Mark and Spencer's Business Strategy: A Comprehensive Case Study

This case study provides a detailed analysis of Mark and Spencer's business operations, focusing on supply chain management, human resource strategies, and quality control processes. The report highlights the importance of maintaining good relationships with customers and stakeholders, along with effective employee training and development. It examines the various stages of supply chain management, from raw materials to customer delivery, and emphasizes the significance of HR strategies in employee retention and motivation. The study also explores the total quality management (TQM) model and its impact on product quality and brand value. Ultimately, the case study underscores the importance of these elements in achieving organizational goals and maintaining a competitive edge in the retail market. Desklib offers similar solved assignments and past papers for students.

Case Study

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION ..........................................................................................................................3
TASK...............................................................................................................................................3
Overview of the organization......................................................................................................3
Supply chain management of Mark and Spencer........................................................................4
Human resource strategies .........................................................................................................5
Quality control process...............................................................................................................6
CONCLUSION ...............................................................................................................................8
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................9

INTRODUCTION
It refers to those activities which engage the business on a daily bases for increasing the
value of a firm and earn a profit. The main purpose of business is to maintain good relations
with customers for a long time with help of using various business strategies. It also includes
various functions for run their activities properly. It includes production, marketing, finance,
human resource and research and development. The company which is chosen for understanding
the business operation are Mark and Spencer. It this report structure, business operations and
supply chain management of the company are described for understanding process
systematically. This research is totally based on the secondary data and the purpose of providing
various task to employee is to increase their thinking of new ideas and creativity. Because these
new thinking and ideas helped to develop product which is totally different from competitors.
TASK
Overview of the organization
Mark and Spencer is a multinational retail company and is headquartered in London. The
company was established in 1884 by Michael Marks Thomas Spencer. The company has wide
range of products but they are mainly dealing with specific products such as clothing, home
products and food products.
The vision of Marks and Spencer is to provide standard quality against competitors
which is measured according to customer experience, taking care of community and environment
and also to maintain good work for employees. Good work culture also helped employees to
increase their passion and interest towards job (Strydom and Kempen, 2021). Customer
experience is very important for increasing the positive word of mouth regarding the company
image .
The mission of Marks and Spencer is to create value for the products which are using by
customers. The other mission is to facilitate best quality products and services to consumers. It
leads to adopt different policies by organization for creating and launching new product globally.
The aim and purpose of organization is to create high profit and become a leader in
market. The other aim of organization is to financial services to customers including account and
savings and so on (Craighead and et.al., 2020). Providing advanced training and development to
employees for increasing their productivity and work efficiency in organization. Because without

effective productivity and work efficiency operational and departmental functions did not work
smoothly. When their product are produced in high quality then their products are used by
consumers for a long time (de Sousa Jabbour and et.al., 2019). Maintaining good relations with
other stake holders are also very important to run their company successfully. It includes
suppliers, CEOs and so on because these stakeholders are essential for maintaining the demand
and supply of product in market. They are also important for establish effective distribution
system between producer and customers. With the help of supply chain management the
satisfaction level of customers are also maintained.
Supply chain management of Mark and Spencer
Supply chain management is a activity where flow of goods and services between
locations and business are done (Ghobakhloo and Ching, 2019)
. In this process various stages are involved which are described below -
 Raw materials – It refers to the unfinished goods which was used in organization for
preparing for producing the product. For producing good quality good quality reliable
and authentic suppliers are very important. In context to Mark and Spencer, they always
target the popular suppliers for receiving best best quality raw materials which leads to
increase the portfolio of the organization.
 Manufacturing – This method refers to the process of producing product in
organization. In context to Marks and Spencer, management used various high tech
equipments to manufacture or packing the products. It includes fixture, dies, cutting
equipments and so on. These tools are very important for organization to run the
operational activities fastly and also for deliver the products to consumers in time. In this
process the product are produced according to the demand and supply by consumers.
 Delivering – This process is comes after manufacturing stage and in this stage the
product is send to different locations. In context to Mark and Spencer for delivering
products to various locations various transportation facility are used. It includes through
roads, railways, air and water which leads to increase the fast movement in delivery of
products to consumers. When the products are delivered to various stores and customers
in time then growth of company are highly increased.

 Retailers – In this stage the role of retailer is to receive and arrange products
systematically in their stores which was sended by organization (Nunes, Causer and
Ciolkosz, 2020). Retailers are directly connected from organization because the various
offers which was implemented from company, retailers displayed in retail stores for
attract the consumers. In context to Mark and Spencer, management must keep good
relations with them for maintaining the proper balance of demand and supply.
 Customers - It is basically refers to the users who consume the product after purchasing.
Customer is the most important asset for company because without consumer business
cannot run successfully (Langley and et.al., 2020). It means business and customers both
are connected with each other. In business money is mainly produced directly by
customers. Customer played a major role for increasing the profit of organization.
Customers are also important for receiving the feedbacks about their product
performance.
Human resource strategies The human resource strategy is adopted by every business enterprise which aims
at integrati9ng the culture of the business organisation and its employees and a system by
coordinating a set of actions for then success of the business enterprises. There are four
key dimensions related to the HR strategy which need to be considered by the
organisations such as culture, organisation, people and human resource system. It is very
important for the HR managers to develop the strategies for making sure that all the core
aspects of human resource management are in sync and align with overall
strategy(Conway and Monks, 2017). It is identified that if employees are trained in such a
manner that they become creative then the organisation need to adopt the various strategy
which will enhance their performance and this will help the business organisation to
achieve its goals and objectives effectively and efficiently. There are several strategies
which is followed by Marks and Spencer which is explained below; Providing security to the employees- this is the most common and essential practice
which is followed by every business organisation. As life is unpredictable work is
considered as a stable factor that is very important for the people. The employment
security can be formal or informal depending on the nature of the business. But it is the

