Discussion questions

Question 1

Ethical egoism is considered as part of the consequentialism theory because the theory approves an act to be morally right if every consequence of the action done is positive and vice versa for a moral wrong. The ethical egoism only narrows the claim by stressing on the maximization of self-interest. The basis of the ethical egoism is therefore grounded on how sufficient an action is to self interest o the doer.

Question 2

Ethical egoist will never come to consider other people’s interests because all it focuses on is that each person is only concerned about his or her own welfare. For instance, people usually desire what others are doing like playing so that they can establish their own welfare. However, this contradicts the claim of the ethical egoism which holds that people are only concerned about sel interest matters.

Question 3

The utilitarianism considers a morally upright action is that which maximizes utility. This includes the well-being and pleasure of the adjacent victims of the action. Being a form of consequentialism, it uses the consequences to measure the rightness or wrongness of an action regardless of the doer’s interests.

Question 4

According to Bentham, happiness is measured by the number of people whose interest coincides with a certain consequence of an action. This means that the greatest happiness is that which the greatest number of people in favor of it. Mill on the other hand considers happiness as a moral desirable action regardless of the number of people.

Question 5

According to mill, happiness is a desire people long to feel. Trading human life in exchange of a happy pig directly reflects Mill’s view of happiness. However, Mill puts happiness boundaries by claiming that it must be moral. Therefore, it is not his view to trade human life in exchange of a happy pig because of the moral of the action.

Marketing

The most memorable advert is one of the most recognized brand in the world. Coca-Cola marketing gimmicks have led to a number of smile videos of a very special vending machine. Coca-Cola has been labeled as a happiness machine that has made an appearance in many nations and the adverts have received a remarkable online recognition. Due to the laughter, the adverts evoke and at least a smile the adverts creates the best memories which every individual would want (Batra, Myers & Aaker, 2009).

The Coca-Cola adverts are able to achieve their purpose due to the mark they leave due to the humorous sense they have. The advert shows how joy is created by sharing a Coca-Cola drink. The advertiser has also been able to accomplish purpose as they have used different people across the continent, numerous adverts at all times and advertising in many nations has enabled the company to strengthen the name of its brand (Batra, Myers & Aaker, 2009). This has made the product more memorable due to the successful adverts.

As a result of the memorable adverts, it's it true to say one would go sampling the entire Coca-Cola products in order to see if they will experience the happiness or the smile. I bought the product as a result of the humor the adverts have (Batra, Myers & Aaker, 2009). Some brands have been in the market for some time while others are new in the market but are not widely known. I have been unable to buy some of the products due to poor advertising. This is because the adverts have not created the desire in me to be strong enough to try their products.

Reference

Batra, R., Myers, J. G., & Aaker, D. A. (2009). Advertising management. New Delhi: Pearson.

Finance Plan

1. Governance

The corporate governance and public administration roles  have come under great assessment due to globalisation and the effects it has on organisations and governments, constantly changing environment that is influencing the outplay of competition among various market in the global economies and the pressure to adapt to all these changes since the early 21^st century . Globalisation has been a movement aimed at greater integration, interaction and interdependence among the populace and organisation across various national borders. The benefits that are currently derived from the globalization which includes better resource allocation, more output and higher standards of living and improved access to a variety of goods and services have come to be accepted widely in recent years (United Nations, 2002).

While there may be limited evidence of globalisation’s quantitative impact on government revenues, increased competition on taxation by various nations to attract foreign portfolio and direct investment, improved mobility of production factors, growth in electronic commerce and threat of growing tax havens all indicate to possible reduction in such revenues (United Nations. & United Nations. 2007).The developing economies have found themselves needing to implement reforms on public expenditures so as to remain competitive in global markets. This has included financial management reforms to create an enabling environment outside reforms on aspects of budgets and thus bring on board fiscal balance macroeconomic control, public participation to ensure fiscal transparency and constant regulatory framework. These changes have been brought about by increased agitation for public participation in policy making and focused attention on public interest. Thus the public organisations such as parastatals and corporations have turned to advancing technology to make fiscal data and information accessible in order to empower the citizens (Almadani, 2015). The government have found solution in greater transparency and accountability.

4. CEO compensation

The schemes used to pay CEOs and which are tied to organization’s performance have constantly been manipulated by the companies, a practice that can seem to bilk taxpayers’ big amounts of money. Significant portions of executive compensation have been a contingent once the companies hit certain threshold of good performance (Mullaney, 2015). These remunerations have been attached to the perception that CEOs are more important than other employees and their performance has the biggest influence on the overall performance of the organisation. The astronomical salaries and bonuses paid to the top executives have resulted to a compensation scale that is skewed towards top management. Since CEO compensation is tagged to the performance of the firm, there was a pairing back of CEO compensation in the early 2000s due to the fall in stock market that was experienced then, but the compensation returned to its normal level after the stock market had mostly recovered by 2007. The financial crisis in 2008 made the level of CEO compensation to fall again which made the CEO-worker compensation ratio to fall in tandem (Institute for Policy Studies, 2015). The differing payments between the CEO and the workers can thus be attributed to compensation systems that encourages  and rewards to employees with short-term incentives like bonuses which is then funded while ensuring that whole  pay budget is not blown off. These changes do not mean that the top notch employees are performing better. In fact, it is not surprising to conclude that only about half of annual incentives for top employees result to better performance. Furthermore, the high and rising CEO compensation reflect income that would have used to assist others in an economy (Davis and Mishel, 2014)

5. Reforms

The widespread accounting and corporate scandals in the early 2000s made regulators and U.S stock exchange to approve various regulatory reforms so as to attain improvement on corporate governance which included the need to increase the board of directors’ independence. The approval of new rules by the Securities Exchange commission made it a requirement for listed companies to have most of the members of boards being independent directors (McKnisey &Company, 2013). A primary aim of the reforms has been to enhance the monitoring function by the board more so financial reporting monitoring. To achieve the benefits of these reforms and increased value, a lot of training for these independent directors would be necessary. This involve directors with less impact and experience learning from those with high impact and experience especially when it comes to developing strategies. This would include increasing information accessibility since independent directors do not have as much information as the managers. To further improve the board performance, there have been proposal to separate the titles of chairman and CEO so as to avoid management that has de facto control (Tonello, 2011). Moreover, to avoid the case of individual compensation especially the board members, at the expense of maximising stockholder value, there have been proposals to involve separate compensation programs that include unions, proxy advisories, human resources, executives and federal or regulatory agencies (Tonello, 2011). This will ensure that the stockholders are involved in decision making.

6

The institutional investors have increasingly become part of corporate governance but have relied heavily on the decisions made by management, which includes the board of directors, to in performing their roles in corporate governance. The investors, however, represent the interest of the shareholders by ensuring that they look after the safeguard their rights and shares and ensure that they access basic information on their investments. The effectiveness of the whole system of corporate governance depend to a great extent on the assurance that the institutional investors will make use of the rights of their shareholders and thus fully exercise effectively their ownership roles in the firms that they invest in. Issues have arisen from the misdirection of management boards of directors on the investment in the NYSE (OECD, 2011).

