University Business Capstone Project Reflective Essay Analysis

This reflective essay analyzes a student's experience with a business capstone project, focusing on the Australian automotive industry, specifically the comparison between Holden and other car companies like Kia. The essay provides an overview of management theories, including PESTLE analysis and Porter's Five Forces, used to evaluate market trends, competition, and the internal and external factors influencing car sales. The research aimed to identify challenges faced by Holden and recommend strategies for improvement. The student discusses challenges in data collection and analysis, emphasizing the importance of understanding market dynamics, target groups, and the impact of technological advancements and government policies. The report also explores the use of frameworks like the Balanced Scorecard and market entry strategies. The essay concludes with recommendations for Holden to regain market share and compete effectively in the Australian car market. The research also involved secondary analysis with both qualitative and quantitative data, providing a comprehensive overview of the automotive industry's competitive landscape.

Running head: Reflective essay
Reflective essay on the capstone project
Name of the Student:
Name of the University:
Author Note:

Reflective essay 1
Table of Contents
Introduction:...............................................................................................................................2
Discussion:.................................................................................................................................2
Conclusion:................................................................................................................................8
Action Plan:................................................................................................................................8
References:...............................................................................................................................10

Reflective essay 2
Introduction:
The aim of this Business Capstone reflective journal is to discuss how the eleven
weeks of intensive study and research carried on during the projects. This essay gives an
overview of the management theories and concepts studied during the course and at the
theories used in writing the task 1 and task 2 of this course. For this, a critical analysis of the
theories used during the projects will be done. The aim of the research was to compare the car
sales volume of Holden with other car companies operating in Australia. As mentioned,
Holden, the Australian car company has been used as the case study of the assignments. In
order to do so, it was imperative to identify the market trends of the car selling and buying as
well as the car industry. While examining a market situation for a company, several aspects
including finance, marketing and operational activities are evaluated by using various
frameworks. For the same reason, several theories and analytical tools were used to find out
the desired outcome. There were certain challenges while using these tools for the research
and the same will be discussed in this reflective journal. On the basis of the learning and the
challenges faced, some recommendations to improve my research skills shall also be
presented in this report.
Discussion:
On the first week of the project, our professor came up with the overview of the
project and shared many lecture notes that would help us to understand the theoretical
concepts of the Capstone project. Once we started working on the capstone project, it
required deciding on the problem or the issue based on which the assignment will be done.
This was quite challenging because the scope of MBA Capstone project is huge and there are
several topic areas opened to be worked upon. As commented by Cengiz and Karatas, (2015),
that any research to be valid at any a given time must be relevant as well as timely. For
instance, the selected problem should be a matter of concern at the recent time and that the

Reflective essay 3
issue had attracted the interest of the concerned people or the government. At first, I thought
of several business issues prevailing in the recent time like the challenges of entering a new
business in the Australian market or any internal organisational challenges faced by the
management of an organisation. However, after a lot of search and reading out recent articles
and journals, I finally came down to the topic of evaluating the issues faced by Holden as an
Australian car company in competition with other car companies in the market.
Capstone projects are focused on global perspective on management and it deals with
a number of theories and analytical tools that helps in evaluating the problem in a more
systematic way (Moro Visconti, 2016). On a global perspective, understanding complex
market situation, the importance of deciding the target group of people and the market
segment along with the demand of the product is important. Moreover, as pointed out by
Cengiz and Karatas, 2015, that in a competitive market, an organisation has to check its
position in the market by the means of Balanced Scorecard to keep a check on their own
performance. All these theoretical concepts were taught in the following weeks of the
capstone project. I thought it to be one of the important topics of discussion because in the
age of globalisation, there is a huge scope of companies around the world to expand their
business at any part of the globe (Cengiz & Karatas, 2015). With different mechanisms
adapted by different companies, better products are being sold in the market at a lesser price.
However, the home made products are facing huge competition and in turn losing the share of
profit that it should be getting. Therefore, the objective of the research was to carry out the
detailed analysis of the internal and external market along with the changing pattern of needs
of the target group of people.
One of the major reasons of the selection of car industry was that it has a particular
target group of people and the internal and external factors are also much specific compared
to that of other industries (Gardiner & Rieckmann, 2015). Australian car manufacturing

