Implementing Strategic Management at Volkswagen

This assignment provides a detailed analysis of implementing strategic management at Volkswagen. It covers the different objectives, visions, and goals of an organization, as well as how to make a strategic plan using SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, Time-bound) targets. The assignment also focuses on Volkswagen's SMART targets for achieving strategy implementation and highlights various business strategies taken to grow resources.

BUSINESS STRATEGY

Table of Content
Introduction...............................................................................................................................................3
Task 1........................................................................................................................................................3
Business Visions and Objectives..............................................................................................................3
Strategic Planning.....................................................................................................................................4
Effectiveness of Techniques used in Developing Strategic Business Plan..............................................5
Task 2........................................................................................................................................................6
Strategic Positioning of VW and making of an Organizational Audit.....................................................6
Environment Audit...................................................................................................................................7
Stakeholder Analysis for Formulating New Strategy for VW AG...........................................................8
New strategy for VW AG.........................................................................................................................9
Alternative Strategies related to Market Entry, Substantial Growth and Limited Growth for VW AG. .9
Justify the selection of the strategy for VW AG.....................................................................................10
Roles and Responsibilities of personnel at VW AG...............................................................................11
Estimated Resource required for implementing new strategies 300......................................................12
Contribution of SMART targets to achieve strategy implementation at VW AG..................................13
Conclusion..............................................................................................................................................13
Reference List.........................................................................................................................................14
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Introduction
The aim of this assignment is to present a business plan and look out for a financer. This case has to be
presented Dragon's den and BBC and have to pitch for investment. In the meantime five ventured
capitalist are willing to invest in this business plan in exchange for equity. One of the investors is
Regent College Academic staff to pitch the business plan before it has being pitched to den of the
dragon. In this assignment the use of strategic planning will be vital for making a good business plan.
The technologies that have been used to make this business plan be discussed too. The whole
assignment is based on business strategy. Thus all the ways of making a perfect business plan will be
discussed. After understanding the strategic plan and also the key elements of strategic planning and
ways of implementing it can be successfully imposed on the employees to solve the issues. These
strategic tools will be applied to Volkswagen. This will help to understand that how much effective
these tools are and has to be put through an examination of VW and far and near environment.
Volkswagen has a portfolio of brands in the international market. This assignment is also about how
new strategic plan can benefit VW and its presence in the market.
Task 1
Business Visions and Objectives
A business vision can be described as a clear mental image of what someone wants from the business
and where do they see themselves in the future. There can be many different types of vision of
different people which varies all the time. It is important to have a clear vision of the business which
someone is doing; this will help them to create a clear focus of what they want to do in the future and
how they want to evolve. It can be said that having a business vision is very necessary because it helps
the businessman to focus on one particular thing and this will force the person to try its best to achieve
success (Hill, et al, 2014). This will also help in focusing in one particular thing because at times
people get distracted from what they are doing and starts heading in the wrong way. This problem can
be solved if the person has a clear focus of what to do in future and with the business. A good vision is
necessary to achieve a person's business goal. Vision says a lot about the organization of what it wants
to do and where it will go in the future. Every person has their own goals and objectives in business. It
basically means the goal which business wants to achieve. Business objectives in the detailed steps
needed to take in order to achieve their stated aim. To get a good business objectives vision of
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business should be very clear only then the person will know what to do in order to achieve the goal
and that person will start to plan accordingly. Action planning is required to meet a business's
objectives because planning is the key for every business success. Innovation is an important factor in
the steps of achieving objective of a business. Any which has innovative ideas will also reach its goals
easily than others who are not focused and do not have a business objective. Financial resources are an
important factor in the whole process because without strong financial support it is hard to achieve the
objectives of a company. All these points have to be kept in mind while setting business objectives
because all these factors it is hard to achieve goals of any company. Thus it can be said that both
objective and proper visioning is an important factor for achieving business goals.
Strategic Planning
The factors which have been considered while making a successful strategic plan are:
Figure 1: Strategic Planning and Different aspects
(Source: Schulz et al. 2014)
● Vision- The management and the business leaders should have a clear vision and should be
focused for the future of the organization. It is important to have a clear vision for any business
this helps the organization to go towards the right path and not in a complete wrong path. Thus
a vision is a major factor that has to be considered to produce a successful business strategy.
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● Mission- Every organization must have a strong mission which can be called as a politically
correct feel good statement. The mission of any company should keep the values of the
organization which has to be true. Any good mission statement will offer a clear and concise
expression of the organization's purpose and philosophy.
● Objectives- Every company should have short and long term goals and there should be
specific objectives of an organization which will help the organization to reach its goal. It
should be kept in mind that all the objectives should be near around the goal of the
organization and should display the mission statements.