The lack of independence on the institutional investors has resulted to them welcoming the board’s requirements   and their recommendation. Despite the institutional wishing to get involved in the various decisions made by the management and the board of directors, they finally let go off their guards due to this increased dependence. They are thus by-passed in implementation and determination of very important issues such as compensation of the executives, investment portfolios and other NYSE investment decisions (OECD, 2011). The investors on the other hand have tried to engage shareholders through voting. Many laws and policies mandate voting by some institutional investors or encourage them to do so. Portfolio stocks institutional voting has largely been removed from the hands of money managers except in cases where the votes have economic significance that is bigger like mergers and elections. Most institutional investors have resulted to delegating the voting decision to voting function from within or outsourcing of this function from proxy advisory organizations.  The failure by institutional investors to disclose voting policies, whether the voting is done internally or outsourced would amount to misrepresentation of the rights of the shareholders. This is because any voting by the institutions is supposed to be done on behalf of the shareholders, thus the requirement for them to disclose the procedures put in place for decisions relating to their voting rights (Small, 2014).

8

With increased pressure for the separation of CEO and the roles of board chairman by activist shareholders, proxy advisory organizations, regulators and institutional investors there have been suggestions for elimination of CEO roles in the board of directors including determining its compensation (Tonello, 2011). This has also included call to increase independent board members to deliberate in privacy issues. There has also been greater call for Corporate Reporting Dialogue in order to achieve greater consistency, coherence and compatibility the reporting frameworks, standards and other related requirements. This has been aimed at ensuring great transparency now that the CEO does not determine who will be on the board of directors list (The Institute of Internal Affairs, 2015). A fair dialogue will be achieved if the board does not consist of people with conflicting interests such as family members. The overall effect where there are conflicting interest would be the board rubberstamping the management decisions without questioning. This also would worse if the managers are unqualified. There have been recommendation for the board of directors to fulfil their oversight roles in the process of financial reporting and audit process with audit committee being given the authority to authorize or carry out investigations into matters they are responsible for (The Institute of Internal Affairs, 2015).

References

United Nations, (2002).Globalization and new challenges of public finance: Financial management, transparency and accountability.

United Nations. & United Nations. (2007). Industrial development for the 21st century: Sustainable development perspectives. New York: United Nations. 29-45

Almadani, A. (2015). Globalization and Corporate Governance. International Journal of Innovation, Management and Technology, Vol. 5, No. 5.

 Mullaney, T. (2015).Why corporate CEO pay is so high, and going higher. Retrieved from: http://www.cnbc.com/2015/05/18/why-corporate-ceo-pay-is-so-high-and-going-higher.html

Statement of Common Principles of Materiality of the Corporate Reporting Dialogue. http://corporatereportingdialogue.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/Statement-of-Common-Principles-of-Materiality1.pdf

Institute for Policy Studies, (2015).Money to burn; how CEO pay is accelerating climate change. Retrieved from: http://www.ips-dc.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/EE2015-Money-To-Burn-Upd.pdf

Davis, A., Mishel, L. (2014).CEO Pay Continues to Rise as typical workers are paid less. Retrieved from: http://www.epi.org/publication/ceo-pay-continues-to-rise/

OECD (2011).The Role of Institutional Investors in Promoting Good Corporate Governance, Corporate Governance, OECD Publishing. doi: 10.1787/9789264128750-en

Small, C. (2014). The Role of Institutional Investors in Voting. Retrieved from: https://corpgov.law.harvard.edu/2012/05/14/the-role-of-institutional-investors-in-voting/

McKnisey &Company, (2013).Improving board governance: McKinsey Global Survey results.1.

Matteo Tonello, (2011).Separation of Chair and CEO Roles. Retrieved from: https://corpgov.law.harvard.edu/2011/09/01/separation-of-chair-and-ceo-roles/

The Institute of Internal Affairs, (2015). Quality ensuring excellence. Model Audit Committee Charter. Retrieved from: https://global.theiia.org/standards-guidance/Public%20Documents/MODEL_AUDIT_COMMITTEE_CHARTER.pdf

Marketing

Bloomingdales is an American store that sells selected designer brands together with pricey merchandise. As a way of marketing the company designed large plates made of glass which was to act as display windows (Erickson, & Johnson, 2008). The company opted not to have the common practice of covering the display windows with the collection of goods they sold but they had the store featured wherein each window a couple of products were sold as props (Erickson, & Johnson, 2008). On the other hand, Nordstrom is an upscale fashion retailer in America whose inventory includes clothing, high-end shoes, and fragrances. As a way of marketing Nordstrom have full-line stores, Nordstrom Racks, club houses, boutiques and a clearance store. It also serves its customers through Nordstrom.com and other websites one of which they sell privately online. In addition, it also trades publicly increasing the number of stores (Spector, & McCarthy, 2012). From the above Bloomingdales is more pleasing due to the window displays that are not covered. This means a customer can have an entire look on all the items without necessarily getting in the store. As a result of using the window display, many people were attracted making it a tourist site. Nordstrom, on the other hand, is more functional and user-friendly as it offered online marketing earlier enough. This is a convenient way of its customers as they can shop online (Spector, & McCarthy, 2012).

Both Bloomingdales and Nordstrom have embraced e-commerce as a way of marketing the high-end women shoes. Bloomingdales has embraced Instagram and Facebook accounts. The accounts have photos and videos of the products (Erickson, & Johnson, 2008). The company has also embraced coupons, promo codes and discounts which are made online as well. The company also uses LinkedIn and Google in its marketing. Nordstrom has also embraced online marketing and in stores for its products on Facebook and Instagram. The company also sells its product on twitter which is versatile to many people despite the region. The company also acknowledges Pinterest and LinkedIn (Spector, & McCarthy, 2012).

Both companies have embraced Facebook advertising but they have not considered the use of video and web conferencing. It would be advisable if the companies’ video conferencing with the clients. This will make them interacted one on one with the clients which will make the clients more comfortable (Spector, & McCarthy, 2012). This will also increase customer’s confidence with the companies because they can raise their concerns directly the concerned persons (Erickson, & Johnson, 2008).

Using Google search engine Nordstrom does a better job in search engine optimization as it appears first in high-end women’s shoes. This indicates that Nordstrom has greatly invested in advertising online in order to make sure that their clients have a wide range of choices to choose from (Spector, & McCarthy, 2012). The women designer shoes range for all occasion’s shoes, height, and style which include designer’s arrivals and the bestselling variety of shoes which have featured trends.

Both websites generate revenue on the online platform such as popups and banners adverts. This is because this advert creates more awareness to the customers about the products they have and the price range (Erickson, & Johnson, 2008). As a result, people try to buy their products in order to have the experience of shopping in this websites online which in turn generates revenue for the companies (Spector, & McCarthy, 2012). The popup adverts may be annoying at times but on the other hand, they create a wide range of options in which online shoppers look for. Therefore the advertisements are beneficial to both parties.

Reference

Erickson, A., & Johnson, M. E. (2008). Bloomingdale. Charleston, SC: Arcadia Pub.

Spector, R., & McCarthy, P. D. (2012). The Nordstrom Way to Customer Service Excellence: The Handbook For Becoming the "Nordstrom" of Your Industry. Hoboken: John Wiley & Sons.

BUSINESS AND MANAGEMENT

1. Which variations in demand for police services should be considered in an aggregate plan for resources? Which variations can be accomplished with short-term scheduling adjustments?

As much as this case is concerned, the aggregate planning is the one which should be considered with the exact quantity as well as the timing of the entire production for the intermediate future (Sommerville 62). Moreover, what this means all that it will be encompassing is the time horizon of the extreme working months.

