Dear
CEO Of Frank’s Real Estate,
We as students that have
taken this course have heard you are interested in sending your management team
to take this advanced business policy course at Northern Kentucky University.
We think this is a really smart idea, and we will tell you why.
This course has a lot of
important information and tools to offer your management team that will help
them in situations down the road. This course covers the different ways a team
or organization can come together and strategize to achieve a common goal. It
also teaches people a little bit of other types of business practices, such as
internal and external audit. It also dives into finance, research and
development, and about information systems. A big part of this course though is
how to handle issues in your home country and internationally. A few chapters
in this course talk about business ethics and social responsibility. These are
two big points that an employer wants their employees to have. Integrity is an
important part of a person’s character and this course would be a good step in
the right direction to further enforce this idea. We who have taken this course
believe it is in your best interest to have your whole management team come to
Northern Kentucky University and take part in this course as well. This course
could shine light on your employee’s and encourage them to work harder and
smarter.
Thank
You,
Porter’s Five-Forces Model
is very important for a company to understand. These five forces can apply to
every single business or market. These forces tell a company if their company
will survive in a certain market and if they will make or lose money in a market.
First, we have bargaining
power of suppliers. This is key to a business that relies upon suppliers. Very
few supplies will allow suppliers to drive up prices, and a lot of suppliers
will allow businesses to get better prices. Bargaining power of consumers
relates to the ability of consumers to make the prices go down. This is a very
important idea to a consumer because you want the lowest price as possible.
Rivalry is big in producing
a product. If another company can do what you do, your power will not be as
strong and you will have to mark your price around the area of the competitors
to survive. However, if you are the only one in the industry you have all the
power and can do what you want with the price. Potential development of
substitute products is something to watch out for when you have your own
industry. If someone is able to make a substitute product of yours you will
need to lower your prices, or create a better product. Potential entry of new
competitors can be avoided if it is hard to enter your sector of business and
survive without having to take out lots of money. However, if your business
sector is very easy to enter you may be in trouble and need to lower prices to
accommodate for this in the future.
In contrast to Porter’s 5
forces which takes an industry perspective, the PEST analysis is a strategic
business tool which is focused more on macro-economic factors or the geography
of a business. The PEST Analysis helps a company identify
The
Strengths-Weaknesses-Opportunities-Threat (SWOT) Matrix is a matching tool that
can be extremely useful to managers. This tool enables managers to formulate
four types of strategies: strengths-opportunities (SO) strategies,
weaknesses-opportunities (WO) strategies, strengths-threats (ST) strategies,
and weaknesses-threats (WT) strategies. Management is able to develop these
strategies by identifying the internal and external factors that are affecting
their company.
Although identifying these
internal and external factors is one of the most challenging parts of creating
a SWOT matrix as it requires good judgement, once these factors are identified
a SWOT matrix can be a very useful tool. Through the four different strategies,
this tool can help companies use their internal strengths to take advantage of
external opportunities, aim at improving weaknesses by taking advantage of
external opportunities, us a company’s strengths to reduce the impact of
external threats and create defensive tactics directed at reducing internal
weaknesses and avoiding external threats. SWOT Analysis are very useful to
managers as it enables them to focus on the most important factors that are
affecting a business and create strategies that are specifically tailored to
these factors.
The other important tool
for the companies to measure and analyze their business policy and strategy is McKinsey
7S Tool. There are total 7 elements described in this tool, and few of them are
considered hard, and others soft elements. But they all work together for an
organization to know that which effects they will be having due to future
changes and what improvements can be made by the organization.
These 7 elements can even
be applied to a project or even to a single team as well, and they can deliver
results for all. The managers can easily identify as well as influence the
three hard elements named as systems, structure & strategy. The other four
elements, which are soft in nature, they are not easy ones to be described,
because they are less tangible to be identified, and organizational culture
will actually define them. These four elements are staff, style, skills &
shared values. It is important for managers to keep in mind that all these
seven elements are connected to each other and depend on each other in so many
ways.
The
other important tool for managers in terms of dealing with market research as
well as consumers is the Gallop Survey. This survey organization helps
companies to get market research for their relevant industry, location and area
of products targeting the targeted consumers. The Gallop Survey can help
companies to get accurate market data with dedicated results regarding
consumers and their behavior towards a certain product or business. For
instance, before launching a business in an area, the managers should use
Gallop Survey to get required market data to see what opportunities they will
have, and what they must do to catch the attention of consumers in that
particular area.