Strategic Marketing: Planning and Control, Third Edition

● Target setting: There are two important factors. Firstly, the target cri-

teria should be objective and measurable. How this is assessed needs

to be communicated and agreed in advance. Secondly, it needs to be

achievable but challenging.

● Focus: It recognises the difference between the symptoms and the

source of a problem. While it may be expedient to treat the symptoms,

tackling the source of the problem should eliminate it once and for all.

● Effectiveness: The tendency exists to measure efficiency as opposed to

effectiveness. Efficiency is the usage and productivity of assets.

Effectiveness is about doing the right things. Ideally, we want meas-

ures of efficiency applied to areas of effectiveness. In reality we tend to

apply efficiency measures to areas easiest to measure. Be careful to

measure what is important, not what is easy to quantify. Additionally,

measurement should be accurate, valid and consistent.

● Management by exception: Management attention is directed to areas of

need. Identifying what constitutes an exception to the norm is a useful

exercise in its own right. The process involves setting tolerances and

benchmarks for normal operation. Management action only becomes a

priority when pre-set limits are breached. Figure 14.3 shows a simple

tolerance control chart. This is based on planned sales revenue plus or

minus a tolerance of 5 per cent. If the levels are broken, or in a pro-

active system appear as if they may be breached, management will

begin to take an interest in the process.

● Action: Good control systems promote action. Such systems do not just

detect problems; they solve problems. Basically, actions adjust the

inputs to the process. For example, extra resources could be made

available to deal with a backlog or we could redesign a process or pro-

cedure to make it more effective.

278 Strategic Marketing: Planning and Control

x = Actual sales

5% Upper limit

Sales

target

Target

x

x

x

x

x x

5% Lower limit

Investigate

Time

Problems of control

A good control system is not easy to develop. The project manager

requires an awareness of the general problems associated with control

Figure 14.3
Tolerance control
chart