2. Evaluate the current staffing plan. What does it cost? Are 26 officers sufficient to handle the normal workload?

The current staffing plan entails doesn’t really sound as the sufficient number to take. This is because, as a means of balancing the number of the officers in the institution, there is the need of adding the officers. Such extra officers are the ones which will assist the current workload of the officers (Sommerville 70).   The overtime time allocated should also be limited in order to meet the its objectives

3. What would be the additional cost of the chief’s proposal? How would you suggest that the

Justify his request?

This is amount is of coz more than the expected one. Adjustment will to be met in order to meet the budgeted amount of the institution

4. How much does it currently cost the college to provide police services for football games?

What would be the pros and cons of completely subcontracting this work to outside law enforcement agencies?

In this case, what we can say is that, there exist various aspects which act as the controlling factors. This is because as much as the size of the athletic program is increasing there will be the reduction of the prevention programs. The rationale for this is giving the officers at least 10 hours of the overtime for each week as well as adding about 4 new officers.  The cons for this strategy are because it might not help other officers during the fall or the spring semesters.

Thus, the general cost will be;

18 officers who will be working at duration of 8 hours overtime. This will amount to @ 18.00/hr 8 officers’ work. Subcontracting it implies that the security will be highly visible hence the absence of the police will have the possibility of hurting the institution.

5. Propose other alternatives.

When it comes to the case which deals with proposing the best alternatives, the best one is that the institution should formulate and implement such strategies during summer. The reason for that is because during that time always there are les students in the institution. The sworn of the officers should also be in the position of ensuring that they have thought each volunteers as well as other helping officers about the program for instance crime prevention, theft and so on (Sommerville 237). This is what will assists in reducing the workload or the cost of the services to be offered.

Work cited

Sommerville, Kerry L. Hospitality Employee Management and Supervision: Concepts and Practical Applications. Hoboken, N.J: Wiley, 2007. Print.

Jacques, Roy. Manufacturing the Employee: Management Knowledge from the 19th to 21st Centuries. London: Sage Publications, 1996. Internet resource.

            Personal Assessments and Strengths

            Question 1

            After finding out my top five strengths I was not surprised by the results.  This is because the strengths categories described the person that I am full.  The results did not surprise me mostly not because I understood my strengths but because I found that I hold the capabilities as the results indicated. My top 5 results based on my strengths include focus, learner, responsibility, responsibility and consistency (Loomis, 2013).

            Question 2

            These traits are associated with my style of leadership.  This is because I believe that leadership requires the provision of directions, plans development, plans implementation and motivating individuals. My leadership styles involved being an afflictive leader and a democratic one. This is because I do not believe in authority as it creates pressure among individual thus breaking the bond that would create a belonging sensation.  Being an afflictive leader helps in creating sensational bonds between the leader and the employees thus generating a belonging sensation. This additionally helps in providing direction to individuals (Bonnici, 2011).  Democratic leadership helps in ensuring that the employees are fully involved in decision-making programs. This helps in increasing performance as the modes of achieving things is developed in democratic platforms.

            Question 3

            The role of an administrator is to guarantee that stuffs are completed in the precise mode whereas a leader guarantees that the precise effects are completed.  Managers are therefore the major facilitators of the success of their employees as they work to ensure that individuals have everything that they require in order to be successful and productive.  My strengths are related to the roles that I hope to perform as a manager because I have to ensure that teams are properly trained, holds minimal performance blocks and that they are happy (Gallup, 2013).  This can only be achieving through consistency and responsibility.  Manager Managers a corporation not based on titles but the strengths that he or she holds (Bose, 2013).  The best manager allows consistently distinct leaders to come up and inspire the organization's teams.  A corporation influences the strengths of its employees and builds a stronger and an influential culture through accepting, understanding, delivering as well as rewarding its employees for the best performance.  This helps in identifying the weaknesses of the employees and establishing what can be done in order to ensure that strength is developed out of the weakness (Bose, 2013).  I need to work on the learner strength in order to gain the capability of learning my employee’s strengths and weaknesses and helping them to develop solutions.  I, therefore, need to be a patient individual’s as learning the personal traits of individuals may prove to be tiring.  Being flexible helps in adapting to different changes that may arise since the leadership world is evolving constantly (Bose, 2013). In these periods of changes, leaders are necessitated to change their course by establishing how the organization is supposed to survive and determining a fresh way of achieving the developed goals.

Question 4

Responsibility is the other traits I need to work on.  A responsible leader must possess the ability to care for the employees as well as good communication.  Several individuals are good orators, however, delivering a good speech is not all that is necessitated from a leader.  This is because individuals may deliver good gaming talk but at the end they deliver nothing.  A leader who holds great communication is that leader who shares their thoughts with the employees by demonstrating the individual character and their strengths through communication (Iqbal, 2011).  This helps in empowering the organization’s employees by defining the objectives of the business and demonstrating how the organization can get there.  This requires courage and the tenacity of not succumbing to business pressure.  Doing all this at the same period helps one in becoming a real and a successful leader (Iqbal, 2011).  These traits differ from the traits I necessitate to utilize as a manager. This is because despite being a responsible manager one is necessitates to be a participative person.  This is by ensuring that interaction is fully created amid the employees and the management.  A manager is involved in organizing, leading, controlling as well as planning which requires commitment and determination.

Question 5

The four traits that I anticipate to utilize most in school as well as in my future career are, learning, responsibility, focus as well as consistency.  In order to get things done in the right way, directions must always be developed. This involves developing and implementing plans of achieving the stated goals.  By utilizing focus I will ensure that the path to achieving certain goals in school as well as in my future career is maintained.  Consistency implies sticking to the stated and developed plans without fail this helps in increasing one's understanding. Additionally, this helps in adapting to changes quickly as businesses are characterized by rapid changes (Iqbal, 2011).  Responsibility is mostly required in improving production as well as becoming a successful leader.  In my future career, I will be a responsible person in order to ensure that I become a motivation to others. This is by ensuring that I hold good communication skills.  This will be useful in bonds creation between me and other employees that creating an opportunity for development.

            Reflection

Bonnici, C. A. (2011). Creating a successful leadership style: Principles of personal strategic planning. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Education.

Bose, C. (2013). Principles of management and administration. Place of publication not identified: Prentice-Hall Of India.

Gallup S. (2013). Strategic – Learning About Your Innate Talents From  Gallup’s Clifton Strengthsfinder. Retrived From https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7sWM36m3d48&list=PLxDaK7wIyw9609RQuIcVwcCtJ6j17hmO4&index=1

            Iqbal, T. (2011). The impact of leadership styles on organizational effectiveness: Analytical study of selected organizations in IT sector in Karachi. Munich: Grin Verlag.

