Global Business Environment: Benefits, Drawbacks, and H&M Case Study

This research project delves into the multifaceted global business environment, exploring its benefits and drawbacks, particularly within the context of multinational corporations. The study employs a comprehensive literature review to establish a foundational understanding of the subject, covering key concepts such as the internal and external factors influencing businesses operating internationally. The research adopts an inductive approach, utilizing qualitative methods to analyze the impact of the global business environment on H&M, a prominent Swedish multinational clothing retailer. The report examines how H&M leverages the global business environment to improve its operations, focusing on aspects like cash flow management, revenue generation, and risk mitigation. Furthermore, the research identifies specific benefits and drawbacks of globalization for H&M, including increased market opportunities and competitive pressures. The methodology section details the research philosophy, approach, choice, and time horizon, along with ethical considerations and limitations. The findings are presented through data analysis and interpretations, culminating in conclusions, recommendations, and reflections on the global business environment's impact on H&M's success and providing insights for similar businesses.

Research Project on
the Theme of
Globalisation

Table of Contents
TITLE: “The benefits and drawbacks of a global business environment”. ...................................1
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
Research Overview.....................................................................................................................1
Background of business concern.................................................................................................1
Rationale of study.......................................................................................................................2
Aim of Research..........................................................................................................................2
Objectives of Research ...............................................................................................................2
Investigation Questions...............................................................................................................2
LITERATURE REVIEW................................................................................................................2
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY.....................................................................................................6
Research Philosophy...................................................................................................................6
Research Approach.....................................................................................................................7
Research Choice..........................................................................................................................7
Time horizon...............................................................................................................................7
Data sources................................................................................................................................8
Research sampling......................................................................................................................8
Research Ethics...........................................................................................................................8
Research limitations....................................................................................................................8
Research reliability and validity..................................................................................................9
Research Budget.........................................................................................................................9
DATA ANALYSIS AND INTERPRETATIONS...........................................................................9
CONCLUSION, REFLECTION & RECOMMENDATION........................................................22
Conclusion & Recommendation...............................................................................................22
Recommendation......................................................................................................................23
Reflection..................................................................................................................................24
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................25

TITLE: “The benefits and drawbacks of a global business environment”.
INTRODUCTION
Research Overview
Global business environment is explained as surroundings within various sovereign
countries. It is divided within two i.e., external and internal out of which external environment
comprises of social, public perceptions, political, tax, socio cultural, competition, legal,
economic, regulation addition to many more. On the other hand, Internal business environment
involve elements those are within the organisations such as management, current employees and
so on. When an organisation expand their business at global level it is important for them to
analyse overall environment is effective manner by utilising several tools (Gutierrez, Boukrami
and Lumsden, 2015). Because there are benefits and drawback for an business firm which they
face while expanding business globally. Thus, this research will help in identifying benefits
together with disadvantages associated with global business environment along with their
consequence on company who expand business.
Background of business concern
H&M is a swedish organisation who are operating this organisation all over the world
this organisation is having online and offline clothing stores and they provide clothes for men,
woman and children . H&M associated with 82 counties in world wide and they are operating
almost 4500 stores and around 132000 employees are working for this company .H&M
providing online services through mobile app and website and 33 counties can access this
website and application online. A biggest achievement for company is that they are 2 largest
retailer in all over the world.
.
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Rationale of study
Importance behind conducting this investigation is to understand the thought of global
business environment. In addition to this everything have their several benefits addition to
drawback same as global business environment also have. This research will help in identifying
some major benefits along with shortfalls that global business environment posses on the
activities and operation of H&M. Although, benefits and disadvantage which company will face
within global business environment going to be discuss within it.
Aim of Research
RESEARCH AIm To identify the benefits and drawbacks of global business environment on
business success of multinational organisation. A case study on H&M.
Objectives of Research
 To develop basic idea about the Phenomena of global business environment.
