Business Environment: Macro and Internal Analysis Report (P4, P5, P6)

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of the business environment, focusing on the positive and negative impacts of macro-environmental factors on a business organization, specifically using Marks & Spencer (M&S) as a case study. It examines political, economic, social, technological, legal, and environmental factors, detailing their influence on business operations. The report then delves into an internal and external analysis of M&S, utilizing a SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats) analysis to assess the company's internal capabilities and external challenges and opportunities. The strengths include brand image, a wide variety of products, and a large number of outlets. Weaknesses include being seen as non-trendy and manual working processes. Finally, the report explores the interrelation between the identified strengths and weaknesses with the macro-environmental factors, highlighting how these factors influence the business's overall performance and strategic decision-making. The report concludes with a list of relevant references supporting the analysis.

BUSINESS AND BUSINESS
ENVIRONMENT

P4 EXPLAIN THE POSITIVE AND NEGATIVE
IMPACT OF THE MACRO ENVIRONMENTAL
OPERATIONS ON A BUSINESS ORGANIZATION.
The Macro or external environmental factors play a very
crucial role in the establishment of a business organization
that will help in the better handling of a wide range of
business operations. The organization like M & S has to
effectively take in consideration various sort of the
different business operations that help in its better growth
and development. The positive and negative impact of the
macro environmental factors on the growth and
development of a business organization is as follows:

POLITICAL FACTORS:
 Positive impact: the better handling of the political
relations and networks will help the M & S to have a
hassle free functionality in an organization. It will help
the company to gain a better productivity and handle the
business operation in a very effective way. Besides this
the supportive political government will help in effective
handling of the wide range of business operations of the
retail firm.
 Negative impact: any sort of political disturbance or
change will lay a very deep impact on the business
organization that will affect in effective handling of a
wide range of business operations of the cited retail firm.

ECONOMIC FACTORS
 Positive impact: a good economic stability will help the
business firm to have effective growth and development
of the business organization in all environmental
conditions. Also, the effective handling of the economic
resources will help the firm to mitigate the risk factors.
Other than this, the growing economy will help the
business firm to meet the operational requirements of the
company in a better way.
 Negative impact: the depressive and slow economy will
lay a major impact on the overall business operations of
the company and is needed to be handled in better way to
sustain the functionality of M & S in market.

SOCIAL FACTORS:
 Positive impact: the better social factor and its
association with M & S will help the cited firm to handle
the business operations and have a better growth in a
very effective way. The interrelation with the social
sections will help the firm to have a better growth and
development of the cited business firm.
 Negative impact: any social glitch or issue may have a
very deep and significant impact on the operations of M
& S and will have a very deep and crucial impact on the
overall operations and functionality of the cited business
organization. The firm has to effectively look after the
measures to meet the social requirements of people.

TECHNOLOGICAL FACTORS:
 Positive impact: the adoption of the latest technology will
help the M & S to have a better handling of its business
operations and meet the needs and demands of the users in a
better way. The usage of the latest technology will help the
firm to handle the different business operations in a very
effective way. Other than this, the latest technical
advancement will help the firm to increase its operational
capacity in a much better a very effective way.
 Negative impact: the major drawback that the technology can
have on the overall operations of M & S is that the failure of
the system will impact the overall functionality of the
business operations in an effective and significant manner.
Also. The data security is the major threat issue the company
has to face.

LEGAL FACTORS:
 Positive impact: the effective following of the legal
obligations that are been set to carry out the business will
help the M & S to perform their business functions in a
much better and significant manner. Besides this, the
legal measures will help in meeting the functional needs
and demands of the user in a better way.
 Negative impact: any legal issue will lay a very deep
impact on the overall functionality of the business firm
and help in meeting the needs and demands of the users
in a very effective and significant manner. Also, the
failure to maintain the legal standards of the organization
will impact its functionality in a crucial manner.

ENVIRONMENTAL FACTORS:
 Positive impact: M & S will look after the effective
handling of the environmental factors by following the
effective corporate social responsibility. Besides this,
with the rise in the environmental concerns, meeting the
environmental factors will lay an impact on the overall
functionality of organization.
 Negative impact: as the environmental concerns have
been grown in a significant manner, the business firm
has to look after the effective handling of the different
measures to maintain the operational functionality of the
cited retail business firm.

P5 ANALYZE THE INTERNAL AND EXTERNAL
ANALYSIS FOR THE BETTER HANDLING OF THE
DIFFERENT SORT OF STRENGTH AND
WEAKNESSES OF ORGANIZATION.
The internal and external assessment of the M & S will
involve the following factors that are been taken in
consideration by business firm through means of SWOT
analysis. It will help in the better handling of the wide
range of business operations by assessing the internal
strength and weaknesses of the firm and external threats an
opportunities that are been taken in consideration by the
business firm. Other than this, the better handling of the
strength and weaknesses will help in conducting the better
assessment of the operational capacity of business
operations. Some major internal and external
factors that are been taken in consideration by
M & S is as follows:

Strength Weaknesses
 Brand Image: The major strength of
Marks and Spencer is the effective brand
image that is been owned by the cited
business firm. These help the business
organization to attract maximum number
of customers.
 Wide variety of products and services: the
M & S has the wide variety of products
and services to offer to its customers that
will lay a very deep and significant impact
on overall business operations of company
and help the firm to meet needs and
demands of their customers.
 Large number of outlets and stores: M & S
has maximum number of outlets in UK as
well as all around the world. This helps the
firm to cater maximum number of
customers.
 Known as non-trendy store: the cited business
firm has a bad popularity to be known as the
non-trendy and mediocre outlet or store
among the young generation. They are
reluctant to purchase the products and
services from M & S due to its old fashioned
and lack of latest trends.
 Manual working: M & S still uses the manual
measure to manage its business operation and
record keeping. It reduces the efficiency of
firm and may impact the handling of various
business operations, which will lead to
significant decrease in operational capacity of
firm.

Opportunity Threats
 Internalization: this will help
the firm to develop a better
operational efficiency that will
help in better growth and
development of the business
organization of firm. This will
help cited firm to handle its
business operations in a better
and effective way and increase
its efficiency and productivity in
a sustainable way.
 Market segmentation: it will
help in meeting the needs and
demands of its customers in a
better way. This will help the
business organization to
develop a better market
segment and provide its
customers with high quality
products and services.to meet
the customer’s requirements in
a better way.
 Increased competition: with the
entry of many other retain firms in
market; M & S is facing the stiff
competition. The other firms like
Sainsbury’s, Tesco etc are
expanding their business operations,
impacting the growth and
development of cited business firm.
The cited firm has to come up with a
suitable strategy to develop a better
quality of product and services to
cater the needs and demands of its
consumers and users in a better and
effective way.

P6 INTERRELATION OF STRENGTH AND
WEAKNESSES WITH MACRO
ENVIRONMENTAL FACTORS.
The Macro environmental factors will be deeply associated
with the growth and development of business operations. The
various factors such as political, social, economic, technical or
legal and environmental will have a very deep and significant
impact on overall operations of the company. These will help
the firm to develop better products and services to meet the
needs and demands of their customers and handle the wide
range of business operations in a better way. Other than this, the
assessment of the business operations will help the business
organization to meet the needs and demands of the users in a
better way. These will help the business organization to handle
the high level of functionality that will be required by the
business firm to handle in order to achieve a better productivity
and handling of business operations.