Loomis T. (2013). Start Here- An Overview of The Strengths Finder Movement. Retrieved From https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=50J8DYo7r44&list=PLhYBLDN6sURWX7h8IdebX2CYyR9QwqoDX

How to improve Armstrong place of work

            There are so many businesses emerging each and every single day and thus this has raised so much competition amongst all the people. One can hardly get a business that is the only business dealing with that line of business without other competitors even if it means competition from other businesses that offer substitute goods.  Therefore business administration has to work extremely hard so that they can change most of their operations so as to adopt new systems and operations that will see them through the success process. Those business that have considered improving on all the sectors within their work place has seen so much growth over the period and thus have been able to compete efficiently with their competitors. The so many businesses that are regarded as the best in the market have had to advance on their operations and also their resources including the human resources and the physical resources that are needed and the management of the business. Therefore no business person or manager can ignore the great need to improve on productivity of the business. Armstrong organization has gone through tremendous changes that are geared towards improving the organizations operations and productivity in general. This has therefore demanded the business administration to accept in changes and believe in the positive implications of these changes so that the organization can be encouraged to aspire to be the best in the market and hence discouraging fixing of the wrongs that may be in the organization. This paper will therefore major on discussing the proper description of Armstrong Company, the type of structure in the organization, problems facing the organization, current organizational theories, solutions on the problems and recommendation.

            Armstrong World Company is located in Pennsylvania which was incorporated in the year 1891. Its operations are available worldwide and it deals with designing and manufacturing of floors and ceilings. The company is based in Lancaster in the United States and it has thirty two companies in eight different countries where they undertake their operations. Their stocks began to be traded in the New York stock exchange in October of the year 2006 (Slaton & Vault 2006).

            The company was established by Armstrong Thomas who was later joined by John Glass where they opened a one room shop in Pennsylvania where they carved bottle corks by hands. Their first deliveries were made by the use of wheelbarrow locally but by the end of the 1890s the company had experienced growth and was regarded as the largest suppliers of cork in the world. Later they introduced the corkboard, brick, fine board and then later the ceiling board. The cork tile and linoleum was later developed in vinyl flooring and into ceramic tiling and laminate floors and finally to carpets. In the 1906, they purchased an Armstrong minor which was basically purchased to act as the central location where it hosted the organizations young sales employees who were under training. Later the house was used for so many other uses that included a place to hold meetings and also to house employees who were visiting the company. The manor is still in use and recently it has been used to host vising employees and customers of the Armstrong Company and its continuing provision of space for meetings. This manor also has some parts that are set aside for maintenance of the minor. Later in 2011, the Armstrong manor was sold as it was regarded that the department was not part of the building and manufacturing of the company. Over the past years there have been environmental complaints since the company did not observe on preserving the environment. They were producing asbestos which is incombustible. The company however stopped the production of asbestos and are now involved in the production of the vinyl, wood floor covering and interior furnishes (Slaton & Vault 2006).

            The company therefore prides themselves in being part of those that are committed to the sustainability of the environment. The company is the leading organization in the designing and manufacturing of floors and ceiling. The company has undergone innovative process in their residential as well as the profit-making products designs, elucidations and services rendered to customers. As a result of this inn ovation, there has been an increase in customers into the company as the organization is capable of delivering exceptional interior spaces that they visualize for themselves and their customers (Slaton & Vault 2006). The company specializes in housing flooring and ceilings, business ceilings and flooring and wall systems. The company is also involved in the manufacturing of cabinets and is ranked as the seventh manufacturing and distributing industry in the United States. It offers six wood species in its stock and also in its semi-routine cabinets. Manufacturing operation serves approximately three thousand customers and it has around twenty six networking facilities.

            The company size is within 5001-10,000 employees but the current employees are approximately 7500 employees globally. The organization is a public company. The company claims that their operations are based entirely on reliability, respect, diversity, endless improvement and desire for safety.

Structure

            The company is subdivided into three businesses that are the resilient floor cover, wood floor cover and building materials. Resilient floor cover deals with the production of vinyl and laminate floor coverings and linoleum floor cover in overseas countries. The building material business involves the making of ceilings mostly for business use and this is the strongest segment of the company. The company is favorably Self-motivated in relation to pricing and organization structure. The company is leading in the market as a result of the duopolistic business hence has a leading market share. The ceiling business is regarded as the most capitalistic as it can be capitalized at considerably higher multiples just as it would in a standalone business. While the floor covers business offers assets that are on the other hand subject to earnings instability, lower pricing and in a lower position in the market thus does not enjoy the market benefits that ceiling business receives (Slaton & Vault 2006).  

            The organization structure of the company is organized in such a way that there is the predisposition to increase task specialization as the company is developing and growing larger. There are several departments that are grouped and established according to the task or roles in the organization. All those tasks that are involved in almost similar task for example all accounting employees are organized and grouped together where there is a supervisor or a head of that department who ensures that the operations in that department are carried out as expected. The company’s management ensures that they identify challenges that are facing the business and they find changes that can help solve these issues and when given directive from the board of directors they implement these changes (Coombs & Holladay 2012). There are the employees who are in the subordinate category and they are the ones who are tasked with the manual roles. The sizes of these groupings or the departments are determined by the number of people a manger is supposed to supervise.

            The company has its operating standards which describes the way in which the company conducts its business that includes their commitment to respect the worthiness and the inherent rights of every stakeholder in the company. The company’s commitment extends to their suppliers as they strive to serve the suppliers interests fairly and conscientiously. They are able to manage their supply chains with their partners and the suppliers must meet the Armstrong management process. This will include the contract obligation to abide by the rules and regulations of the countries in which the company is conducting their business.

The company evaluates the suppliers’ according to their abilities to meet those obligations. The suppliers are also monitored by the company so as to measure the suppliers’ performance and appropriateness where the company requires these suppliers to submit details that demonstrate compliance with the company’s obligations. It is through this management process that the company is able to acquire quality suppliers in a quality supply chain. The company uses a third party in the supply verification process. They also carry out an audit on the suppliers so as to verify that they have met the legal and regulatory contract obligations.

            All employees in the organization are required to complete their training as pertaining to the Armstrong Code of Company conduct. They are also required to certify that they will follow these standards in their daily work in the company. However those workers with specific job responsibilities related to the supplier management usually receive more training on Armstrong management and audit techniques.

The company has been using low cost techniques of communication within the business where their promotions use minimal resources and this is a considerable step as it helps on saving finances and thus preventing the stakeholders from complaining (Coombs & Holladay 2012).

            The company has embraced the values that were exemplified in the operating principles that were adopted in the 1960. The company has been holding onto the legacy that was set by its founder by ensuring that acts fairly and that it strikes a balance between the interest of its customers, shareholders, workers, general public, suppliers, the society, and government.

 This makes the company to be more consistent on these principles and authority and compliance is taken seriously. The company therefore uses corporate governance and they have made this governance stronger by expanding the committee charter and have also established multiple means in which the shareholders are able to contact the board of directors. The boards of directors are made up of outside directors with the exemption of the CEO. There are several regular holdings of the executive sessions without the presence of the management and they have regular access to the company’s employees.

The auditors, compensation as well as the governance committee have charters that guide their operations. The board of directors often encourages the customers, shareholders, stakeholders and the general public to give their feedbacks, concerns and their thoughts that would help the company in improving their operations so as to serve them well.

Problems

            Armstrong faces some challenges along the process of their operations for instance; there is short supply of raw materials into the company due to the nature of these raw materials. For instance there is the short supply of plasticizers and when they are available their cost is sensitive as a result of price fluctuations in oil resource. Most of the times, the producer specifies the amount of supply that will be supplied to Armstrong despite their order. The long time basis taken by the company to order raw materials creates a lot of problems especially when there is an increase in demand and the customer requires the goods within a shorter period. Hence the scale of manufacturing is low thus there is minimal space that can accommodate too much raw materials or work that is in progress.