● Strategies- An organization's strategies refer to how the goal and objectives of the organization
can be achieved. Strategic planning often means how to reach the goals by using different
strategies (Rosemann and vom Brocke, 2015). Brainstorming and free discussion can help to
achieve good business strategy. Every staff has different ideas and those ideas can be
transformed into new strategies in order to reach company goals.
● Action plans- It is useless to have great vision or mission statements if there is not action plan
present in the organization. Action plans are the only way to make strategic plans succeed.
Making a detailed action plan should have all the information of what is to be done, what is
due are commonly glossed in strategic planning.
Effectiveness of Techniques used in Developing Strategic Business Plan
Business planning is an important activity for any company. It is being done depending on the size,
geography or the industry. Strategic business plan may sometimes be intimidating also has different
varieties of business plans. There different techniques which can effectively help to form an effective
strategic business plan which are:
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Figure 2: techniques used in developing strategic plans
(Source: Hill et al.2016)
● SWOT Analysis- SWOT analysis is a critical component in making business plans. It can be
done for the entire organization, marketing or HR is a SWOT analysis. The full form of SWOT
is Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities and Threats. This is a complete brainstorming process
which helps to facilitate different factors related to the strength and opportunities as well as the
threats. It faces both internal factors and external factors. After the analysis the final list is
being developed by goals, objectives and strategies.
● Ranking- This process is done to bring a long list of items such as SWOT analysis. Votes are
being conducted and every participant is given certain number of votes which they can use and
with the help of these votes the whole process is done (Cassidy, 20160. They can place many
votes for one single item. At times participants gives sticky dots and place on flip charts where
the entire item list are being given. Once the whole process is done and the voting is done total
number of votes are being counted each of the item votes are being tallied and the item with
the most votes are being identified.
● Team Facilitation- Team Facilitation plays a major role in ensuring the process from starting
till ending. There are different individuals who are involved has an opportunity to conflict
addressed and also the work of the team. This technique involves active listening, positive
attitude and reflection of the constructive feedback (Senge, 2014). All the teams have to go
through some predictable steps that are storming, performing, and forming which requires
facilitation skills.
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Task 2
Strategic Positioning of VW and making of an Organizational Audit
The financial statements of Volkswagen group combined management report and created issued
unqualified audit reports in all of the cases. There are different strategies which these companies try to
keep in order finding faults after the organizational audits. There are different strategic directions
which can be clearly understood and thus it can bring the following benefits:
● The Capabilities will be aligned to support the achievements of the strategy developed.
● Resources will be added to different business process based on orders which will act according
to its importance and proper contribution of advantages.
● There is a chance for VW to excel in its business depending on the sector it is in.
The main purpose of this organizational audit is to help the managers with proper tools, commitment
and information to evaluate the amount of advantage and outcomes derived from their current
strategies. An audit helps to produce the data which can determine whether there is a need to change
the current organization plan or not and it can be also understood what changes can be actually made.
A strategic audit involves a lot of different activities to find out the issues and solving it. These issues
can only be solved with the help of auditing (Simon, et al, 2014). Auditing gives chances to the
managers to find out the problems which are present in the organization has to be solved. These issues
are done by different companies like for Volkswagen Pricewaterhousecoopers does the auditing. The
auditing is done to monitor the activities of the organization and the performance of the organization.
It can be also said auditing helps to boost a company's performance. It helps the company to stay in the
game by enhancing its performance from all sides. Thus strategic auditing is required to boost the
overall performance and resolved issues.
Environment Audit
Environmental Audits are the tools which can quantify any organizational environment performances
as well as positions. There are different types of environmental audits like Environmental Compliance
audits, Environmental management audits and Functional environmental audits. There are different
benefits of these audits depending on their objective and scope. This type of auditing includes:
● It is important to meet specific statutory reports.
● Environmental risks should be known to be managed.
● Developing and implementing ISO 14001 EMS
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● Saving money is an important factor and boost environmental performances.
● Demonstration of how organizations are environmentally responsible.
It is the sole responsibility of the environmental auditor to conduct the audit as they has experiences
and skills in performing that particular task. They have personal attributes such as work ethics, open
mindedness and different personal attributes. They already happen to know about the subject matter
which they are auditing on and how it can be applied on different organizations. The team leaders are
able to resolve the issues by planning and by having communication as well as leadership skills. It is
still important for the environmental auditors to complete their training also attain appropriate amount
of knowledge before they starting their work (Haines, 2016). These auditors should work according to
the level of job which has been asked to do. If an auditor fails to attain the level of work that person
should again start the five days training to complete the course. These auditors are always expected to
work with high level of outputs coming out of their and as a result making them more trusted by the
companies who hire them for their work. There are some outline skills which has to be present in the
auditors so that the complete auditing takes place easily and can be carried out easily.
