Introduction

Enterprise-wide strategic leadership (ESL) and sustainable success are two relatively new constructs of engaging in contemporary strategic management that are easy to understand but difficult to define. Strategic leadership has been in use for many decades, usually among the higher levels of management such as corporate executives, senior group management, and general managers of strategic business units (SBUs) and small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). It may also include the general management of the value delivery systems in large corporations. These are the business leaders responsible for setting vision and/or strategic direction, establishing principles and values, crafting objectives and strategies, determining high-level policies and behaviors, and assuring governance, reporting, and ethical practices among many other aspects.

ESL involves all aspects of strategic leadership, except that the perspectives are broader and include strategic thinking and management of the company and its SBUs as well as the extended enterprise(s). It includes leading change within the company, linking the SBUs with their extended enterprises, ensuring that the whole enterprise is functioning properly, and achieving success across the business environment. The same is true for SMEs.

ESL requires a mindset that envisions a more assertive and inclusive vision for the future based on the underpinnings and perspectives of enterprise-wide strategic management (ESM), the principles of sustainable business development (SBD), and an architectural blueprint that integrates the value delivery system.