Thus there are higher chances of late delivery in case the raw materials have been delivered late and this may affect the company negatively by losing their customers as they may view them as unreliable. Another challenge is on the ink that is used during the work in progress have are short live hence must be used so quickly so that the entire batch cannot be contaminated and if it is contaminated then the whole batch must be scrapped. This is therefore a reason as to why the company has a minimal work in progress.

            The fact that the world is globalizing each day, the company is limited towards producing excessive products even though they might have a long life basing on sales but with changes in fashion, the product produced may not be in fashion within a short time (Turker & Altuntas 2014).

This therefore limits the production of the company hence minimal growth of the company. Overreliance of only a few employees to carry out a certain task in the company has caused the company great challenge as the location of the expertise knowhow is within only a few employees thus making the company weak. 

            Effects of the problems and Solutions        

            These problems within the company has raised concerns within the company’s management and thus to correct these problems they have been able to strategize on the various ways in which they implement in the company. Changes within the company affected the company in a way that the company has to change its schedule on the undertaking of the operations.

            According to the organization theory, overdependence on a group of employees may cause problems within the organization in cases where the employees are on leave or when the employees have retired or have quitted the job (Daft 2006).

This is because the replacement of the human resource may take longer than it is supposed to take hence the company may undergo slow operations and hence losses. 

            Basing on the organizational theory and design, it is advisable that the company distributes its role to the employees without overloading some employees in some departments especially the technological department that are involved in innovations. Thus there should be employed many workers within this department so that when one employee is not in then there can be others to fill that gap without affect ting the entire company. The result will be continuous success over the time without any chances of slow work in progress due to failure of just a small number of the employees for instance two or three employees.

The company therefore ought to demonstrate the effects that one decision has on the rest of the company thus this will help the company’s employees to understand the company in entirety and any action that they take affects the company. This will thus enable them to improve on the quality of their work by avoiding any careless acts that affects the business. 

            The company has thus been able to accept and adopt the preactor technology that involves scheduling and production planning.  Thus the company has integrated the internal scheduling of suppliers deliveries together with the dispatch system. The company has thus achieved tremendous local results as a result of the use of this technology. However, it is recommended that in the company should conglomerate the effects of rolling out of this system throughout the company so as to be successful. This will ensure that the entire supply chain approach is effective thus no late deliveries and quality services are given with quality products that are readily available in the company hence good customer relation.

            According to Daft, the contingency approach that enhances the measure of effectiveness basing on different parts of the company for instance, the resource centered approach. This approach evaluates the company’s effectiveness by observing the operation process from the beginning to the end and whether it has obtained the important resources that are necessary in attaining high performance (Daft 2006).

Armstrong Company therefore has failed in this approach as it does not have adequate resources that are important in ensuring that the company has attained success. This affect the company since it cannot be able to use it to obtain performance when there are no other performance indicators.

is thus recommended that the company finds the necessary resources that will help in making the company’s operations a success and this will enhance the effectiveness of the company. With the increase in the market served and the growth of the company, it is recommended that the company should add on more departments and positions where there will be more managers and supervisors who will coordinate these added departments. This will help to serve many and also this will help in solving of the uncertainties within the company.

            The company has only few employees who are involved in the technical tasks in the business hence there are no technical staff that are found in the external environment doing market research. It is thus commended that the company should add buffer departments that are responsible for the technical core of the company. The business should also implement the business intelligence where it represents the new approach of boundary- spanning responsibilities that link and bring together the company key elements in the external company’s environment (Daft 2006).  This will ensure that there are high practical analysis of both the internal and external information that shows patterns and relationships that might be relevant for the company. This mainly assists the company in identifying the market gaps and the trends in the line of business thus, allowing the company to make necessary changes that will see it to success.

            An organization may face challenges in achieving its objective. Bureaucratic theory may hinder an organization from succeeding. There is danger in simplifying that the organization could achieve improvement when there is over authority and an intense hierarchical power (Hales 2000). This means that the organization will be run in more of a directorship program where the employees are not heard or listen to. They are obliged to work accordingly. This means that the employees are not motivated as they work for long hours with little pay.

This affects the business adversely since efficiency is not optimized. It is also unhealthy for the workers as they tend to be unproductive as they have nothing to be proud of. Another critique of the theory that affects business is the working conditions that they are subjected to. This contributes to great difficulties of running the business as employees cannot work in unison (Cunliffe & Luhman 2012). It is therefore recommended that the Overworking hours be paid to the employees. There should also be a good relation between the employees and the management. Hence Armstrong should ensure that the supervisors are not too hierarchical and that they use power in the right way without any discrimination. This will thus create an enabling environment for the employees at all level hence they will be able to be more productive.

            Resource management is a vital aspect of running a health business. When the resources are poorly managed it becomes more difficult to run the business. This worsens the going concern assumptions as there is poor cash flow in the business. Operating costs are not met due to the financial constraints which affects the business adversely. Due to poor resource management credit limits by the credit lenders are lowered which affects the business. Suppliers of raw materials tend to with their credit limit or shorten it as a result of poor resource management by the organization. It is therefore recommended that the company should raise awareness on the employees on the importance of sustainably using the resources to ensure that the company does not spend on unnecessary expenses. Therefore the management should ensure that they set up strong and more effective project portfolios that will enhance better management of resources within the company and that new development of products is produced (Coombs & Holladay 2012).

Conclusion

            Armstrong Company has gone through tremendous growth over the years since it was first started but they have been able to stay in business due to the endless efforts by the entire stakeholders involved in the company. The changes that have been implemented in the company have enhanced it to withstand the challenges and the uncertainties that have faced the company. The integration, collaboration and cohesion between the management, suppliers, customers, society and the shareholders has enhanced the company to attain its goals and this has enabled the company to lead in their operations. The balancing of the interests of all those that are involved in the running of the company has enhanced the company to be able to have strong governance over their competitors in the market. It is thus important that the company has adopted new technologies that have enhanced it to develop even more and to produce ceilings and quality flooring products that make the company proud.  The company will continue to grow and succeed if they stay to the course by globalizing their activities and upholding integrity. This is also enhanced through valuing all those who make their operations a success that is the customers, employees, suppliers and the government.

References

            Bonham, S. S. (2008). Actionable strategies through integrated performance, process, project, and risk management. Boston: Artech House.

            Coombs, W. T., & Holladay, S. J. (2012). Managing corporate social responsibility: A communication approach. Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell.

            Cunliffe, A. L., & Luhman, J. T. (2012). Key concepts in organization theory. London: Sage.

            Daft, R. L. (2006). Organization theory and design. Mason, OH: Thompson-South Western.

            Hales, C. (2000). Managing through organisation: The management process, forms of organisation and the work of managers. London [u.a.: Business Press Thomas Learning.

            Slaton, H. R., & Vault (Firm). (2006). Vault guide to the top manufacturing employers. New York: Vault, Inc.

            Turker, D., & Altuntas, C. (2014). Sustainable supply chain management in the fast fashion industry: An analysis of corporate reports. European Management Journal, 32(5), 837-849.

Part 1

The stages of life can be correlated with the organizational stages of development since when it started until it is stable. I know a certain electronic company which was founded in my presence and have been monitoring it while young until it grown to national level. The first stage is birth also known as a stage of existence. This marked the start of the company at which the entrepreneur’s thoughts were put into action.  At this stage the organizational structure was very simple with a centralized management system. The company sold only power cables, data cables, power banks, bulbs and other small commodities (Nelson & Quick, 2012).

