FY021 Introduction to Business: Analyzing Functions at Body Shop

This report examines the critical roles of Human Resources, Marketing, and Finance within The Body Shop, highlighting their importance in the company's success. It delves into collaborative working practices, emphasizing the benefits of transparency and team cohesiveness for enhanced organizational efficiency and employee satisfaction. The report further explores financial management and reporting, explaining their significance in ensuring effective resource utilization, accurate financial tracking, and compliance with regulatory requirements. Ultimately, the analysis underscores the interconnectedness of these functions in driving The Body Shop's performance and achieving its business objectives. Desklib provides access to similar solved assignments and resources for students.

FY021
Introduction to
Business
Studies

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
MAIN BODY...................................................................................................................................1
Role of HR marketing and finance in an enterprise ...................................................................1
Collaborative working practices ................................................................................................2
Financial management and reporting .........................................................................................4
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................5
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................6

INTRODUCTION
HR and The business firm selected for the present report is The Body Shop. This
company is headquartered in Brighton, United Kingdom and offers cosmetics, skincare and
perfume products. The company was formed in the year 1976 and is currently available in 3,000
locations all over the globe. This report includes description of the role of HR, marketing and
finance in the company. In addition to this, collaborative working practices are also described in
this report. In addition to this the role of financial management and reporting is also provided in
this report.
MAIN BODY
Role of HR marketing and finance in an enterprise
Human Resource Function: Human resources refers to the set of individuals who form
the workforce of the company (Dahlbom and et. al., 2019). Human resources of the company are
considered to be an important organizational asset which drive organizational success. This is
because the knowledge and skills commanded by the workforce of the company helps the firm
gain competitive advantage and maintain high performance. The HR function includes the five
core areas of staffing, development, compensation, safety and health and employee and labour
relations. Apart from this, HR function also supervises organizational leadership and cultures and
ensure compliance with employment and labour laws. These five areas help business firms
develop high performing human capital which contributes to the success of the company
(Saunders and Hunter, 2017). The role of Human resource function in business firs is to manage
the employee life cycle and administrating employee benefits so that seamless experience of staff
is enabled. The Body Shop has created a global workforce of 10,000 employees. The HR
function helps the respective with staffing and developing employees so that every position of
the company is occupied by skilled professionals. The Body Shop is able to gain success in
various international markets because of this HR function as workforce of skilled employees is
contributed in every region. In addition to this the HR function at The Body Shop is also
responsible for maintaining safe and healthy workforce and complying with different labour
regulations in different countries. This helps the company complete daily activities in a lawful
manner all over the globe while also keeping employee satisfied with safe working environment.
HR function of The Body Shop also completed the role of developing future leadership and
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maintaining positive work culture. This role of the HR function supports long-term survival of
the respective company and ensures that the company is moving in an profitable future direction.
Marketing Function: This is an essential business function for every firm irrespective of
their industry. A simplified definition of marketing states that it is the process of making the
target consumers interested in the products or services offered by the company. Another
definition of marketing states that it encompasses the actions taken by the company to attract
audience to the products or services of the company with the help of high quality messaging
(Gama and Casaca, 2019). The role of marketing is to deliver stand-alone value for prospects and
consumers by using effective content with the long-term aim of demonstrating product value,
strengthening brand loyalty which ultimately lead to increase in sales of the company. The
marketing function ate The Body Shop helps the company build a positive international brand
mage so that the firm is able to gain high sales in domestic and international markets. The Body
Shop is able to provide consumers additional value and improve consumers experience with the
help of the marketing function. This supports creation of loyal consumer base fr long-term
survival of the company. In this way, the marketing function helps the Body Shop attain high
profitability and build loyal consumer base for long-term profitability and growth of The Body
Shop.
Finance Function: This function focuses on financial aspects of the company and is
crucial for the success of the company as it ensures that financial issues and assets of the
company are managed effectively (Kraan, 2017). The role finance function in an enterprise is to
provide financial information which is needed by other departments of the company to ensure
effective and efficient functioning of the company. In addition to this, the financial function also
supports business planning and decision making by providing suitable financial data on the
financial position of the company and market. The role of finance function at The Body Shop is
to prepare accurate financial data which assists in making future decision of the company. This
