In the business environment it is important for organizations to look at their competitors and aim to be better than them. An Inside Out strategy examines what the strengths and weaknesses are, once identified the organization will produce the products and attempt to market them well (CMA, 2012). While the Outside In strategy considers customer value as the starting and ending point, emphasizing the external environment when undertaking strategic thinking (Brandmatters, 2010). Strategy examines issues that may affect the future of organizations and prepares for or overcomes these issues as a number of strategies can be used to identify them. This essay will define the Inside Out and Outside In of organizations. In particular, different strategic theories and concepts will be examined using examples of organizations to explain how Inside Out and Outside In will explain the success of organizations. An organization's external factors might be emphasized when strategic thinking takes place, looking at the bigger picture, including competitors and customers. The PESTEL analysis framework can be used to identify the external macroenvironment of an organization. Issues including the political, economic, social, technological, environmental and legal environment can be the key factors influencing organizations (Johnson G et al, 2011). Managers within an organization should carefully analyze their environments, as this could help an organization anticipate any future threats and take action and minimize threats before they can affect the company. An example is Western European beer companies, where legal laws such as drink driving have affected large supermarket chains as... half the paper... it's not just about buying a product or service but to benefit from it. (European Business Review, 2008). Using an Inside Out strategy, products and services meet the requirements to compete with competitors and sell to customers. However, they are not examining how external environmental factors can influence consumers and the change in their needs, which affects the products or services they need. For a company to be successful, it should consider making major contributions around the strategy-making process rather than just within it (Harvard Business Review, 1996)). As shown in the Outside In strategy, organizations should take a broad view of their external macroenvironment and be able to adapt to environmental changes. This will prevent them from having future problems, although some managers may be more concerned with their current success and what happens today.