The next stage is growth or survival when the company started to build up its capabilities. A systemized framework was established through the expansion of the business into a wider variety of electronics dealt with. Components like loudspeakers, television sets and laptops were gradually introduced. The next stage is maturity. The company is currently in this stage because the current management has become hierarchical. The company is no longer expanding but instead it is focusing on growth. It has now specialized in laptop sales. The company at this stage is very stable because problems are easily combated. The next stage is renewal whereby the restructure of the company is restructured. Lastly, decline is a stage that marks the initial process of death of the company (Nelson & Quick, 2012).

Many companies are freeing themselves from bureaucracy by establishing approaches that promote self dependence and management. An example is Zapoos which is a shoe retailer company. It is first converting to Holacracy which flatters the system of titles. The company is using the approach of ideology which regards the company as private and individual premise (Reigngold, n.d). The approach of business transition is also used whereby the staff is departing and restricting of the company is considered. This has generated much tension for the public.

Part 2

Question 1

Control mechanisms have recently been recognized by most businesses across the globe.  Control mechanisms are advantageous such that they assist companies in upholding high quality outcome of the business operations.  The controls also help in balancing the investments as well as the income made to ensure a safe cash flow. Controls also help the managers to compete with other companies in terms of technology, marketing, pricing as well as in the quality of products made. However, the control mechanisms tend to squeeze the employees in to some unfavorable working conditions. Controlling the expenditure for example means the reduction of wages which commonly leads the subjection of the working force. Control mechanisms are also limited to various boundaries beyond which they should not go. This comes as a requirement of the legal process which moderates these controls to ensure fair competition (Leitch, 2008).

Question 2

It is however healthy for managers to set up the appropriate control degree failure to which various risk of excess control may befall on the company. It is very evident that excessive control develops a bureaucratic kind of an environment which uses up most of the company’s corporate resource. Excess controls also lead to duplicate work whereby the managers keep monitoring the various document flows and other aspects (Leitch, 2008). The repetition of this wastes time and resources as a result. Lastly the controls are inflexible because making changes to controls is very difficult. Less application of controls would whoever brings down the productivity of the business because the employees in many times are not self-driven (Leitch, 2008).

Question 3

Different companies embrace only the control mechanisms that best fit their situation. This is because the control may be based on the strategic and operational planning of the company and therefore the goals of different companies differ. Therefore, there is no any standard control mechanisms that can cover all industries (Leitch, 2008).

References

Leitch, M. (2008). Intelligent internal control and risk management: Designing high-performance risk control systems. Aldershot, England: Gower.

Nelson, D. L., & Quick, J. C. (2012). Organizational behavior: Science, the real world, and you. Mason, Ohio: South-Western.

Reigngold J., (n.d) A move to “self-management” has shaken the online shoe retailer. Can it regain its mojo? Fortutne http://fortune.com/tag/zappos/

About fashion

Question 1

A monopoly exist where there is a certain firm that dominates the market or acts as the main supplier of a particular commodity. The market is characterised by lack of competition for the production, supply and selling of a product or service (Hirschey, & Bentzen, 2016). Luxottica seems to have obtained total dominance in the world’s production of eyewear, by producing sunglasses and frames for almost every designer brand. The 60 Minute video reveals that about half a billion people have glasses made by Luxottica, which has resulted to the firm attaining monopoly in the eyewear market. The firm goes to an extent of charging very high prices, at $400-500 a pair of the glasses as compared with other brands that charge lower prices (CBS News, 2012). The firm attain its monopoly status by owning various designer brands which include Prada, Dolce & Gabbana, Channel, Burberry, Versace, Ralph Lauren and Tiffany. The company also owns too much of this eyewear industry which include both the supply chain and the distribution network. It owns outlets such as Lenscaftewrs, Oliver Peoples and Pearle vision and also owns Eyemed, the most dominant company for vision insurance. This enables the company to charge high prices for the products it sells and earned abnormal profits of about $8 billion. Its monopoly status was enhance by buying Oakley, its biggest competitor in 2007 (CBS News, 2012). This means the company can set high prices as much as it wants to and other players in the market will follow.

Question 2

If the smaller competitors want to upset Luxottica’s market dominance status, they would have to engage in marketing strategies that will capture the attention of the consumers and make them aware of the unreasonable prices they are paying for the eyewear products. The easiest way this monopoly could be busted is for the consumers to understand that they are products are overpriced. Competitors like Warby Parker should thus follow this strategy in putting up a competition (Carlson, 2012). In order to chip away at the practices of Luxottica, the smaller competitors should turn to online selling and marketing which will enable them to sell cheaper alternative eyewear products. They should initially target those consumers on tight budget and whose coverage is not part of their vision insurance plans.

Question 3

As the owner of a Luxottica’s main competitor, I would aim at ensuring that the market will be made less consolidated. This would be through providing enough information to the consumers about the competitive pricing. This would make the consumers to make informed economic decisions and thus lead to the eyewear becoming less exploitative and more efficient. Moreover, I would ensure that high quality glasses are produced but sold at least expensive prices, which will be enable by online retailing.

Question 4

As one of Luxottica owners, I would seek to diversify the products brand by including sportswear in the consumer products. With deep capital capability, the diversification strategy would work well since the company is able to overcome the hurdles of heavy investment as well as man power needed. Sportswear products like clothing and shoes that are sold alongside eyewear products would capture more of the customer’s attention, which would give the various brands a huge boost. The products variety would safeguard the company against depending on a single line of products in the face new entrants in the market.

First quiz

The results shows a positive response to my capacity of becoming a fashion entrepreneur. The results characterises an individual with the potential to become an entrepreneur.  They are in line with good qualities of an entrepreneur, since they give a description of an individual who enjoy dealing with concrete and real-life situations such as winning over new clients, closing deals and the reviewing of information. The results also shows an individual who is able to relate to other people is a good trait of a person who want to venture into entrepreneurship. They also portray me as a person who, when faced with obstacles can look for different ways of achieving their goals or try a new thing. The ability to be highly organised is also shown, so that the daily schedules and activities are well planned.

Second quiz

The results show that my personality aspects as relates to this measure are more than 17.Thus I possess the basic characteristics of an entrepreneur, a fact that is shown by the desire to make decisions on my own rather than listening to individuals whom I know are not as capable as I am. L don’t like remaining in mediocrity since I like to challenge myself out of a comfort zone, which is driven by the desire to win. In order to be my own boss, I strive to search for new but better things to do, and do such things in a different ways. This ultimately leads to deep questioning of the conventional wisdom and manner of doing things especially in situations where there are different views from different people. I believe in letting everyone raising their views, assessing their opinions and then going with the best even if it does not augur well with the majority. My ideas are liked by most people I share with especially when dealing with difficult situations. Most of these are my friends who are entrepreneurs, and who are excited by my zeal to succeed my things, especially the joy I derive from selling things. I attribute this to my background where I involved myself in incoming generating activities during the school holidays.