Stakeholder Analysis for Formulating New Strategy for VW AG
This is the review and impact of stakeholders on the business. There have been different strategies to
formulate new strategies in business. The different strategies are:
Marketing strategies- While developing new strategies there should be careful and critical customer
stakeholders group. It is important to be honest and transparent and conduct fair amount of connection
with the customers on the basis of its expectations. Conducting market research is an important
marketing technique which should be learned to meet the needs and motivate which are largely
influenced by the research to analyze stakeholders and customers.
Motivation of employees- It is important to understand the role of the employees in the company to
optimize the ways to satisfy and increase the production. Long term consideration is a major turnover
for the employees and the morale of the organization (Reich and Benbasat, 2013). Understanding the
needs and expectations of the employees can improve the work environment and can increase the
growth. Every business needs monitored employment so that there is no discrimination with the
employees and laws related to hiring to keep a discrimination free work environment.
Corporate Citizenships- It is important to balance the community in order to bring profit is a common
expectation in today's date. Every leader expects that everyone will perform with honesty and their
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best integrity. This will help in boosting the work and the performance. Active participation is
important to show the presence in the community which can also help in changing the community
where the operation is taking place.
Partnerships- Chain management is a significant business component. It is the collaboration between
manufacturer and distributors to give the best value to the customers. In this case partners have high
expectations that the work will be done with openness and integrity just for the benefit of the
organization. Technology has helped in consideration of inventory management plus strengthening
inventory as well as the distribution system. Maintaining trust and fairness is something that every
member expects from the others it is a critical point because all the deals are of long term. These deals
have to be given importance as they are being conducted by many members and also runs for a long
time.
New strategy for VW AG
Volkswagen Ag aims on producing effective product for the customers through which they work
through various strategies that would be effective for the company to conduct and ultimately the
customers would get benefited from the strategies. The Group aims in making togetherness between
the customers and the company. So in this way they are looking to perform various points through
which it would become effective for the company are as follows:
a. Excellent employer: Through the works that are being done by the company they would
obviously aim to become one of the main companies that would be able supply their cars in
almost every country possible (Schulz et al. 2014). Effective measures are being taken up in
the context of doing so.
b. Excited customers: Effective systems would need to be evaluated through which the
customers would be able to make an effective move and work through the agendas of the
company. Exciting new offers would need to be evaluated by the company to make the
customers lure to the company.
c. Competitive profitability: As value holders, they expect sufficient profits and an enduring
increment in the estimation of their offers. The company would need to make speculations with
a view to accomplishing gainful development and fortifying our intensity, hence keeping the
Volkswagen Group on a firm balance and guaranteeing it remains an alluring venture
alternative.
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d. Becoming the role model for environment safety: new and effective environmental cars
would be profitable for the company to meet the nature’s want and work as per the needs
(Blackwelder et al. 2016). Environment friendly cars had been one of the main sources that the
company is being working on and trying to make it effective in the coming years.
Alternative Strategies related to Market Entry, Substantial Growth and Limited
Growth for VW AG
VW AG had been working effectively and trying to make a name for itself in the market and in this
way it had been working its way out of the shackles that had been put up by other companies. The
company had evolved some market entry strategies which are as follows:
a. Direct exporting
b. Licensing
c. Franchising
d. Partnering
e. Joint ventures
f. Buying a company
g. Green field Investments
In the context of working through market entry strategies it had also made effective substantial growth
strategies which are as follows:
a. Authentic Purpose
b. A powerful Brand
c. Partnership and Collaboration
d. Customer Retention
e. Community
f. Repeatable sales
g. Flexible and effective leadership
Through the provided strategies the company had work out the different strategies and also
implemented it in its business so that the customers would know about the works that are being done
in the company and would lure towards it.
Limited growth strategies would help the company to steadily grow its market and work through it in
an effective way (Ahneman and Doyle, 2016). Limited growth strategies are as follows:
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a. Market penetration
b. Market Expansion
c. Expansion of the product and its varieties
d. Diversification
All the above points would be helpful in applying the ways through which it would be effective for the
company to work on and make an effective work for the customers.
Justify the selection of the strategy for VW AG
There are different strategies which could be adapted but the above strategies have been selected as it
has been judged that it might bring a solution to the company. There could be many other strategies
but these strategies can be effective to handle the total business process. Volkswagen could make
profit from these strategies as it has been seen that automobile companies can take such strategies to
bring development and make the work done more efficiently without having any problem. Auditing is
a critical factor which has to be used to minimize the issues related to the company. This justification
can help in the total change in the work flow (Armstrong and Taylor, 2014). It can be said now that
VW AG has developed a lot because of having these strategies using them to manage the huge rush of
work which goes on the automobile factories. Maintaining workers and employees and managers
under one roof is a seriuos pressure on the company. The whole process is a very effective process
which can help in different ways which would in the end profit the industry in the exportation and
manufacturing of new products in the market. Customers have played a major role in adapting with
this kind of strategy as there is a clear of the customer in the whole process.