most crucial part for the business enterprises. This strategy can benefit the Marks and
Spencer as it helps in retaining its employees(Eaglebarger, 2017). Hiring the right people- this is again the most and foremost thing which the HR practices
for the functioning of the business enterprise. The main role of the HR Manager is to hire
the right people at the right time. Not only hiring people but finding the right talent
according to the job role is the important task of the HR department within the business
organisation(Mangipudi and Vaidya, 2018). Training and relevant skills- This HR strategy states that the business organisations
should spend heavily on the training and development of the employees. There should be
several programs which should be conducted in order to motivate employees and enhance
their skills and knowledge. Marks and Spencer focus on this aspect as it values that it is
important factor and this should be taken into consideration. The company believes that
learning is a continuous proses and it should not be stopped. Self- managed and effective teams- As it is known that an effective team can result
better than anything. It is important that every business organisations has effective team
in order to complete the task and achieve the goals of the business organisation on the
right time. Marks and Spencer and its HR focuses on this strategy because it values the
people who are putting efforts and it ensures that an individual effort is been appraised in
the team(Burr, 2018).
 Fair and performance based compensation- There are people who are well
knowledgable and they are valued for the for their performance within the business
organisation. This is the strategy which need to be adopted by the HR so that employees
are motivated and they are valued for their efforts. Marks and Spencer practices this
strategy so that they can retain their employees and they are motivated with certain
incentives according to their performance.
◦ Quality control process
 It is a process through which the business organisations seeks to ensure that their
product quality is maintained or improved. This involves testing the units and
determining if they are in the specifications for the final product. This is the important
aspect for the business enterprises to maintain the brand value and offer the right products

to its customers. There is a model which is used by the business organisation know as
total quality management (TQM). The model is explained below:
TQM- It is a framework which is based on the belief that an business enterprise can
build long tern success by having all its members, from low level workers to its highest level
executives concentrate on improving the quality of the products or services the company is
offering to its customers. The main objective of this model is to eliminate waste increase
efficiencies by ensuring that the production processes of the business in done in the right way.
This model have an effective advantage to the Marks and Spencer employees and the company's
development. If all the employees of the company focus on the quality management and
continuous improvement, it is believed that the organisation can establish and uphold the cultural
values which can lead to long term success of the organisation. This model also helps in
identifies the skill deficiency in employees along with the important traini9ng and mentoring so
that it can be improved. This model helps the organisation in delivering the products with the
less defectiveness in it. This enhances the quality and the brand value in front of the customers.
As Marks and Spencer is dealing in the clothes section there is the vast changes of the
defectiveness in the product. It is very important aspect for the company to maintain the quality
of its product to remain the trust of the customers. As a result of the less defected products, the
organisation can save its costs in customer support , products replacements. The cost saving can
lead to create higher profit margin for the business organisation. From the research it is identified
that the companies adopting this manage to save more and create value by eliminating the
defected products(Bian, and et.al., 2018).

CONCLUSION
After the analysis of above information it is understood that human resource
management, quality control and proper supply chain management are essential to run the
operational and departmental functions properly. These elements also helped organization to
achieve their vision, mission and objectives. Human resource department are highly responsible
to manage the whole organization properly. HR department also maintained good coordination
between other departments such as finance, marketing, production and so on. Without proper
coordination company are not able to manage their expense properly. So for Mark and Spencer
quality is very important in their product for maintain the customer satisfaction level.

REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Bian, Y., and et.al., 2018. Metal–organic framework-based nanofiber filters for effective indoor
air quality control. Journal of Materials Chemistry A. 6(32). pp.15807-15814.
Burr, I.W., 2018. Statistical quality control methods. Routledge.
Conway, E. and Monks, K., 2017. Designing a HR system for managing an age-diverse
workforce: Challenges and opportunities. In The Palgrave handbook of age diversity
and work (pp. 585-606). Palgrave Macmillan, London.
Craighead, C. W. and et.al., 2020. Pandemics and supply chain management research: toward a
theoretical toolbox. Decision Sciences, 51(4), pp.838-866.
de Sousa Jabbour, A. B. L. and et.al., 2019. Circular economy business models and operations
management. Journal of cleaner production, 235, pp.1525-1539.
Eaglebarger, S., 2017. Engaging employees beyond the office freebies. Strategic HR Review.
Ghobakhloo, M. and Ching, N. T., 2019. Adoption of digital technologies of smart
manufacturing in SMEs. Journal of Industrial Information Integration, 16, p.100107.
Langley, C. J. and et.al., 2020. Supply chain management: a logistics perspective. Cengage
Learning.
Mangipudi, M.R. and Vaidya, R., 2018. A Study of Digitalization in HRM and its Effectiveness
in Execution of HR Strategies and Policies. Helix. 8(6). p.4220.
Nunes, L. J. R., Causer, T. P. and Ciolkosz, D., 2020. Biomass for energy: A review on supply
chain management models. Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, 120, p.109658.
Strydom, M. and Kempen, E., 2021. Towards economic sustainability: how higher education can
support the business operations of emerging clothing manufacturing micro
enterprises. International Journal of Sustainability in Higher Education.