Essay

The overall information represented by the questions help in evaluation of one’s fitness to become an entrepreneurship. The results help in measuring that extent of fitness and shows that I can make a good fashion entrepreneur but with a lot of room for learning and development. For one to be an entrepreneur, there are basic traits that one should have. To start with a person has to derive joy from being a fashion entrepreneur and this is possible if they are passionate about it. Being in entrepreneurship is not easy since one will have to face obstacles that they will have to overcome, thus they should be resilient. Moreover, being able to related to people will assist in completing deals, winning a lot of customers and holding meaningful discussions. To achieve their goals, the entrepreneur should do things differently, and be courageous enough to deviate from the conventional way of doing things (Isenberg, 2010). The desire to achieve results and to reach out to buyers in a big way is another that is shown by the results to be very necessary trait of a fashion entrepreneur. In conclusion, being a risk taker is defined by all the characteristics the entrepreneur possess.

References

Hirschey, M., & Bentzen, E. (2016). Managerial economics.447

CBS News, (2012).  Sticker shock: Why are glasses so expensive? 

 Isenberg, D. (2010). Should You Be An Entrepreneur? Take This Test.1. Retrieved from: https://hbr.org/2010/02/should-you-be-an-entrepreneur

 Carlson, N. (2012).Warby Parker Wants To Destroy A $20 Billion Company That Charges Customers Insane Prices

Business Administration

Business Intelligence is the acquisition and transformation of raw information through various techniques and tools in order to make the information useful for business purposes. The techniques used are capable of handling large volumes of information that is usually unstructured. By the use of technology new strategies are identified and developed to create more business opportunities (Cukier, 2014). Business intelligence is a simple way of analyzing data in which implementation are made through effective strategies that facilitate the business to have a competitive market advantage which results in long-term stability. Big data is an extremely important tool for business that helps business in that it creates more understanding (Cukier, 2014). Both big data and business intelligence facilitate the use of knowledge in order to come up with better solutions. The use of information transforms the society of today due to advancement. Business intelligence differs from big data in that tools and technological techniques are used to analyze the data in order to have more meaningful information while big data requires the intelligence of individuals to understand it in order to make improved decisions (Cukier, 2014). The benefits of using business intelligence and big data help in the transformation of the world and how to deal with challenges. Both techniques require training in order to make them more efficient.

Information is regarded as an importance tool that has many attributes. It leads to promptness, accuracy, precision and completeness of any decision made. Clarity of information avoids unambiguity which results in the smooth learning of business. Big data comes in various forms. It is prescriptive, predictive, diagnostic, and descriptive (Cukier, 2014). The Big data analytics are value as it facilitates the use of information to solve existing problems. Quality data is the information that is regarded as fit for the intended use such as in operation, planning and decision making. Quality data helps achieve the company objective, increase efficiency which results into customer satisfaction in return creating high revenue (Cukier, 2014).

According to Goetz medical charts are hard to access and have useful information that can be used to make humans life much better and healthier if they knew how to use the information. The information in the medical charts is impossible to read (Goetz, 2010). This usually has an impact on patients as they are not able to read the information on the charts making them unable to make right and informed choices. The magazine was interested in the medical data as it involved intelligent treatment by the use of technology which involved analog microchips in treating clinical illness (Goetz, 2010). Business intelligence would have a great and a positive impact on people. This is because they will be able to read the information, try to analyze it and come up with better decisions that will make them healthier. Other industries such as banking industry will benefit from the use of the intelligence system. This will ensure that credit card usage is understood and default rates will be known.

Big data has opened doors for innovations such as having a bunch of sensors on the chairs. This is used to gather information and transmit the data giving each person a unique identity similar to that of fingerprints. Big data has also enabled the detection of drivers in their cars seats that prevents car theft. The technology through big data has also enabled the use of cars by certain drivers, prevention of accidents through the vibration of the steering wheel to wake up the driver among others (Cukier, 2014). Automatic data processing and analysis through the machine learning undermines automatic learning due to the fear of big data era. There are concerns about the privacy and how it will safeguard the free will of the people. It is also terrifying in that by the use of machine learning people's jobs would be taken away. It undermines the process by stating that by use of data as a tool to enable human accomplishment there is also a chance that the same tool can kill if used wrongly (Cukier, 2014).

Visualization of performance through dashboards is a key component of business intelligence. Having worked in an organization that uses visualization of performance through dashboards displays a sense of pride is created (ACOBS & Rudis, 2014). This shows that the organization is proud of what it has achieved to enhance a competitive advantage over its competitors as it is easy to manage a business. People are able to see what the company can do creating confidence to the people (ACOBS & Rudis, 2014). Using dashboards and visualization of a hospitality industry in which I aspire to work in will be beneficial to the business. By using dashboards a company can be able to compete due to the key performance indicators as there are patterns and trends that already exist.

Reference

ACOBS, J. A. Y., & Rudis, B. (2014). Data-driven security: Analysis, visualization and dashboards. New York, NY: Wiley.

 Cukier Kenneth  (2014) Big Data is Better Data. Retrieved from
https://www.ted.com/talks/kenneth_cukier_big_data_is_better_data

             Goetz Thomas (2010) It's Time to Redesign Medical Data. Retrieved from
http://www.ted.com/talks/thomas_goetz_it_s_time_to_redesign_medical_data

Peaceful Rest Motor Lodge

            In this case, the businessman designs a product to satisfy himself for he has for a long time been traveling and had been in different motels. He looked what would satisfy him as a traveling businessman. In this idea, he thought that he would represent the overall quest of all traveling businessmen but his idea was unfortunately mistaken because most of his potential customers were mainly tourists and vacationers. This group of customers had only a few people who traveled for business. The motels were seen to be emergency products by some of the tourists and shopping products for other people who were for an economical place to reside into. He lost most people due to their perception regarding motels as heterogeneous products and others preferred special locations which made them have their reservation in advance.

            Rest Motor Lodge is faced with a number of critical issues in its business. The current form of doing business in Motor Lodge is based on a traditional form of doing business. The organization has not taken into consideration of the new techniques of doing business and fully mechanizing its operation. The company does not have an advanced online booking which some of the clients considers very important. This is attributed to its convenience and the less time it would cost a client in looking for a room. The traditional marketing involves the use of newspapers, billboards, newspapers, local television channels in which they are limited to only a few people. This limits the number of people who get this information and does not apply to traveling businessmen. Businessmen are people who need international information as they travel from time to time in various regions.

            E-commerce is an alternative for this business as its information will be readily available online.  Businessmen will be able to know its locality earlier in advance and the price chargeable and the members of facilities they have and what kind of services they offer. According to Tristan, this will create a large number of the customer base as they are able to have a direct reservation due to its convenience (Shaw 2006). The adoption of this market strategy will lead to the business establishment because there are so many people using the internet nowadays. The adoption of this strategy will not only aim at customer’s convenience but will also be used to reach the most number of customers. The implementation of e-commerce will assist in taking full advantage of marketing in order to produce great content.

            Through the adoption of e-commerce, there will be new intermediaries and facilities in the business. This means that value will be added due to the new channel of business information distribution. There will be the lack of geographical barriers, physical and temporally barriers. This indicates an increased advantage to competitors since its reputation will increase and its brand name strengthened. If the business adopts electronic commerce as a way of doing business social, political, cultural and economic barriers will be overcome. There will also be less channel of conflict which results into negative energies of doing business. The system will also create demand through direct promotion and advertisement (Shaw 2006). With an online business, there will be market separation due to the product individual targets and customization. Company’s organization will be developed in a manner that it can be able to deal with a large number of clients in a hierarchical manner. As a result, there will be proper management of data electronically this will increase business security.  This, in turn, will increase customers trust-reducing the overall form of doing business.