Reflective essay 4
companies like Holden, Ford Australia, and Volkswagen Australia are already at a threat of
ending their manufacturing units in Australia because of the huge competition from the
imported cars. Thus, keeping aside the other foreign companies operating in Australia, I
chose Holden as the case study organisation and comparing it with the rise of sale of Mazda
and Kia.
Chronologically, the next step was to carry out the internal and external analysis of
the market. In the view point of Valadkhani and Smyth, (2016), external analysis of a market
is the unique way of identifying the scope and opportunities of the market for a company to
operate. At the same time, the analysis also defines the threats and the unlikely challenges
that the company can face while operating in the market. As stated by Dunn, Calais, Lee and
Pryor, (2018), PESTLE analysis framework can be considered as the basic and most suitable
framework used for analysing the external market of a country. Likewise, the Porter’s five
forces framework has been used to analyse the internal operational activities of a company.
External Factors Internal Factors
PESTLE analysis
 Political factors
 Economic factors
 Socio-cultural factors
 Technological factors
 Legal factors
 Environmental factors
Porter’s Five Force analysis
 Threat of new entrants
 Threat of substitutes
 Bargaining power of buyers
 Bargaining power of suppliers
 Industry rivalry
PESTLE gives the overview of the prime factors including the political reasons that
involves any kind of governmental interventions in the business operation. Giving example
from the project analysis, it can be said that the Australian government gives all kinds of
benefits to the outside companies to operate their business in Australia. As identified from the

Reflective essay 5
reports, that after the time of global recession there has been a boom in the car market as the
demand of cars have been increased to a great extent (Pomfret & Sourdin, 2017). The
Australian government has been involved in providing subsidy for the manufacturing of low
emission vehicles in order to grow the demand of the environmental friendly vehicles.
Talking about the economic factors that enhance the car selling in the country, it can be said
that the per capita income of the people is high compared to other countries due to higher
wage of the workers (Dean, 2018). At the same time, Australia is one of the developed
countries of the world and the purchasing power of the consumers is quite high. The demand
of all types of cars is high as well and it is welcoming the car manufacturers from around the
world to do business in Australia.
Greenland, Combe and Farrell, (2016) pointed out the socio-cultural factors that
affects the purchasing decision of the people in a country is also in preferable state when it
comes to the Australian car market. It has been found that there is a high increase in the
demand of Sedan and SUV’s. People buy cars to match their status with others in the society.
With the change in the trend, there has been a shift in the demand of the people as well and
this could have been found to be fulfilled by various foreign car manufacturing companies.
Toyota, Ford, BMW, Porsche are the well-known companies which have been found to
operate in Australia and have been successful in the country’s market (Islam & Mamun,
2017). Technologically, there has been great advancement in innovation and social
determinants when it comes to the Australian market (Dincer, 2017). It has been pointed out
by, that there is a great demand of eco-friendly cars in the recent time and as a result of this
the car manufacturers are coming up with technological innovations to improve the present
car design and manufacture cars that could be environmental friendly.
Apart from this, the demand of fast and automatic cars has always been there (Majid,
2016). Companies like Toyota are always there in the market with their new technology. This

Reflective essay 6
has helped to increase the customer base of the company in Australia (Majid, 2016). Like, the
government of the country can come up with any kind of changes in the governmental
policies and this can lead to a change in the operational activities of the companies. Legally,
it can be said that there are several other external tools and business strategies which are used
while working on the business capstone project. Any company that enters a market follow a
market entry strategy that is most suitable for them. As of other car companies operating in
Australia work as direct entry strategy where they open their own manufacturing set up and
manufactures cars (Morris & Metternicht, 2016). It requires following the legal procedure of
opening the manufacturing hubs in the country. Environmentally, the products should be
environmental friendly and non-damaging. The car manufacturers have come up with the
latest technological innovations to reduce the level of smoke and other environmentally
degrading elements.
Apart from the above mentioned factors, understanding the target group of people is
another important segment in the working procedure of any foreign company (Yee, Abdullah
& Nawi, 2017). Here, we can talk about the Porter forces. It was in the next week of the
research I started working on the present demand of the people in the car market in Australia
or the factor of bargaining power of the buyers. It was important to understand as why the
people of Australia are not buying the cars manufactured in their home land and why do they
prefer to go for the foreign brands. For this, I had to research a lot and I had brought out the
comparison charts and tables with that of other car companies from the annual reports of the
companies. In this respect, I would like to mention that I faced great difficulties in getting the
type of comparison charts and figures as per the requirement (Gardiner & Rieckmann, 2015).
In fact, getting data of sale and a comparison with other companies were also not readily
available and I had to work a lot in order to make sure that the data is correct. However, with
much logic and definite figure, I had put a number of comparison charts too that gave an