 To determine the role of global business environment in operation of H&M.
 To identify major benefits and drawbacks of global business environment on business
success of H&M.
Investigation Questions
 What are the ways to develop basic idea about the Phenomena of global business
environment?
 What are the role of global business environment in operation of H&M?
 What are the major benefits and drawbacks of global business environment on business
success of H&M?
LITERATURE REVIEW
Literature review is considered as crucial portion of research because it helps the research
worker to analysis information in accurate manner. Main purpose of this section is to identifying
gap and conflict in previous study. Herein, each objectives or questions of research will be
address by the researcher.
To develop basic idea in context to Phenomena of global business environment.
As per the opinion of Shawn Grimsley, 2018, business environment is said to the
aggregation of intrinsic as well as extrinsic factors directly effecting organisational performance.
For instance, regulation of health together with safety is classified as an extrinsic component
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whose outcomes are analysed on influencing internal environment of business activities as well
as operations. In addition, business environment introduces as the combination of factors
pertaining in inside and outside boundaries having influence on operating situations of an
administrative system. Certain factors associated with business environment includes clients,
suppliers, legislation and government activities, social and economic trends etc.
According to the (Crane, Matten and Spence, 2019) global business environment is
explained as the surroundings in different countries, with contrary number of factors that
exogenous to the domestic company environment. This externally influence decision making
process of employees while identifying resource use addition to capabilities. Along with this,
global business environment is characterised into the internal environment together with external
environment. In addition, factors with external environment are the legal, cultural, tax, political,
economic, technological as well as social environments. Along with this, internal environment
introduces as a company specific and includes employees, owners, materials, machines etc. All
these are main factors that directly influence on business operations of an organisation at internal
level.
To determine the role global business environment have on H&M operation
From the view point of Jim Woodruff, 2018, global business environment played more
effective role in improvement of business operations of H&M. Global business environment
helps H&M by easier cash-flow management, increasing its revenues, benefiting from currency
exchange, benefiting from currency exchange, decreasing competitions, longer commodity
lifespan, better risk management, disposal of surplus goods, access to export financing,
enhancing reputation etc. All these are main roles played by global business environment. As
these are support Swedish multinational clothing-retail company (H&M) by improving its
operations in the production of goods or service at international level. Along with this, the
procedures concerned with global business environment plays essential role in H&M as well as
improving its business operations together with attaining better outputs within given time
duration. Other than this, lean production is a method that is primarily designed for minimising
material wastages together with managing labours efforts so to maintain production levels. It also
plays important role on operations of H&M as it improves production efficiency, product quality,
reduces wastages addition to enhancing quantities of production level. The managers of the
business concern applied the concept from developing ideas to distributing final manufactured
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product. Such concept helps in cutting various costs addition to making practices efficient
together with responsive towards fulfilling market needs. If managers of H&M adopts the
approach of lean manufacturing then they will experience benefits in improving employee
efficiencies, satisfying personnels, better adaptability of innovations, effectively responding
demand fluctuations, fewer delays together with total productivity improvements.
As per the thoughts of Carol Woods, he described globalisation as certain global
changes where an entity have to perform their key function within the self contained national
boundaries so to move towards practising at international level. In other words, when there is
liberal movement of commodities, services addition to people so to access people receding in
other nations is termed as globalisation. This is very important as it will benefit managers of
H&M company to accomplish huge financial gains addition to profitability by enhancing shares
of market by practising at international level. H&M Firm has main goal to capture local addition
to international customers globally.
To identify major benefits with short falls of global business environment on business success of
H&M.
