be familiar with budgets, operational measures and routine management reporting, even if they do not own the full financial plan. Experience contributing to planning, change or improvement initiatives is useful. No formal business qualification, finance specialism, MBA, prior consulting experience or advanced spreadsheet modelling is required. Participants should bring a current strategic or operational issue they can use as an application context.

A typical training day

08:30 – 10:30First session
10:30 – 10:45Refreshment break
10:45 – 12:30Second session
12:30 – 13:30Lunch and networking
13:30 – 15:00Third session
15:00 – 15:15Refreshment break
15:15 – 16:30Workshop and daily review

Live online deliveries follow the same structure in East Africa Time, with shorter screen blocks and longer breaks.

What the fee includes

  • Instruction by a practitioner facilitator
  • Full course workbook and materials
  • Exercise files, templates and case studies
  • Refreshments and lunch on classroom deliveries
  • Certificate of completion
  • Post-course application plan

Frequently asked questions

The course is designed for experienced managers with responsibility for a team, function, programme or business area. Participants should understand basic budgets and operational reporting, but do not need an MBA or formal strategy qualification.

Bring a current business priority, performance issue, strategic initiative or operating challenge. A laptop is useful for working with templates, although all core course materials are supplied.

It suits business unit leaders, senior functional managers, heads of operations, programme directors and public sector managers. It is intended for people who must connect executive direction with measurable delivery.

Leadership courses focus primarily on people leadership, while project management courses focus on delivery controls for defined projects. This course focuses on strategic choices, operating models, portfolio priorities, performance systems and the management routines that connect them.

Participants can use the analysis, scorecard, prioritisation and governance templates on a live priority. The 90-day action plan provides a starting point for discussions with sponsors, teams and peer functions.

Training runs from 08:30 to 16:30 each day, with about 6.5 contact hours daily. Time is divided between instructor input, case work, group analysis, simulations, peer discussion and individual application planning.

Questions about this course?

Ask about dates, fees, group bookings or running it for your team. Our training team replies by email.

Ask on WhatsApp info@skillsetdevelopment.com

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