Strategic Management Assignment Solution Sample

Introduction - Strategic Management

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The manager of an organisation is responsible for strategic management activities, this helps to improve performance and competitive advantage for their industry. This is all about description and identification of strategies that are useful for organisational growth. Strategic management is an activity of formulating, implementing and evaluating functional decisions that helps an organisation to attain its objectives and goals (David, 2011). It is an continuous process used by an industry to maintain their competitive advantage. Every organisation is concern about their market position. The report content study about three different organisations that are placed in Malaysia. The major purpose of FAREEDA, OLD TOWN WHITE COFFEE, CROCS is to maintain competitive advantage across the country. FAREEDA is a brand name, they produce and sell exclusive scarves and shawls. Their basic aim is to expansion of business at international level. OLD TOWN COFFEE is famous for providing roasted coffee with the use of original method. They ensure that every cup of coffee give same taste to consumers. CROCS is leading company, they produce innovative footwear for men, women and children. Their major strength is to offers a huge portfolio of every season goods.

A Tasks

The basic state of affairs of business strategy is to find out competitive advantage in which firm can compete with other organisation who are available at the market place. Business strategies that are design by an organisation are helpful in achieving sustainable competitive advantage. Porters' Generic business model are followed by the organisation which are successful in attaining competitive advantage for Fareeda.

Porters Generic Model constitute of four major strategies which involves cost leadership, cost focus, differentiation leadership, differentiation focus. In market and industry segments cost leadership and differentiation strategies lead to competitive advantage. These models are describe as below:

Cost leadership : The basic objective of this strategy is to become the lowest cost operator in firm. There are lots of completion available at market place for a single product, every firm wants to achieve high profit position (Dezsö and Ross, 2012). Fareed mainly focuses towards providing best and quality services at very low price then the pricing strategies adopted by competitors. Alexa is major competitor of Fareeda, this strategy is related with large scale businesses who are offering standardise products to consumers at relatively low prices. It focuses on minimising the cost of goods so that sales can be increases rapidly. Low pricing strategies can be adopted like discounted price, offers, coupons, vouchers etc (Freeman, 2010).

differentiation focus: In this strategy firm focuses towards differentiate their product form other market segments. Differentiate goods are provided to customers according to their specific needs which helps to satisfied them. According to different need and wants of consumers market are segmented which are helpful in easily reaching customers according to their desired needs. Fareeda use niche marketing strategy in which products are undifferentiated and the prices are relatively high as the product is launch first time in market. Company produce scarves and shawls with use of silk and chiffon which are undifferentiated from other competitors.

Differentiation leadership : Through this strategy business targets large market. Their basic aim is to reach at competitive advantage. According to this strategy company position their market on the basis of unique criteria which is selected by buyers. The firm sell their products at premium price. These products have some value added features which are helpful in satisfy need of potential customers.

Fareeda apply cost leadership strategy for attaining their aims and objectives. There is huge competition available at market place so they sell their products at lowest price just to make extra profit then their competitors and to achieve competitive advantage.

Task B

According to me this marketing strategy has a competitive advantage at market place. Major aim of every organisation is to earn high profit with the use of appropriate marketing strategy. The firm concentrated on selling large volume of goods at very low prices, this situation allows an industry to maintain their profit or expand their market share. Most of the consumers are attracted towards low price, they wants to satisfy their own needs at very less price. There is lots of substitute available for a single product at market place, if consumers are not satisfied with services of particular brand or shop then they can easily switch to the others. Fareeda apply cost leadership strategy for attract large number of consumers towards their brand. It is a most applied strategy for maintain sustainability in competitive advantage.

The company is famous for providing high quality material in their scarves and shawls. They sell their product at very low price which is lower as compared to its competitors (Helfat and Winter, 2011). Every different consumer having their own set of choice, and they want goods as per their own needs or wants. Firm produce product as per demand of consumer or new market trend, for satisfy their buyers with services. Fareeda use various unique colours for their scarves and shawls because girls and women are very much attracted towards unique colours. Alexa is competitor of Fareeda, they both use similar strategy to reach at high profit position. Fareeda always charge less as compared to Alexa for maintain large consumers or profit. This strategy is helpful in attaining competitive advantage at market place (Hill, Jones and Schilling, 2014).

For example Fareeda has adopted differential pricing strategy to sell its product at comparative low cost then the prices adopted by competitors which helps in growth and success of business. According to the philosophy of company they produce fashionable or unique scarves or shawls which are different as compared to other scarves that are available at market place. At the time of selling their products they offer wide range of choices at very less and affordable price. Their main purpose is to provide best and beautiful scarves or shawls, so that they look more gorgeous when they wear those scarves and shawls. Their products are widely used by female Muslim, girls.

