Any business activity is a process of achieving projected outcomes. The more we focus on detail, the more we find the same scalable elements of a simple purpose – to drive work. Assuming that any process is divisible, the most critical advantage for a business environment would be the ability of aligning the largest, most complex of its business drivers with the smallest ones and vice versa. This function can be imagined as zooming in and out of a business process.
What we have to accomplish every day to accomplish once a goal of our lifetime.
Managing projects can be considered, related and applied to 3 general levels according to the amount of complexity required and size of the areas affected:
1. Strategic – major and most important objectives to be achieved for a reason
2. Tactical - information subdivisions which specify the course of how the strategic objectives would be achieved (Tactical Level is usually an outcome of corporate planning)
3. Operational – information units which determine the way of performing basic steps in the most logical and consecutive order
Basic organisational matrix
A division of work into Strategic, Tactical, and Operational levels of focus should also match with an organisational division into the 3 general frames of reference: Me, Project, and Organisation. See further Organisational Design
The structural and systemic divisions of the 3 levels can be demonstrated by the following equations:
• 1 strategic plan = a number of strategic steps
• 1 strategic step = 1 tactical plan
• 1 tactical plan = a number of tactical steps
• 1 tactical step = 1 operational plan
• 1 operational plan = a number of operational steps
An organisation, being itself a structure or system, is usually divided in a similar way however, because this principle is perfectly scalable, strategy, tactics and operation can all be applied on any level within any activity.