Reflective essay 7
overview of the research at a glimpse and any reader would find it easy to see a comparison
of the Holden and that of Kia. It has been clearly observed that the consumers are of different
opinion when they have to invest their money in buying cars and thus, the bargaining power
of buyers was high. At the same time, many global companies are seeking the market
opportunity of Australia and thus, for the home based companies, the threat of new entrants
was also high (Garrity, Keck, Bradshaw & Ishikawa, 2019). However, threat of substitute
arises when there is another product available that could be served in the same purpose of a
car and in this way, Yee, Abdullah and Nawi, (2017) pointed out that the cab services like
Uber have opened up the opportunity where the people are no longer going for their personal
cars but is availing hired cars and also the pool services. Thus, threat of substitution has also
increased. With advanced technology and innovative work, the bargaining power of the
suppliers of the car parts and machineries has also increased (Valadkhani & Smyth2016).
My research involved secondary analysis with both qualitative data and quantitative
data. The qualitative data included all kinds of reports where the information about the sales
of the cars and the declining market demand had been discussed. The quantitative analysis
included the figures of the number of cars being sold or the revenue generated by the
company (Cengiz & Karatas, 2015). When the entire research was done and the analysis part
was also over, it was time to recommend certain ways by which Holden could probably
improve its business operation (Valadkhani & Smyth2016). I had proposed that the car
company has to come up with better innovative techniques in the manufacturing of the cars
that would help to meet the expectations of the people in the recent time. In order to create a
better image in the market, it is important to think about the environmental friendly operating
system that would produce less smoke and would not pollute the air (Clibborn, Lansbury &
Wright, 2016). Apart from this, most importantly, Holden has to improve its marketing
activities in order to create awareness about its own product and to create a separate customer

Reflective essay 8
base. If the marketing can be done successfully, there is a high chance that the demand of the
cars in the market will be increased and consequently, the sales will increase as well.
Conclusion:
The reflective journal gives the details of the three week long plan that was required
for carrying out the research. Primarily a proposal was prepared to outline the things to be
done in the main research paper. This has helped me to get prior idea of how the research to
be conducted and thus, I was prepared to carry out the research step by step and at the same
time, I had a number of references ready as well that were directly used for writing the
research paper. There were a number of challenges like the lack of specific information
regarding the company and other things but all these were handled effectively and the
research work was submitted well within the deadline. The limited word count cap for the
research was another issue where I was not able to address many theories and frameworks
needed for the analysis. In case there were more words allotted, I would have expressed my
findings with more research. I would like to bring improvement in certain areas and for this, I
would like to plan certain goals to be achieve within next 2-3 years before I become a part of
any corporate house.
Action Plan:
I have clearly understood that there are certain areas that need improvement and in
order to overcome the challenges and hurdles faced during the research, I have set up certain
short term and long term goals for me to fulfil. As for the short term, I would like to state that
in order to improve my research skills; I would start reading more journals and newspapers
that would help me to stay up to date in the recent context. I have to keep myself up-to-date
to make sure that whatever changes in market situation, I am aware of it. Apart from the
research skills, I want to improve my feedback taking and communication skills as well.
Once when a feedback was given on the report done by me, I came to know the areas of

Reflective essay 9
improvement in the report and how better research can actually improve the content of the
research paper. I would also like to increase my interaction with friends to improve my inter-
personal and group communication with others.
As for the long term plans, I would like to improve my skills by getting enrolled in a
course where I would dedicate myself in bringing my personality and building my leadership
capability as well. This shall help me to become a part of the organisational business in a
more appropriate and acceptable way. I want to develop my skills to a level where I can be
able to contribute largely to the organisation I would be working for. I also want to
participate in debates, seminars and conferences to be part of the huge group of people and
can prepare myself for all the challenging things that can come my way in my future.

Reflective essay 10
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service science teachers' general chemistry laboratory achievement. Australian
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https://www.mededpublish.org/manuscripts/1361
Clibborn, S., Lansbury, R. D., & Wright, C. F. (2016). Who killed the Australian automotive
industry: The employers, government or trade unions?. Economic Papers: A journal
of applied economics and policy, 35(1), 2-15. Available at:
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/1759-3441.12127
Dean, M. (2018). Parliament in the periphery: Sixteen years of labor government in South
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A
Dincer, I. (2017). Importance of research, innovation and commercialisation for technological
success. International Journal of Research, Innovation and Commercialisation, 1(1),
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