 The system will also manage business logistics through just in time concept that will ensure there are control and increased efficiency which will increase cash flows projections. There will also be better communication and interactivity with the clients directly. Digitalization of the business will also be enhanced will make the business easier to conduct.

            Another critical issue of the business is based on the room prices. Prices do not entirely indicate the amount of revenue to be made by the business. Tristan Knaus, there is no point of giving away the room yet that will not mean that there will be an increase in the occupancy rate. This means that lowering the prices and making them affordable to all class of people and the businessmen will not attract people. Price is a relative sensitive area in a business but it cannot be used alone to attract businessmen. There are different strategies to use together to increase the occupancy rate and revenue in general. Price effect has an impact on the market based on how consumers will spend their money. The current form of business has not differentiated different classes of its customers as it has a general price on all the rooms. The income effect indicates that consumers use their money or demand for goods and services based on the increase and the decrease of their incomes and it is not affected by the price tagged on the commodities. Therefore lowering the prices will not mean that the occupancy rate will increase (Lu et al 2016).

            To overcome this critic the business can adopt strategic pricing which will create a sustainable long-term solution. Promotional pricing may help the company in short term battles but will fade with time. Having an outward eye to the environment will be of great assistance but has to be used together with an inward eye. Through the pricing, model prices will be strategically placed in the different class of people in order to add value to its portfolio.

Adding value to its services despite varying prices will greatly stabilize the business generating more sales. Understanding the various market bases will result in right pricing. Intelligence analysis will give a clear understanding of pricing actions such as using non-price responses. This will involve matching of competitors prices and reveal the cost advantage, competing on the quality of the rooms and the adoption of co-opt contributors which involve strategic partnership with providers of related services. This means that lowering of prices should be the last thing to adopt as many businessmen and other people prefer to pay for value added service at an extra cost in order to get what they desire rather than pay low prices that will not give them the satisfaction they want (Lu et al 2016).

            Franchising the business is another critical issue due to the amount of money used. The holiday inn alternative will require a great startup capital due to the required improvement. The location of the motel is not favorable as it can only be found looking for the resort area (Barkoff et al 2008). The cost of running the business will increase in order to form a centric culture for the customers. Franchising will include restrictions and create frequent monitoring. By franchising such services there also arises a risk of going out of business which can create a bad reputation. Profit realized will be shared among the different stakeholders who launched the holiday inn alternative. There is also a risk of inflexibility due to the restriction which may hinder business growth (ATER et al 2015).

            The lodge may adopt cooperative organization which can be achieved through various strategies. The motel may create and develop recreation facilities such as a pool in order to avoid franchising as a way of providing the services. This will increase the completion as it will be able to offer the same services as its competitors.

Advertising of the locality using the billboards will also create awareness of where it is located rather than leaving it for the people to find by themselves (Blair et al 2005). This will also assist the motel not to associate its self with the already established business but will be able to establish itself despite the location.

Recommendation

            As a result of the rate at which the company is losing money and also the low occupancy rate that is below the company’s average even though the prices are low.  It is therefore recommended that the management should use ample time as well as funds so as to be able to fulfill the important operations that would enable the company to grow. The funds would enable the company to be able to advertise and also to be able to launch sales promotions that would result to a higher occupancy. Advertising would make it easier for the customers to be able to find the motel more easily and thus increasing the occupancy. It is also recommended that the motel should indicate signs that indicate the geographical location of the motel. This is the cheapest and effective form of advertisement that would help to save some cash and is used each and every day and helps to show the existence of the motel. The culture of the motel ought to be customer oriented and thus resulting to more online reviews from the customers so as to attract many more customers thus increasing the number of customers. In the current time in business most of the customers look for reviews online so as to make decisions on purchasing services from the motel.

            Another recommendation is that there is need for the motel to increase its services by widening the selection of activities in the motel. For example, there should be the innovation of recreation facilities such as pooling activities in the motel.

 This would help to increase on the range of customers who will visit the motel for various purposes. The adoption of this system in the motel will help to reduce on the unnecessary expenses in the company and also will help reduce direct competition from other people with similar line of business due to the full-service facilities in the motel. Franchising of the business will thus not be recommended since the business would have implemented on the above recommendations and thus no need for franchising. It is therefore important that the management of the motel should ensure that they have implemented all the recommendations and that they have increased quality and selection of their services.

References

            ATER, I., & RIGBI, O. (2015). PRICE CONTROL AND ADVERTISING IN FRANCHISING CHAINS. Strategic Management Journal, 36(1), 148-158. doi:10.1002/smj.2212

            Barkoff, R. M., Selden, A. C., & American Bar Association. (2008). Fundamentals of franchising. Chicago: American Bar Association, Forum on Franchising.

            Blair, R. D., & Lafontaine, F. (2005). The economics of franchising. New York: Cambridge University Press.

            Lu, L., Gou, Q., Tang, W., & Zhang, J. (2016). Joint pricing and advertising strategy with reference price effect. International Journal Of Production Research, 54(17), 5250-5270. doi:10.1080/00207543.2016.1165878

Shaw, M. J. (2006). E-commerce and the digital economy. Armonk, NY [u.a.: Sharpe.

Healthy food expansion into North Korea

To: the CEO Sweet Health Company

Cc: department heads

From:

Date:

Subject: expansion of the company to North Korea.

I propose that the company should consider expanding its outlet to the outer border of the country. The establishment of the plant should be in North Korea following the wide market gap in this line of business in that country. I believe that in expanding our company to North Korea will open up new opportunities for the growth of the company. The plant will therefore major on processing of healthy foods which will be exported from other countries. After processing the food it will be stored in cans which can be preserved for a longer period hence can help to solve on the chronic food issue as a result of famine in the country.

I will be glad to talk about these recommendations with you later on and discuss on the decision that you make.

Yours faithfully,

             Establishing Sweet Health Company plant in North Korea is based on a number of regulations. As a foreign company establishes a business in other country government policies regarding the operation of a processing industry will have to be adhered to. One of the regulations will have to ensure that the plant operates in a manner that is friendly to the environment and has measures and policies that will safeguard it. Any emission that is harmful to the environment should be treated before discharge. The market size in the dawn of starting a business will be relatively medium in order to allow several adjustments to be made in the new business venture. The initial cost will be relatively high but the incomes will increase with time as the company creates awareness for its existence. Process food will be demanded due to the country agricultural challenges (Business in Korea North for Everyone 243).

            As the business developed and demand increases there will be an expansion of the plant in the large geographical area in order to fight the feminine menace. North Korea recognizes foreign investments as a positive element of nation development but the North Korean government has remained dedicated to ensuring that foreign investors have a level field as the government aims at promoting economic democratization. The unpredictable weather conditions affect both the transportation and communication systems. This means that extra caution should be taken to ensure that business will run as usual.

            The company will set up a relief group that bears the company name and it will ensure that it offers the most affected people and the neediest ones of food. This will include the children, patients and the pregnant mothers. The company will start off by donating food to hospitals and with its expansion it will also help the children and pregnant mothers who are in great need of food.

References

            Business in Korea North for Everyone: Practical Information and Contacts for Success. Intl Business Pubns USA, 2012. Print.

            Eberstadt, Nick. The North Korean Economy: Between Crisis and Catastrophe. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers, 2008. Internet resource.

Foran, Racquel. North Korea. , 2013. Print.