The world of BIC

 Your research will capture the BIC World company’s development The assessment should be written in a report format (not an essay). You will need to use analytical headings and sub-headings. 1. Evaluate the strategies that managers use to help organisations adapt in an uncertain or complex global environment. 2. Critically evaluate the internal environment of companies through modern tools and dynamic concepts. 3. Critically evaluate alternative policies and strategies a company may adopt to meet stakeholder needs and mitigate risk within changing external environments. 4. Develop appropriate criteria to evaluate strategic options within a range of situations in conditions of limited knowledge or uncertainty. 5. Understand the importance of and demonstrate strategic corporate social responsibility in the formulation and implementation of the strategic management process. A professional looking front cover (excluded from the word count) Executive Summary. Please do not call it an abstract. (excluded from the word count) Table of Contents (excluded from the word count) Introduction Analysis of the external environment Analysis of the internal environment The Strategic Analysis Analysis of the business (competitive) strategy Evaluation of strategic options through SAF and ethical theories Conclusion References (excluded from the word count) Appendices (excluded from the word count) Please feel free to use different headings and subheadings. Your final structure will depend on your research. Executive summary: Please do not call this section ‘abstract’. Abstracts and executive summaries are very similar, although a convention is that abstracts are written mainly for academic papers and executive summaries are written for business reports. The executive summary must be inserted before the table of contents. If the executive summary looks professional it will help to impress your reader / marker. Here you need to include a summary of all the major points of analysis from every part of your report, including the main findings and conclusions. Again, this is not an introduction, it is an executive summary, i.e. it is a condensed summary of the whole report. People usually read executive summaries in order to decide whether or not they want to read the whole report. Therefore, don’t keep the reader wondering about the report’s conclusions or recommendations. You are not writing a detective story. Maximum word count: 200 words Introduction: Write an introduction for sign posting purposes. Explain the purpose and the structure of the report, and briefly introduce the organisation that you will be analysing. Since you have a limited word count, the introduction should be very small – about one paragraph. The introduction is different from the executive summary and the conclusion because it does not include the summary of the findings and conclusions. Leave those for the conclusion and the executive summary! Suggested word count: 150 words 1. External environment analysis: To analyse the external environment of the case study organisation you are asked to use both frameworks: a PESTEL analysis for the macro external environment and a 5 Forces analysis for the micro external environment. Choose the most important factors from the PESTEL and the strongest forces from the 5 Forces framework that you will later use to justify the business level strategy. There is no need to analyse every aspect of these frameworks. You can include a full summary of the analysis of both frameworks in the appendix. Make sure that you reference both frameworks. Make sure that your analysis focus on the industry, and not on a specific organisation. Specify the geographical area of the industry that you are focusing your analysis on. You may consider the external environment in a global context or within a context of one country. The decision is yours. Suggested word count: 200 words 2. Internal environment analysis: To analyse the internal environment we expect you to use either the resources and capabilities theory (R+Cs or else the Resource Based View of the Company) or the Value Chain theory. Choose one theory. If you use RBV we would like you to present the key strategic resources and core capabilities. Please see examples of resources and capabilities in the lecture slides. To analyse the organisation’s financial resources you must mention some key financial indicators for that organisation. You will need to state clearly what are the core capabilities/competencies of the organisation and why they are core. Use VRIO (VRIN or VRIOS) logic to justify core competences/capabilities. An example could be: does the organisation’s level of financial control and or use of economies of scale derive competitive advantage? Is this a core capability within the organisation? If you use Value Chain analysis you do not need to describe in detail every single activity. Here, you will need to show those linkages (combinations of primary and support activities) that either increase the customer value or reduce the operating cost. Make sure that the linkages are analysed clearly. You can conclude this section by explaining what competitive advantages are created for the organisation and how. Suggested word count: 200 words 3. The strategic analysis This section can be divided into two sections: the analysis of business (competitive) level strategies and the evaluation of current and / or future strategies that include ethical implications. 3.1 Analysis of the Business Level Strategy Identify, evaluate and justify the competitive level strategy of the organisation. Consider theories, such as cost leadership, differentiation, hybrid or Blue Ocean. To justify the business level strategy you need to make a clear link between the strategy, external and internal environment analyses. Make sure that you reference the theories clearly. Suggested word count: 550 – 600 words 3.2 Evaluation of strategy and its ethical implications The evaluation of strategies should include two elements: 1) Suggestions and recommendations for future strategies and 2) Future strategies’ ethical implications You can suggest either sustaining the existing strategies, or developing the existing ones, or developing new strategies. To evaluate strategies use theoretical frameworks such as: SAF (preferably) : theoretical frame work used to evaluate strategies Suitability, accessibility, Feasibility