British Petroleum (BP plc) is a multinational oil company headquartered in London, United Kingdom. They’re the third largest oil company in the world, and the fourth largest company worldwide measured by revenues. Employing over 78,000 workers around the world, BP’s Human Resources play a very important role in the company achieving success. BP recognized this and in 2010, BP’s executive team agreed a high-level philosophy covering their required practices of performance management as well as a set of guiding principles for rewards, in order to monitor performance and best motivate employees to reach objectives. In hope of achieving individual success as well as team success. Performance Management is a process which enhances the effective management of individuals and teams to achieve high level of organizational performance. When not used effectively, there can be many issues with performance management practices and this is why BP executives have chosen to publish this Continue reading
Business Analysis Case
Analyzing Toyota’s Recipe for Success – The Toyota Way
The fundamental reason for Toyota’s success in the global marketplace lies in the so called “Toyota way”. The Toyota Way is not only about technology and efficiency, it is about doing the right thing for the company, its employees, the customer and the society as a whole. In other words, the incredible success of the Toyota way is a direct result of operational excellence. Toyota has turned operational excellence into a strategic weapon. This operational excellence is only in part based on tools and quality improvement methods made famous by Toyota in the manufacturing world, such as JIT, Kaizen, and one-piece-flow. Although such techniques helped spawn the “lean manufacturing” revolution, tools and techniques are no secret weapon for transforming a business. Toyota’s continued success at implementing this tools stems from a deeper business philosophy based on its understanding of people and human motivation. Its success is ultimately based on its Continue reading
PEST Analysis of Nokia
Nokia Corporation engages in the manufacture of mobile devices and mobile network equipment, as well as in the provision of related solutions and services worldwide. The company has four main business functions or segments: Mobile Phones, Multimedia, Enterprise Solutions, and Networks. The Mobile Phones segment provides various mobile voice and data devices. This segment offers mobile phones and devices based on GSM/EDGE, 3G/WCDMA, and CDMA cellular technologies. PEST Analysis of Nokia PEST analysis identifies the political, economic, social and technological factors that of which directly affect a company. Political Factors Political/Legal environment are usually considered as one because they are enforced by the nation’s government. It is vital for Nokia’s operation because different nations with their respective government have different Political/Legal platforms respectively; Nokia operating on global level must abide to ground rules and regulation in different markets of host countries around the world. To its success, Nokia surveys its Continue reading
Case Study of Zara: Use of Technology to Improve Operational Responsiveness
Fashion giant, Zara, forms part of the retail group ‘Grupo Inditex’ which is one of the “largest, fastest growing and successful” clothing retailers across Europe. Grupo Inditex is formulated by an amalgamation of major high street names from across Europe, including Zara, Pull and Bear and Bershka, in total boasting 3825 stores across 68 countries. Zara’s success story begins by offering a product range capable of catering for men, women and children, providing affordable and stylish clothes whatever the season. Coupled with this, is their keen eye for discovering new fashion trends and translating these trends from the catwalk to the high street, both quickly and affordably. Zara boasts a marketing strategy of firstly product variety with a focal point of ensuring speed to market. At present, Zara launch 10,000 new articles per year across their portfolio of stores. Finally, store location, as any marketing is left to store location Continue reading
Case Study: Business Strategy Analysis of Wal-Mart
Sam Walton, a leader with an innovative vision, started his own company and made it into the leader in discount retailing that it is today. Through his savvy, and sometimes unusual, business practices, he and his associates led the company forward for thirty years. Today, four years after his death, the company is still growing steadily. Wal-Mart executives continue to rely on many of the traditional goals and philosophies that Sam’s legacy left behind, while simultaneously keeping one step ahead of the ever-changing technology and methods of today’s fast-paced business environment. The organization has faced, and is still facing, a significant amount of controversy over several different issues; however, none of these have done much more than scrape the exterior of this gigantic operation. The future also looks bright for Wal-Mart, especially if it is able to strike a comfortable balance between increasing its profits and recognizing its social and Continue reading
Case Study: Lenovo’s “PC Plus” Strategy
Lenovo is the largest personal computers (PC) maker in the world as ranked by IDC, but global PC market is a hyper-competitive market with tough competition from competitors like HP, DELL and Acer. The industry also suffers from low profit margins too where Lenovo’s profit margin is around 2% only compared to Apple’s profit margin of 25-30%. Also the PC market itself is declining as consumers are buying more tablets and smartphones which is affecting the sales of desktop computers and laptops. All these factors have pushed Lenovo to adopt a new business strategy called as “PC Plus” Strategy, which covers terminal products like PCs, smart phones, table PCs and smart TVs. Lenovo’s acquisition of Motorola Mobility’s handset and tablet business from Google, following its acquisition of IBM’s x86 server business, puts the company exactly where it wants to be: at the forefront of the computing and smart devices businesses. Continue reading