helps the firm prepare effective plans for dealing with competition and capturing beneficial
position in a new market. The growth of The Body Shop all over the globe can be contributed to
the finance function. This is because accurate financial information helps the company
effectively manager financial assets and gain functioning to facilitate future growth of the
company.
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Collaborative working practices
Definition of collaborative working is defined as non-hierarchical method of working in
which every employee of the company takes a combined effort to attaining organizational goals
by sharing their skills and knowledge (Thompson, 2020). The concept of collaborative working
is a recently developed concept as hierarchical organizational structure are fading away from the
corporate world. Collaborative working is highly beneficial for business firms as it enhances
workplace atmosphere, reduces time taken to complete various activities and increases
productivity, creativity and flexibility. Business firms all overt he globe are adopting
collaborative working practices in order to improve employee satisfaction and enhance
organizational efficiency. The Body Shop[ also neds to adopt several collaborative working
practices as it leads to employee empowerment and will help the firm develop innovative
skincare and cosmetics products to gain sustained competitive advantage in the highly
competitive cosmetics industry. Some of the collaborative working practices which will provide
beneficial results to the company:
 Cultivating openness and transparency: This practice facilitates collaborative working
by creating free working environment where employees are informed about every
business activities and have the freedom to share their opinion effectively. This
collaborative practice involves building open communication between employees and the
firm so that employees have the knowledge of challenges faced by the firm and strategic
objectives of the company (Challender, 2019). The Body Shop needs to adopt ethic
practice as it will increase consumer loyalty and the information sharing by the company
will encourage employees to engage in collaborative working. This will act as foundation
for collaborative working at the company and will lead to creation for positive working
environment.
 Increasing team Cohesiveness: This collaborative working factor involves building
cohesive teams in the company because they are more successful in providing effective
results. The reason for high success of cohesive teams is that each person on the team is
included in as many as large decision as possible. Every team members feels included
which enhances their perception of significance of the role leading them to performing
more effectively. The Body Shop needs to adopt this collaborative working practice as it
well help the company utilize collaborative working to increase organizational efficiency
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and employee productivity. This will also provide the respective enterprise the added
benefit of increase employee satisfaction and loyalty to the company.
Financial management and reporting
Financial management is defined as straitening, planning, organizing, supervising and
controlling financial assets of the company. The main areas included in financial management
are endeavours used for reducing cost of finance, ensuring sufficient availability of funds and
dealing with financial activities such as procurement of funds (Bulturbayevich and et. al., 2020).
The role of financial management at The Body Shop is to plan organize and govern financial
activities of the company. Financial management helps the The Body Shop ensure availability of
funds and effectively utilize financial resources of the company to facilitate growth of the
company.
Financial reporting is defined as the processes of using accounting practices and financial
information to reveal the financial position and performance of the company over specific time
period. In context of The Body Shop the role of financial reporting is to track, evaluate and
report the income generated by the company. Financial reporting helps The Body Shop
understand financial resource usage, cash flow, business performance and financial health of the
company. This assists the company make effective decisions and also comply with government
audits and supply authorities accurate financial information when needed.
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CONCLUSION
From the above report it is determined that, functional areas of business HR, marketing
and finance play an important role in ensuring effective functioning of the company. Every
employee at the company collaborates with each other in order to assure that the business
objectives are accomplished in a timely manner. Adoption of collaborative working practices
such as transparency and team cohesion helps business firms improve organizational efficiency
and employee satisfaction. Financial management s important for firms as it helps the company
effectively utilize financial resources. The role of financial reporting is significant as it discloses
financial position of the company. This is used to make effective decisions for the future and
provide accurate data to government authorities.
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REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Dahlbom and et. al., 2019. Big data and HR analytics in the digital era. Baltic Journal of
Management.
Saunders, J. and Hunter, I., 2017. Service led design: planning the new HR function. Routledge.
Gama, A. P. D. and Casaca, J. A., 2019. The balanced scorecard approach in evaluating the
marketing function. International Journal of Business Excellence, 19(2). pp.267-284.
Kraan, D. J., 2017. Enhancing the finance function in line ministries. OECD Journal on
Budgeting, 16(2). pp.75-92.
Thompson, S. W., 2020. The Challenges of Collaborative Working: Bridging the Gap between
Research and Practice. International Journal of Strength and Conditioning, 1(1).
Challender, J., 2019. Building Collaborative Trust in Construction Procurement Strategies. John
Wiley & Sons.
Bulturbayevich and et. al., 2020. Modern features of financial management in small
businesses. International Engineering Journal For Research & Development, 5(4).
pp.5-5.
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