Institution
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BMW
In perfect competition, businesses and organization work through a system of strategies. These strategies are made effective through a clear investigation among the organization within a given market and industry as a way of establishing information about other competitors. Competitors strive to find out the strengths and weaknesses of other organization with an industry or market. This paper is about the BMW Group and the way the company managed to identify and then eliminate its weaknesses. The BMW Group has been having significant developments and growth since its establishment, which can be traced from its ability to discover and eliminate weaknesses before its competitors find about such weaknesses.
Ensuring success in BMW Group was a project that was to be done in a systematic manner in seven major stages/ steps. BMW Group had to start from the identification of the weaknesses problem. The management went into the preparation step, then to the appraisal step in which a comprehensive evaluation was done, and to the presentation stage where detailed plan had to be approved for financing. After the financing of the project of eliminating weaknesses and promoting growth, implementation was done but with the necessary approval and financial plan (Taylor and McDonough). Monitoring was then initiated to assess the project. Evaluation of the project was then done after the project completion. Evaluation is meant to establish the project’s performance and efficiency, which was actually positive according to 2011 fiscal year.
In 2011 fiscal year, the company increased its sale volume and ended up emerging the market leader in terms of premium car market-segment. The BMW Group is said to have achieved such position despite its operation under poor market and industrial conditions. The year 2011 was the company’s best year in its history in corporation efforts. The BMW Group has been operating under poor and tough conditions that expose the company to significant weaknesses in its business operations and success. One of the key success factors in eliminating its weakness is the ability of the group’s Supervisory Board to monitor business performances with immense interest. This kind of interest made the Supervisory Board to supervise company’s Board of Management in a continuous way as well as diligently while assisting in its advisory capacity. The assistant provided to the Board of Management by the Supervisory board was done to aid in planning all the company’s major undertakings. Another important aspect of the BMW Group’s advancement in the premium car industry and market is trust among management and Supervisory Board (Gallagher). Trust is build from the company’s tradition that all ideas need to be conceptualized after a significant analysis. The company had a system of continuous monitoring of activities within the organization and any outside forces that can increase the company’s weaknesses. The core aim of this kind of investigation is to ensure that any weaknesses are discovered by the company and resolved before the competitors take advantage of the weaknesses (Gallagher).
A system of investigation through structured auditing was regularly being done. Any performance was being predicted based on the prevailing performance as well as the company’s financial position at a particular time. After establishing the performance of the company and its financial position at a stipulated time, the management came up with various corporate strategies and business plans that can aid the BMW Group in moving to greater heights by first eliminating the most subjective weaknesses and enhancing its strengths such as improving business relationship with customers (BMW Group). Elimination of the most pronounced weaknesses kept on maintain a steady growth and performance of the BMW group against its competitors. The kind of strategy chosen went hand in hand with the established business plan and would bar competitor from taking advantage of the organization’s weakness or discovering its strengths and opportunities such that competitors may over take BMW Group from such perspectives (BMW Group).
Another factor that initiates BMW Group’s growth and elimination of its major weaknesses was the effort of the company’s Board of Management and the Supervisory Board to discover possible risks and establish risk provision programs. This provision of risk control programs has been in practice through the company’s risk management department. In this case, possible risks in the markets and in production could be established (Bodell). The company could then apply various strategies of dealing with risks at different times depending on knowledge or assumption on predicted outcomes in the market of its products. The company would apply risk-averse related strategies when the market conditions are projected as unwelcoming. Risk taking strategies would be applied when market compensations are high according to the management projection, but the company would want to be risk neutral when adequate information about market condition can hardly provide basis for some marketing strategies. These risk management strategies mainly applies to the company’s stock exchange market.
The BMW Group has been keeping in its sale promotion efforts to build and develop the company’s brand name. Sales performance is highly monitored to ensure that the company keeps on improving in terms of its competitive position. While in a perfectly competitive market information is open to all consumers and competitors, some of the company’s operations are maintained as secrete to its high performance. The company has also been placing significant efforts to improve its workforce development programs, which were also a source of the BMW Group’s weakness (Bodell). Workforce development has helped the company to maintain and improve some aspects of its technology through innovative programs and intensive research on new car models, which would place stiffer competition to the competitors’ products. All problems concerning the company’s workforce are resolved as soon as possible as a way of generating worker motivation. Employee motivation is critical in improving the performance of workers in terms of quality and quantity. The BMW Group has thus developed by establishing a systematic process of identifying and eliminating its weaknesses (Bodell). It has developed to be a market leader in premium car industry.
Works Cited
BMW Group. The ultimate career path from the builder of The Ultimate Driving Machine. 2013. 10 May 2013 <www.bmwstep.com/docs/Full Size STEP Brochure.pdf>.
Bodell, Lisa. Kill the Company’: Identify Your Weaknesses Before Your Competitors Do. 17 December 2012. 10 May 2013 <http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article.cfm?articleid=3132>.
Gallagher, Patrick. BMW: A Strategy built on Premium Brands. 23 Oct 2012. 10 May 2013 <http://www.slideshare.net/patricksgallagher/bmw-a-strategy-built-on-premium-brands>.
Taylor, Jr. Joe and Michele McDonough. Seven Phases of the Project Cycle. 5 Mar 2011. 10 May 2013 <http://www.brighthubpm.com/project-planning/2433-seven-phases-of-the-project-cycle/>.