Task C

Old town white coffee is a famous and largest firm which is placed in Malaysia. This firm mainly focuses towards providing same service to each and every consumers. They apply traditional method or production and they ensure that they always give same taste, feature, texture in their products. Their major purpose is to attract huge buyers towards their firm, so that they can easily reach at profit position. The company export their goods more then 13 country. Large number of consumers are attract towards coffee just for the same taste. They put their all affords to differentiate them form competitors. Old town white coffee use various methods and strategy to maintain sustainability in competitive advantage.

Firm apply unique production method which is different form its competitors. They produce coffee through traditional method ,and this is helpful in achieve aims and objectives. They sell their product at premium price which is beneficial for consumer as well as organisation. They ensure their customers for providing best and quality services. The company use natural equipments and material for production function which differentiate it from others. Cost is a major factor which has impact on consumer choice and preference. Mostly buyers are attract towards low price, they want high degree of satisfaction at very low price (Hodgkinson and Healey, 2011). So old town white coffee taking advantage of this philosophy sell their goods at low prices which is lower as compared to its competitors. The company offer wide variety of coffees as per taste and preference of different consumers. They produce more than 200 different types of coffee which is major strength of this organisation.

Company spend huge amount in offering quality and hygienic services to their consumers. Organisation is very much aware about cleanness of their cafe. The use beautiful mugs or cups to survey coffee to various consumers. They spend on decoration just for attract teenagers or children. Some time firm offers products at low price as compared to daily price. they provide free voucher, offers, coupons, lucky drown for their regular consumers. These all strategies are helpful for old town white coffee for differentiate itself form its competitors (Leiponen and Helfat, 2010).

Task D

To make the survival possible comparison between stark bucks and old town white coffee are discussed below.

Old town white coffee

This is an organisation which provide wide variety of coffee to their consumers. They use traditional method of production, and they ensure their customers that they always provide same taste, texture and feature product. They adopt various strategies to achieve at sustainable competitive advantage (hou and Wu, 2010). The major strength of old town white coffee is they earn high profit as compared to other coffee stores. Their weakness is that their innovation and development is slow because they depend on single product only. Company mainly target consumers on the basis of economic profile such as middle class, privileged class, upper middle. They segment their market demographically in which age, gender, religion, profession are included. Firm apply various strategies of promotion at their target market where large number of consumers are willing to consume products which are offered by old town white coffee. Mostly consumers are concern towards price factor, they mainly attract towards low price. High price consist that firm provide high quality in their products. So on the basis of consumer profile they offer different products on different price.

Starbucks

It is a well established company which is deal with coffee across the world. It is famous for its quality of products which are offered by them. Major aim of Starbucks is to become a most recognized and respected bran across the globe. It is a very profitable organisation, firm generated revenue at very high volume. Major strength of Starbucks is it earn very large volume of profit as compared to other brands. Weakness of firm is it depends on retail of coffee which make their operation slow and diversify in other sectors. Starbucks apply smart partnership strategy which lead the firm at high position, for this their sales is increased.

Firm is mainly concern about providing satisfactory service to their consumers so that they can enjoy last drop of coffee with same interest and taste. The major attractive strategy which is adopted by Starbucks is they provide perfect cup of coffee form beginning it is evaluated that price of Starbucks is comparatively high because of high quality. They set their price in order to attaining high profit, they segment their market on the basis of income of person. They mainly target to high profile people, because they want quality products. They never concern about price factor (Makri, Hitt and Lane, 2010).

From the above comparison it has been evaluated that old town white coffee can survive while competing with Starbucks. The major reason behind this company use low pricing strategy to attract consumers even they provide high quality in very low price. Price of starbucks is competitively high then other brands so it is easy for old town white coffee to compete with Starbucks and earn profit.

Task E

Crocs Inc is worlds leading footwear brand which deals in men, women, children footwear. Competitive advantage consider with important part of company in order to compete form all external components. It enlighten the benefits that are received by customers when they are connect with business organisations. It can be in form of services, products, even location as well as reputation. Managers of Crocs should have to conduct a market research to know the needs and wants of buyers; it is also helpful for attracting many potential consumers. Along with this, for find out the competitive advantage of their entities, employers need to understand its customers as well as competitors.

