Marks & Spencer Business Context: SWOT, PESTLE, Leadership & CSR

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of Marks and Spencer's (M&S) business context, employing frameworks such as SWOT and PESTLE to evaluate the internal strengths and weaknesses, as well as external opportunities and threats facing the multinational retailer. The SWOT analysis identifies M&S's well-established brand, global presence, and multichannel operations as key strengths, while weaknesses include public perception issues and declining sales. Opportunities for growth lie in global expansion and enhanced online presence. The PESTLE analysis examines the impact of political, economic, social, technological, environmental, and legal factors on M&S's business, including the challenges posed by Brexit and the importance of technological innovation. The report also recommends a suitable leadership style and discusses the company's Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) initiatives, highlighting its commitment to environmental sustainability and ethical practices. Ultimately, the analysis aims to provide insights into how M&S can navigate the dynamic business environment and capitalize on its strengths to achieve sustainable growth.

Context of Business

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION ..........................................................................................................................3
TASK ..............................................................................................................................................3
SWOT Analysis..........................................................................................................................3
PESTLE Analysis........................................................................................................................6
Evaluate how the changes in macro-environment factors influences the threats and
opportunities of business.............................................................................................................7
Recommend a suitable leadership style......................................................................................8
Corporate Social Responsibility................................................................................................10
CONCLUSION .............................................................................................................................10
REFERNCES:................................................................................................................................12
Books and Journals:..................................................................................................................12

INTRODUCTION
The context of business involves an understanding of those variables or factors that
affects the company from several perspectives, consisting how a company taking decisions and
what it ultimately trying to attain. The context of business is mainly exploited by IT to find out
the main implications for carrying out the strategic initiatives. The company which is chosen for
this assignment is Marks and Spencer (M&S). It is a multinational retailer in UK, which is
specializes in household products and non-household products. It is also registered on the
London Stock Exchange (Tuan and et. al., 2019). In 1884, the company was headquartered in
London, England, UK. In present times, it has 959 stores throughout the country of UK, in which
615 stores merchandise only food products, through its asserts the nature, TV commercials,
luxury of F&B. It also provides its services through online platforms. The report covers various
models and frameworks such as PESTLE and SWOT. It is also mentioned with leadership style
that best suits the organisation. Lastly, it is discussing various CSR initiatives taken by company.
TASK
SWOT Analysis
SWOT is an acronym of strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of an
organisation. This is a proven framework to analyse the brand with its strengths and weaknesses
that are internal factors as well as opportunities and threats that are external factors. It will
support to benchmark the performance of business in comparison with other players in the
market (Torres and Sidorova, 2019). The following is SWOT analysis of the Marks and Spencer:

Strengths- Well-experienced: From the past 136 years, the company operates its business as retailer
in UK. Initially, the brand started their business with Penny Bazaar at Kirkgate Market.
After then, the company has made a significant partnerships over the decades throughout
the globe. Multinational Company: The company operates its business both online and offline. It
has a significant presence in Europe, Middle East and Asia. It is researched that M&S has
1462 outlets in the entire world and out of which 1035 are available in UK itself.
Presence in both platforms facilitates a global presence to the company (Szelagowski and
Berniak-Woźny, 2019). Recognized brand: It created a reputation of offering quality products to the clients in the
marketplace. That is the reason when customers go out for purchasing, their first
preference is M&S. As per the Statista, the company is well recognised by it customers
and very popular in UK. Multichannel presence: It has both online stores and brick and mortar stores which
provides franchising options. M&S operates 910 stores and 300 full-line stores in the UK,
220 acquired and 310 franchised are simply offers household product. Online channels of
M&S can provide an ease to the customers to shop throughout the world. Variety of Products: It facilitates a range of quality products in the market. For example,
the brand has been providing a range of quality vegetables for the past four decades out
of 136 years. By making a good relationships with local growers who delivers fresh
products to serve to the customers has impacted positively on the brand. Famous designer's brands: The chosen organisation has provide a significant chance to
the designers on a large scale of various brands at its stores. Some of those are
Collezione, North Coast, Big and Tall, Autograph, Indigo Collection, Blue and Harbour,
Classic, Portfolio, Limited Collection, Per Una and many more (Simons and Handl,
2019). When the organisation has brought different brands under one roof, it creates
significant image in the market.
Weaknesses-

 Perception of Public: Most of the customers think that M&S do not provide clothing
products to the teenagers and young people. Although, this perception is not right at all,
but impacts negatively on the company. Declining sales: It is researched that the company's sales has been declined in the year of
2019. The reason behind this decline is the non-availability of the product and poor
supply chain of distribution. In 2017, the same situation faced by the company in which it
could not meet the requirements for food and clothing products, which delivered a
negative impact on the organisation. Customer satisfaction: Many customers experiencing low satisfaction levels form the
brand. There have been lots of problems in terms of in-store experience as well as returns
policies. This caused poor brand loyalty of customers and switching to other companies. High cost due to manual processes: One of the weaknesses of the chosen company is
that it heavily depend on the manual operations. It needs a lot of time and costs.
Opportunities-
 Global expansion: As discussed above, the company has a global presence in several
countries such as Russia, Brazil, India, Indonesia and Poland. It can also explore other
countries for the business expansion (Renkes and Sommer, 2019). By playing an active
role it can increase its branches in other countries as well. Online store: The selected organisation has an online presence but when it is compared
with other leading e-commerce brands such as eBay or Amazon, it is not that effective at
all. Even though it is old, has a name and well experienced, it is far behind from its
competitors. E-commerce retail business is very common nowadays and can be taken as
future of shopping because people avoid crowded places and are busy in their personal
lives where they have no time to visit physical stores. Market segmentation: It is found that M&S follows only one principle of opening mega
outlets all over. If the brand focuses on segmenting the customers on the basis of their
demands and needs, it can create a great opportunity. It can often provided many
advantages such as low costs of maintenance, small stores means low cost of rent and
simultaneously increases the revenue for the business.
Threats-