According to the (Quarshie, Salmi and Leuschner, 2016) certain advantages related to
global business environment comprises identification of threats, assist in accomplishing
objectives, happenings in the marketplace, threats inherent in any opportunity, increased sales
opportunities and hence forth. The described ones are consider biggest advantages in context to
global business environment and assist an organisation to achieve better results within given time
duration. In contrary, there are some drawbacks related to global business environment such as
lack of forewarning of unforeseen events, no Assurance as to Organization Effectiveness,
absence of strategic approach, no fully reliability and so forth. The mentioned ones are main
limitations pertaining with global business environment and negatively impact on success of
H&M. In addition, the concept helps an organisation by improving its brand image together with
goodwill in competitive market as well as in mindset of targetted customer. It will further
support the firm to maximise customers base and also support them to achieve competitive
benefits within set duration. Apart from this, global business environment is mainly
recommended on towards rising capital which implies integration of domestic together with
national economic system towards international level. Moreover, It is said as combination of
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numerous markets in the international economic level and heading towards enhancing
interconnectedness among distinct national economies. It will further assist in entering in large
market place in order to gain customer attention by offering different variety of commodities
with services. Therefore, global business environment is beneficial for H&M by determining its
business opportunities addition to threats, providing growth direction, learning in continuous
manner, building image as well as sustaining in competition.
On the view point of Todd Anderson, globalisation has certain benefits for enterprise as it
eliminates monopoly of profit within competing markets at global context. It will further helps in
enhancing success growth through delivering quality commodities to numerous users. As per
such approaches, a business concern can decrease their dependency on distinct economies. Now
a days. due to presence of wide internet users who easily gets attracted towards H&M's existing
commodities as well as new products of the brand . Furthermore, the basic drawback of
globalisation that H&M company managers faces is new and existing competitor on the global
market resulting in creating threat during entering towards new market place. The moment
organisation expands in market, it is important for mangers to have knowledge about gaining
huge revenues and profitability in market.
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RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
Research methodology is said to an important procedure which will helps an investigator
to collect information in accurate manner. It is a most important section which assist a researcher
to complete research systematically (Laudonand Traver, 2016). This section is considered to be
one of the most essential part of investigation which contains a detailed description regarding
several tools and techniques that are used to collect, measure, evaluate together with interpreting
all necessary information in effectively style so that proper conclusion can be presented over
findings. The tools and techniques used for performing this investigation is mentioned below:
Research Philosophy
Herein, Positivism and Interpretivism research which are important philosophy opted by
investigator so to gain effective outcomes addition to results from the research. Interpretivism
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Illustration 1: (Source: The Essence of Research Philosophy. 2019)

philosophy is suitable to carry out the research report as it benefits the investigator to reach on
accurate together with valid conclusion. In contrary, positivism philosophy does not
appropriately fits in implementing investigation as it results in invalid conclusion for the project
report.
Research Approach
Herein, inductive addition to deductive approach are considered as necessary research
approach preferred by numerous researcher and investigator to evaluate particular investigation
topic in better aspects. In this type of deductive approach, usage of various current theories
addition to their applications so to determining hypothesis in context to the special circumstances
to derive empirical information (Murray, Skene and Haynes, 2017). On other hand, inductive
approach uses non numerical information with applications that helps the researcher to collect
some results that results in verifying numerical evaluation. For this all, suitable one is inductive
approach for researcher due to its characteristic of providing suitable data during conducting
researches and For this research, information gathering is done through qualitative method of
collecting information which further aid in collecting information in theoretical manner.
Research Choice
The research choice is basically depends upon the characteristic of data which will be
gathered for performing particular investigation. The investigation choice are basically of two
type such as qualitative and quantitative. In order to perform this investigation qualitative
research methods will be used which help in gaining an understanding regarding the underlying
opinion and motivations. The main aim behind selecting qualitative method of investigation is
that it provide a theoretical framework through which a issue of research can be deeply analysed
by uncovering the trends in thoughts or opinion.
Time horizon
This section is consider as most crucial part of investigation which contains a description
regarding the time taken by activities performed within the research (Oh And et.al., 2016). For
proper management of time Gantt chart will be used which is a graphical representation of
activities that are required to be perform within the research along with time take by them.
