a CEO
By Sunday, November 22, 2015
You are a CEO of a medium sized US based manufacturing company looking for opportunities to expand its operations globally.
Do the following to complete this assignment:
- Select two countries, one developed and one emerging, where you would like to invest.
- Describe the company, its industry, its products, the markets it serves, and the type of operations that will be taken abroad.
- Consider the assigned readings and the research literature related to this module and develop a country risk analysis report for your company to assess the attractiveness of each country for your business and decide what (if any) opportunity should be pursued.
- Analyze the political, social, and economic factors. Use current research and statistics from reputable sources.
Write a minimum three-page report. Make sure you write in a clear, concise, and organized manner; demonstrate ethical scholarship in accurate representation and attribution of sources; and display accurate spelling, grammar, and punctuation. Use the APA format.
Assignment Overview
Effective operations management, particularly strategic planning, requires a thorough understanding of the organization itself. The vision of the organization’s founder, CEO, or strategic-management team cannot be realized if it is not consistent with the assumptions and beliefs, values and culture that prevail in the organization. One of the tasks of strategic planners is to assess these organizational qualities and where inconsistencies are found, decide whether to change the vision or the organization.
Another task is to evaluate prevailing assumptions, beliefs and values to determine whether they are helping or hurting the organization. Appropriate assumptions, beliefs and values have two main characteristics: 1) they reflect internal and external realities, and 2) they help the organization to achieve its vision. Inappropriate assumptions, beliefs, and values have opposite effects and must be changed before top managers attempt to introduce a new vision.
Sometimes the operations planning team works with the CEO and the top managers to develop a new vision for the organization. If this is the case, knowledge about the organization’s internal environment helps planners to develop an appropriate vision. The emerging vision also should meet two criteria for profitability: 1) it should involve business/products with the potential for leveraged customer value, and 2) it should involve business/products with the potential for increased competitive advantage through system innovation. These criteria are essential because they involve changes in customer perception and organizational operations, both which achieved through effective management and should not require extensive capital outlays.
The strategic planning team helps the organization to devise a grand strategy to achieve the vision and then develops specific goals, objectives and plans of action. Where the CEO and the top have difficulty thinking through the strategy, goals, or objectives these can be analyzed by the use of the critical-success-factor-method.
Many executives think in terms of what it takes to be successful rather than in terms of grand strategy, goals and objectives. So the question we should ask ourselves is, “What does it take to be a successful business? Some people refer to the answer to this question as the “critical success factors” (coined by John Rockart). Once the critical success factors for the business are identified, executives can use them to develop strategies. The method can be applied by strategic planners within the company or by an out side management consultant or advisor. The three steps to this process are:
1. Generate success factors. In applying this approach in an organization, the
strategic planner meets with the CEO and asks, the question we discussed
earlier, “ What does it take to be successful in this business?” The result is a
first cut list of critical success factors. My experience as a consult performing
this type of analysis is that you need to query several people in top
management. This approach gives you a broader view of the organization.
2. Refine CSFs into goals and objectives. The planner reviews the CSFs and
and evaluates and restates them in a clearer and more precise language.
At that point we seek to establish some goals based on the CSFs. In the end
we pare the list down to 7-10 critical factors.
3. We then determine how to measure these factors (hard data if possible).
The group discusses each CSF in turn and decides on its treatment. Sometimes we may select a subcommittee to consider a particular CSF and it performance measures in more depth. My experience using this type of internal analysis has proven to be good tool to evaluate the internal environment of an organization.
Some companies have quite effective internal operations and yet fail because of unfavorable conditions in the environment. Others are able to generate good or even outstanding profits, despite a number of internal problems simply because they happen to be in the right place at the right time.
To be successful and to maintain a competitive advantage, an organization must constantly monitor events, tendencies, and stakeholder demands in its economic, political, competitive, geographic, sociological, and technological environment.