Roles and Responsibilities of personnel at VW AG
The strategy implementation demands a person who has that potential to lead over other personnel and
segment responsibilities and work among the employees according their quality and the role within the
workplace environment of an organization. The situation is not different in case of Volkswagen.
According to the viewpoint of (Rothaermel, 2015), the employees of the concerned organization who
are charged to execute various business strategies must have some kinds of roles and proper
responsibilities. This is because, to achieve business growth in terms of financial profitability, it is
essential for the business owners to give responsibilities to a sole person who can arrange and maintain
all employees in a particular manner. As mentioned by (Slocum, et al, 2014), for implementing
successful business strategies, all the roles and responsibilities of personnel should have to be
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demonstrated and defined clearly so that, it will be possible for the employers to make understand each
employees about the ultimate goals and objectives. Therefore, it can be stated that, CEO of the
concerned company must be responsible to allocate jobs and communicate with the employees and
other stakeholders to provide strategy related information. Along with this, it can be stated that, the
CEO of Volkswagen is responsible for guiding all the strategic planning’s.
In case of maintaining strategic implementation, it is one of the duty of the responsible person to keep
all the records related to finance and other activities so that, it will be possible for the employer to
understand the recent condition of this company in the existing market. Along with this, with the help
of proper maintaining data, it will be possible for the company to avoid any forms of legal
responsibilities. This is because, it is essential for strategic planning to avoid legal issues. As
mentioned by (Kumar, 2016), in case of strategic implementation, it is necessary for the employees to
maintain ethical standards and a CEO has that potential to maintain this responsibility.
Estimated Resource required for implementing new strategies 300
It is essential for the business owners to estimate proper resources so that, it will be useful for the
company to achieve competitive advantage in the existing along with the target market. There are
three types of resources that are useful in implementing new strategies. These are
1. Financial resources
2. Human resources
3. Physical resources
Financial resources:
Financial resource is one of the important aspects in case of implementing new business strategies and
it means how the concerned company Volkswagen finances its strategies to make them more effective.
As mentioned by (Northouse, 2015), finance can be developed with the help of two ways such as
equity and debt. It is worth noting that, equity can be more preferable because, in case of equity there
is no need of paying interest on principle. Existing finance funds include bank overdraft, shareholders’
capital, cash balances, and creditor’s and working capitals.
Human resources:
In order to get successful business strategy implementation, it is necessary for the business owners to
employ human resources. The concerned company also considered human resources for the
implementation of the strategic planning. According to the viewpoint of (Booth, 2015), human
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resources are the fundamental aspects to maintain company's performances within the existing market.
For the concerned organization, it is necessary for the managerial department to employee HR who
has effective knowledge on technology and productivity.
Physical resources:
The category of this kind of resources includes range operational resources in order to deliver a
strategy. This includes production facilities, marketing facilities and information technology. The
concerned company should utilize high quality technology to fulfill adopted technology.
Contribution of SMART targets to achieve strategy implementation at VW AG
The full of SMART is Specific Measurable Achievable Realistic Timely. Setting goals are easy but
achieving them is not that easy. VW AG has implemented different strategies to achieve their goals.
These goals must have values which will reflect on the belief and character of the company. VW had
their goals and has faced a lot of difficulties in achieving them but they have as a result of which the
company has a different outcome now in relation to its competitors (Stacey, 2016). VW has aligned its
goals with values. VW AG has shared its goals with its employees in order to achieve success.
Employees are the keys to achieve success to bring positivity. VG has assembled its detailed progress
to raise the issue among employee so that it can be solved. On the same time minimizing potential
challenges is an important factor to reduce the effects of the work (Moran and Morner, 2017). The
completion of at least one challenge per day is an important factor in SMART targets. Establishing
support system can encourage and make healthy feedbacks which every company are willing to hear.
Rewarding is the last and the most important factor in the entire SMART process as it creates a new
milestone.
Conclusion
Thus we can conclude that from this assignment the different objectives, visions and goals of an
organization can be understood. It can be said that with the help of this assignment how can a strategic
plan be made is being learned. This assignment has also focused on Volkswagen and its SMART
targets to achieve strategy implementation. This assignment has helped to understand the total idea of
business strategies made by the companies. Here the idea has been taken to VW AG. The whole
assignment is mainly in relation to how these business plans can be implemented on the organization.
There are different roles and responsibilities of the person who is in charge at VW AG. SMART
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targets have been achieved with the help of new strategy implementation. There have been different
strategies which are being taken to grow the potential of resources. Thus this assignment has helped to
understand business strategies from its core.
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Stacey, R.D., 2016. The chaos frontier: creative strategic control for business. Butterworth-
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