• What do they need to do to become successful in future
• Why potential buyers not buy at all
• Why customer purchase form Crocs
• Why users are willing to purchase from competitors

All these questions are assist in order to conduct a market research. The researcher can easily identify the factors that impact on organisation's performance in competitive market. There are mention below some benefits of competitive advantage that are as follow: -

Basic financial planning – Competitive advantage is enable to create plans and strategies for future. It is also helpful in order to know the strength and weakness of competitors so as managers can develop their planning according. Along with this, competitive advantage also beneficial for developing annual budgeting which is enable to reduce financial problems of cited organisation. The procedure responsible to manage sales revenues, profit & loss statements and balance sheets of business organisation.

Forecasting for future – Competitive advantage is also helpful in order to forecasting for future to the development of cited company. With managers can easily identifies which factors will impact on the growth and performance of company in upcoming period. In addition, it can be also helpful to reducing the complexities for large enterprises (Powell, Lovallo and Fox, 2011).

Strong action plan – When managers are not able to take long term decisions so then competitive advantage helps them. They often fail in it due to some external forces. In the absence of all these strategies it makes easier the process of decision making.

Task F

Crocs is a well known footwear brand, they mainly focuses on attracting large number of buyer with their organisation. At the time of production they are mainly concentrated on different colours and design because mostly people want unique colour and design in their foot wears. It is not easy to compete with a famous brand on which people having faith and trust.

For competing with Crocs I am going to add some different feature in my product just to attract more customers then crocs. Pricing policies will be design to keeping in mind the policies adopted by competitors. Providing extra voucher, coupons, free offers to their potential buyers. For making our brand known to public I am conducting some advertisement functions for providing proper detail of product. Crocs capture the market of more than 90 countries because of their quality and feature in products. It is not that easy to survive in competitive market my firm appoint those people who are having knowledge of market.

More than one language is known by them, they need to have nice command on marketing aspects for convene and attract large number of consumers (Wheelen and Hunger, 2011Z. As per the discussion with my manager and employees I m trying to add some advance and innovative techniques for production function. According to marketing survey my major focus is on price of goods because more consumers are attract towards low price. For making awareness about the product my organisation provide goods at very low price then crocs.

Conclusion

As per the above discussion it has been founded that every organisation is focuses on attracting large number of consumers with their products and services. Fareeda, old town white coffee and Crocs are well known firms, they apply various marketing strategies for achieving competitive advantage. They three are famous for their uniqueness and best quality of products. Getting position of competitive advantage firm gets more profit and benefit. In this competitive world it is not easy to survive in market and competing with others. Mostly organisations apply price leadership style for pull in consumers towards a particular brand. In today's scenario people are more brand conscious, they usually run towards attractive and famous brand.

Reference

Books and Journals

• David, F. R., 2011. Strategic management: Concepts and cases. Peaeson/Prentice Hall.
• Dezsö, C.L. and Ross, D. G., 2012. Does female representation in top management improve firm performance? A panel data investigation. Strategic Management Journal. 33(9). pp.1072-1089.
• Freeman, R. E., 2010. Strategic management: A stakeholder approach. Cambridge University Press.
• Helfat, C. E. and Winter, S. G., 2011. Untangling dynamic and operational capabilities: Strategy for the (N) ever‐changing world. Strategic management journal. 32(11). pp.1243-1250.
• Hill, C. W., Jones, G. R. and Schilling, M. A., 2014. Strategic management: theory: an integrated approach. Cengage Learning.
• Hodgkinson, G. P. and Healey, M. P., 2011. Psychological foundations of dynamic capabilities: reflexion and reflection in strategic management. Strategic Management Journal.32(13). pp.1500-1516.
• Leiponen, A. and Helfat, C. E., 2010. Innovation objectives, knowledge sources, and the benefits of breadth. Strategic Management Journal. 31(2). pp.224-236.
• Makri, M., Hitt, M. A. and Lane, P. J., 2010. Complementary technologies, knowledge relatedness, and invention outcomes in high technology mergers and acquisitions. Strategic Management Journal. 31(6), pp.602-628.
• Powell, T. C., Lovallo, D. and Fox, C. R., 2011. Behavioral strategy. Strategic Management Journal. 32(13). pp.1369-1386.
• Wheelen, T. L. and Hunger, J. D., 2011. Concepts in strategic management and business policy. Pearson Education India.
• Zhou, K. Z. and Wu, F., 2010. Technological capability, strategic flexibility, and product innovation. Strategic Management Journal. 31(5). pp.547-561.

Online

What is strategic management. 2013. [Online]. Available Through: <http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/strategic-management.html>. [Accessed on 22 JUNE 2017].