Application of Strategic Management Tools in Lithuania: Managers' Knowledge and Experience

Application of strategic management (SM) tools has been addressed by various researchers. Some of them aimed at defining it, while others discussed the suitability of certain tools for management practices used by specific organisations. The scope of these studies varied from one to several countries. Such variation of research contexts suggests the multidimensional nature of this issue. A number of studies addressed the aspects of SM tools' application in organisations of different types and sizes. This paper discusses the experience of Lithuanian managers in application of various SM tools. Research findings are based on the questionnaire survey aimed at uncovering respondents' views, attitudes towards and experience of application of twelve SM tools in business practice. To ensure statistical comparability the proportion of SME managers was reduced to 89 percent of the entire sample, while SMEs constitute 99.7 percent of all Lithuanian businesses. This enabled us to compare the experience of managers of big companies with that of managers of SMEs. The responses were validated using psychometric statistics and consistency analysis, which enabled achieving relatively high psychometric quality of the results. The structure of the questionnaire and the indicators of the psychometric quality generated by cluster analysis resulted in classification of the SM tools into two relative groups. The latter were subjected to qualitative interpretation taking into account the logical links of the cluster components and the percentage of approval. The questionnaire consisted of semi-open questions. The data they produced was processed using the manifest and hermeneutic content analysis methods. The manifest content analysis revealed the areas of application of specific tools, while hermeneutic content analysis allowed relating managers' responses to specific attitudes towards strategic management. Analysis also revealed the SM tools, which are applied by Lithuanian managers most frequently, and whether they are applied correctly.