Reflective Report on Key Skills Development

Individual Report

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
Main Body.......................................................................................................................................3
Overview of business along with key factors and business challenges .................................3
Swot analysis of Pearson Plc..................................................................................................4
Porter's five forces model.......................................................................................................5
Key managerial and operational issues faced by Pearson Plc................................................6
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................6
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................7
Part 2................................................................................................................................................8
Reflective report on key skills development..........................................................................8
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................10
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................12

INTRODUCTION
Business environment is regarded as the sum of all individuals, institutions, and other
factors that affects the performance and productivity of any business. These factors are usually
not in a control of management, despite of the fact affect the overall profitability of a business.
Changes in customer needs and demands, technological advancements, political uncertainties,
change in government's economic policies, rise in the level of competition, arising new trends
and changes in taste and preferences of a customer (Kamariotou and Kitsios, 2019). Business
makes proper strategies with the detailed analysis of external factors and take the anticipated
measures so as to prevent from future uncertainties and challenges. Pearson Plc started its
business operation as construction but later in the year 1920 shifted its business from original to
publishing. It is a multinational publishing and education firm, headquartered at London,
England. Below mentioned report covers understanding of management theories, basics of micro
and macro economic, decision-making process and strategic management that affect the
performance of Pearson Plc. Apart from this development of distinct skills required to work in
team and analysing the external environment.
Main Body
Overview of business along with key factors and business challenges
Pearson Plc is a British multinational publishing and education company, started its
operation as a construction business in the year in the year 1840. The company entered into a
new market with a new products, in the year 1920, into a publishing sector. At present it is
regarded as one of the largest company in education and largest book publisher in the world
(Hmoud and Laszlo, 2019). Pearson business operations has majorly two streams which includes
Global line of business where a company provides textbooks and digital technologies for
teachers and students. Pearson's school brand includes BTEC,Bug club, Edexcel, Fronter,
GradPoint, Schoolnet etc. Whereas Pearson's higher education brand consists of e-colleges,
mastering, online tutoring, revel and financial time publishing. On the other hand, Pearson group
majorly focus on a concentrated market, that is North America. Pearson, with the help of around
20,000 employees deliver a quality of products and services across globe, nearly about 200
countries with the aim of helping everyone, including educational institutions, employers and
governments, in achieving their potential through learning. Company with the help of their

knowledge and expertise help millions of people access content, follow courses, sit assessment
and gain qualifications with the objective of developing engaged learning experiences (Pucihar
and et. al., 2019). One of the major strengths of Pearson Plc is that it solely focus on education
followed by its merger of Penguin books with Bertelsmann, a German conglomerate. On the
other hand, Pearson focus largely on North America market, which is sometimes regarded as its
weakness.
Swot analysis of Pearson Plc
Strengths Weakness
 Pearson has developed strong brand
portfolio over a period of time which in
turn is useful for company future
growth strategy.
 Pearson is a leading performer in
publishing industry which have been
achieved by investing heavily in human
resources through effective training and
development programmes (Burke and
Cowling, 2020).
 Pearson is one of the largest education
company, however the market share
captured by Pearson is more
concentrated towards North America.
 The product range offered by Pearson
Plc is limited, thus affects overall sales
revenue and profitability of a company
in long run (Bai, Cordeiro and Sarkis,
2020).
Opportunity Threats