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Data sources
There are two different methods for collecting data which are considered for this
investigation which are known as primary and secondary. In context to primary methods, these
are applied by research worker for development of questionnaire aiding in gathering exact
information from different respondents (Monshipouri, Welch and Kennedy, 2017). In contrary,
secondary method are generally used by investigator for collecting information through
secondary sources including books, magazines, newspapers, publications, journals and so forth.
In present report, collected data will be utilized for assist in gathering almost same information in
context to research. In addition, Data analysis method is most suitable option for the research of
sampling questionnaire.
Research sampling
It is a method of selecting group of people in a manner that represent whole population
and support in gathering information on behalf of them. Sampling methods are of two type such
as probabilistic and non-probabilistic method (Chazdon And et.al., 2017). Among these non-
probabilistic approach will be used as it help in avoiding any kind of bias behaviour. The sample
size opted to complete the study is 30 wherein random sampling analysis is considered as most
suitable approach.
Research Ethics
Research ethics are most crucial factor to be consider by researcher while performing
investigation which help in ensuring the right presentation of information. As it is important to
give correct information because it will help in conducting entire research in correct manner by
following legal formalities. The ethics that researcher must follow are informed consent, must
keep the confidentiality of work as well as people involve in investigation and research must try
to represent real information without filtering it. Apart from this, most important is that data as
well as information related to respondents should not share with third party thus they have to
keep them secure and safe.
Research limitations
The major limitation which found in investigation is the time provided for conduction of
research was very limited and this restrict the researcher in assessing the number of sources for
gathering the information (Binder, 2016). As global business environment is wide concept which
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require proper time for gaining detail information about it. Hence in order to deal with this issue
researcher has used questionnaire which support in gathering larger amount of information in
less possible time from number of people.
Research reliability and validity
The information presented within the investigation is most reliable and valid as the
secondary information is gathered from authenticated sources which is published previously. In
addition to this the data is gathered from respondents are presented in a manner in which it has
been collected hence it is reliable and valid (Lawrence and Weber, 2014). Thus, in simple term it
can be said that information gathered is true and fair as well as related to the research topic.
Research Budget
An investigation required different resources such as newspaper, magazines, internet
connection, communicational technique etc. in order to perform investigation in more
appropriate manner and for accomplishing the research goals and objectives. So in order to
arrange these resources and performing investigation effectively the budget of £ 550 will be
required.
DATA ANALYSIS AND INTERPRETATIONS
Data analysis will be accomplished with application of thematic analysis. Moreover, It is
consider most essential method of data analysis which will assist an investigator to evaluate
accurate information in effective manner (Peng, 2016).
Q1 Do you have any knowledge in context to global business environment practices?
a) Yes
b) No
Q2 Which benefits does global business expansion provide to H&M?
a) Larger customer base
b) Access to advancement
c) Availability of resources
Q3What are the major drawbacks which are witnessed under global business environment?
a) Higher competition
b) Change in customer demand
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c) Regulatory issues
Q4 What are the prime role of global business environment in operation of H&M?
a) Enhance availability of resources
b) Maximise trade surplus
c) Fluctuate cost of labour
Q5What are the several ways that H&M can expand their business operations globally?
a) Franchising
b) Joint venture
c) Licensing
Q6 Does globalisation helps H&M in providing competitive advantage in marketplace?
a) Yes
b) No
Q7 What are the major threats that are present in global business environment and can affect the
operations of H&M?
a) Cultural differentiation
b) Political barriers
c) Trade barriers
Q8 As per your view point which measure will support in avoiding the challenges faced at
global business environment by H&M?
a) Market research
b) Knowledge about laws and regulations
c) Unique product & services
Q9 What resources are required to be consider by H&M while expanding its business at global
level?
a) Human resources
b) Financial resource
c) Technical resources
Q10 Which are the factors that attract companies toward expanding its business operations
globally?
a) Economies of scale
b) Access to new marketplace
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