Impact of Key Drivers on Operations and Marketing Functions of Marks and Spencer

This report analyzes the impact of key drivers on the operations and marketing functions of Marks and Spencer, a large-scale organization in the global business environment. The report includes a SWOT analysis and examines how political, governmental, economic, social, technical, legal, and environmental factors affect the company's operations and marketing. It concludes that social and technical factors have the most significant influence on M&S due to their inability to adapt to automated techniques.

Global business environment

Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
MAIN BODY..................................................................................................................................1
SWOT analysis............................................................................................................................1
Examining the ways in which these key drivers can impact upon firm’s functional areas of
marketing and operation..............................................................................................................2
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................4
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................5

INTRODUCTION
Global business environment is the environment which includes economic and political
situations of all the countries (Cuervo‐Cazurra, 2011). The main aim of this report is to analyse
how key drivers in a business environment impacts functions and operations of an organisation.
For this purpose, Marks and Spencer is selected which is a large scale company. In this report,
performance of this company is analysed using SWOT analysis. Furthermore, in this report it has
been analysed that how key drivers impacts marketing and Operation functions of M&S.
MAIN BODY
SWOT analysis
SWOT analysis is a theoretical framework which helps in analysing attributes of an
organisation. This framework involves strengths, weakness, opportunities and threats of a
company.
Strengths:
Marks and Spencer is a large scale organisation with high recognition of their brand. This
company is known for their wide variety of products. This company focusses on delivering high
street fashion with great quality due to which their customers are satisfied from their service.
Also, due to huge target market, this company has large number of physical stores and effective e
commerce portal. Considering strategic approach of this company, M&S is also engaged in
various corporate social responsibility activities due to which their brand equity and image is
high.
M&S also focuses upon global expansion and has operations in multiple European and
Asian countries. This provides this company strength to earn higher profits through international
markets.
Weakness:
Similar to the strengths, this company also has various flaws which are considered as
their weaknesses. One of the most influential weaknesses of this company is its traditional and
outdated techniques of operations due to which they face the issue of increased manual costs.
Also, the food and beverage segment of M&S is continually declining due to high competition in
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F&B market. Also, due to existence in multiple countries, M&S is facing various law suits due to
not following country’s individual trade laws.
Opportunities:
There are various opportunities available to Marks and Spencer which they can exercise
to acquire a sustainable success. By having huge existence in world and experience of dealing in
international market, this company can expand their business in countries in which they do not
currently operate such as few Asian and African countries.
This company is facing an issue of non effective promotion. This provides an opportunity
to M&S to promote their brand and products using social media so that they can acquire even
larger target market (De Jonge, 2011).
Threats:
Due to various internal weaknesses and key drivers, Marks and Spencer faces various
threats in global business environment. The major threat faced by this company is huge
competition in every sector in which M&S operate such as Clothing, fashion and F&B. Another
threat faced by this company is the non stable economic condition of the world due to which
profits of this company are highly impacted.
Due to continuous non effective promotional efforts, Marks and Spencer has started to lose
its brand value.
Examining the ways in which these key drivers can impact upon firm’s functional areas of
marketing and operation
Key drivers which can impact the functional areas of M&S are political factors,
governmental strategies, economic factors, social and technical factors, legal factors and
environmental policies. There are certain ways by which all these drivers impact the marketing
and operations functions of M&S.
Political factors:
This key driver can impact the operational function of M&S. This company is known for
its wide range of products and due to changes in global business environment, political policies
of various countries will change that can also result is licensing issues to M&S due to their
operations of various stores will be shut down (Lasserre, 2017).
Governmental strategies:
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Every nation has its own government and rules, as M&S operates in various countries the
change in government rules and strategies can impact the operational function of M&S.
Governmental strategies are the key drivers which tend to change continuously and a mere
change in these strategies can reduce the product variety of M&S which will directly impact
upon their operations and brand image.
Economic factors:
Economic environment of global business environment is most important key driver. If
economic policies such as increase in interest rate or enhancement in taxation levies upon M&S,
then their operations will be highly affected.
Social and technical factors:
These key drivers are related with the social world which is continuously upgrading. It is
important for M&S to cope up with current social preferences and technologies so that brand
image of this company can be sustained. Due to increased alignment of people towards social
media, marketing function of M&S is highly impacted as this company is still engaged in
traditional marketing tactics.
Also, M&S works using manual techniques whereas its competitors are using automated
techniques due to which operations and marketing functions of this company are impacted.
Legal factors:
Every country has its own laws and legislation and they are different from the
international laws (Wetherly, 2014). This variation in regulations and laws impacts the
organisation operations and marketing function. For example, in few Asian countries selling of
beef is illegal but in European countries, it’s a great way to make profit. This variation of varied
laws resulted in few law suits on M&S.
Environmental policies:
Considering all environmental policies can result in loss for Marks and Spencer. This key
driver of environmental policies restricts M&S from operating on their own terms due to which
this company’s operations are highly influenced.
All the above key drivers are analysed in such a way that they showcases their influence on
operations and marketing function of M&S.
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CONCLUSION
From the above report, it has been concluded that it is important to analyse internal
capabilities and external influencers of a company before considering it for global business
development. Various ways by which key drivers impacts the operations and marketing function
of M&S are analysed. From which it has been concluded that social and technical key drivers are
the most influenced factors which impacts M&S due to their internal incapability to cope up with
automated techniques.
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REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Cuervo‐Cazurra, A., 2011. Global strategy and global business environment: The direct and
indirect influences of the home country on a firm's global strategy. Global Strategy
Journal. 1(3‐4). pp.382-386.
De Jonge, A., 2011. Transnational corporations and international law: accountability in the
global business environment. Edward Elgar Publishing.
Lasserre, P., 2017. Global strategic management. Macmillan International Higher Education.
Wetherly, P., 2014. The business environment: themes and issues in a globalizing world. Oxford
University Press.
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