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[December 08, 2020 13:28]
1. The external analysis of the firm:
– first address the general environment described in class (see the lecture notes—legal, economic, etc.
– Second, look at the industry dynamics and competitive market (e.g. who is the firm selling to, what challenges does the firm face in profitably reaching their customers).
– Next, the analysis should discuss the firm’s competitors—are they larger, smaller, more profitable, more flexible? What advantage or disadvantage would these competitors have in the marketplace? The 5-forces model is a good tool to organize your work
Identification of the firm’s strategy and its competitors’ strategies:
– summarize the focal firm’s strategy *as well as its competitors’ strategies*
– discuss why each firm has chosen its respective strategy, as well as the main advantages and disadvantages of each, based upon the firm’s characteristics.
– This task should be accomplished by means of *a table*
Value Chain Analysis: Outline: – *structure as per instructions*
(A) Primary Activities
(1) Inbound Logistics. What activities are used to receive, store, and disseminate inputs to a product (materials handling, warehousing, inventory control, etc.) in your company?
(2) Operations. Describe the activities necessary to convert the inputs provided by inbound logistics into final product form (machining, packaging, assembly, etc.) What are the chief elements of your company’s production strategy? (e.g., making plant upgrades, use of TQM programs, etc)?
(3) Outbound Logistics. What activities are involved with collecting, storing, and physically distributing the product to your customers (e.g., finished goods warehousing, order processing, etc)?
(4) Marketing & Sales. Analyze the chief elements of your company’s marketing strategy (e.g., pricing, advertising, promotions, distribution channels, deployment of all the other weapons of competitive rivalry).
(5) Service. Describe the activities designed to enhance or maintain your product’s value (repair, training, adjustment, etc).
(B) Support Activities
(6) Firm Infrastructure. Analyze the activities that support the work of the entire value chain (e.g., general management, planning, finance, accounting, legal, government relations, etc). For example, what are the chief elements of your company’s finance strategy (e.g., the use of debt, dividend payments, sales/purchases of stock, use of cash, etc)? What is your company’s strategy for exercising social responsibility and being a good corporate citizen?
(7) Human Resource Management. How does your company recruit, hire, train, develop, and compensate its personnel (e.g., use of overtime, worker compensation)?
(8) Technology Development. What activities are completed to improve your firm’s product and what processes are used to manufacture it (process equipment, basic research, product design, etc)?
(9) Procurement. Describe the activities completed to purchase the inputs needed to produce your firm’s products (raw materials and supplies, machines, laboratory equipment, etc).
In addition, the value chain analysis should include the following:
(10) Competitor Analysis. Benchmark each activity against the closest competitor and industry averages. For example, in your analysis, elucidate what each firm spends on marketing? What marketing methods are used? Did the marketing tactics change in response to competition? In addition, each activity should be examined relative to competitors’ abilities and rated as superior, equivalent or inferior.
(11) Temporal Comparison. Compare each activity over two logical points in time (change in the economy, introduction of a new product in the industry, disaster like BP, Toyota recalls).