 High Competition: The retail sector involves immense competition all over the world.
The main competitors of the M&S are Tesco, John Lewis, Sports Direct, Next, Gap,
Morrisons, Sainsbury's, Zara, Tommy Hilfiger, United Colors of Benetton and many
more.
PESTLE Analysis
PESTLE analysis is a proven framework which is vital for the businesses such as M&S,
as it provides a deep understanding to market fluctuations and enhance its business on regular
basis. It involves various macro environmental factors such as political, economic, social,
technological, environment and legal. In context of M&S, the following is the analysis of all the
external factors: Political factors: The chosen organisation has a global presence with more than 1300
outlets throughout the world and has its headquarters in London. The company has been
facilitated by several benefits such as free trade policies. But Brexit created a massive
impact on the business where many policies are no longer apply to the M&S. It is found
that Brexit may increase the production costs of company (Marić, 2020). Hence, if the
UK truly falls apart, M&S overseas' stores will have to either shut down or rises their
prices which may result in losing valuable customers. Economic factors: An increase in inflation rate of a certain economy impacts the way in
which company operates their business. UK is one of the largest economies all over the
world as well as has an open economy. This factor encompasses foreign exchange rates,
inflation rates, economic growth, interest rates and many more. As the UK government
has enough finances to manage the monetary and fiscal policies, the inflation rate can be
successfully maintained. In case of M&S, the brand has created a successful strategy that
deals with the quality of products. Financial crises can results in declining the demand of
high quality goods and services. The chosen company has been significantly affected by
the crises which caused in lowering job opportunities by 2%. Social factors: Customer choices and preferences are affected by the social, cultural,
psychological changes in the marketplace. In 2006, the company wanted to improve the
offerings with a motive to keep up the changing trends in the marketplace. M&S and
ASDA appeal to various markets in terms of demographics and social class, this has
implications on dealing problems in the marketplace. In case of M&S, many consumers

go for autograph range and limited stock collection rather than classic collection. Also,
there was a rise in trade after credit cards came into place. M&S has grabbed the
opportunities very well and allowing their consumers to use credit cards in their shopping
which affected the business in positive way. Technological factors: The company has introduced Technology Transformation
Programme that makes company to go digitally and offer a diversified customer
experience. It is designed to generate a faster, agile and commercial technology function
that would cause in boosted growth and development of business. M&S is highly focused
on the creation of new Technology Operating Model which would deliver an exploitation
of advanced technologies, encompassing the adoption of methods associated with
industry agile method. Legal factors: The legal factors involves legislations of country. In case of M&S, it
focuses on the conduct of training and development sessions on the fields such as health
and update them year to year with an intent to keep themselves updated with the present
laws and legislations (Leminen and et. al., 2020). The chosen brand came under public
scrutiny when it got accusations of failing to safeguard its workers and employees from
potential risk exposures. They were also charged which was based on the Health and
Safety at Work Act 1974 with a purpose to establish necessary measures towards
workers' safety and health.
 Environmental factors: The issues linked with the present climatic conditions are being
promoted regularly in magazines, on TV commercials as well as in newspapers. The
selected organisation has launched its Green Policy which is known as “Plan B”. This
initiative adopted by the organisation to deliver a positive affect on the communities,
well-being and on the planet (Davis, 2017).
Evaluate how the changes in macro-environment factors influences the threats and opportunities
of business.
In case of M&S, the inter-relationship with macro-environmental factors has been
discussed below: Political factors: The political factors of UK are stable which can create new
opportunities for the business on a large scale, but on the other side, Brexit affects the
business of M&S severely.

 Economic factors: It provides a threat to the company when inflation rate increases, the
demand for product decreases and delivers a significant rise in the products of M&S. On
the other side, the company has also affected badly by economic factors due to which it
cuts down the jobs by 2% (Jackson, 2018). Hence, it can be a major threat for the
company. Social factors: These variables facilitates a positive impact on the company. M&S can
create a growth opportunities by understanding the current trends in the market. By
conducting research on the customers' tastes, preferences, demands and so on, a company
can offer a positive brand image while winning the hearts of customers. Technological factors: M&S already adopts latest technologies such as Technology
Transformation Programme and Technology Operating Model in the operations of
business which becomes a strength for the organisation (Glebovskiy, 2019). By putting
innovations in products and services, the company can create new opportunities for the
business. One of the downsides of using latest technologies is that it requires high costs
and expertise. This can be threat for the M&S. Legal factors: This factor affects the company a lot in terms of adopting new legal rules
and legislations. It is already a weakness of the M&S as their workers and employees
faced issues related with their health. For which, company faced many legal
consequences as well as paid charges in order to avoiding workers' safety and health.
 Environmental factors: It is the strength of the company as it already adopts various
initiatives towards the well-being of society, employees, partners, suppliers, workers and
many more. M&S has clearly taking various steps towards sensitive issues related with
climatic changes, people' health, industrial waste management, recycling products, ethical
training and many more. It can attract more customers by enhancing its steps towards
sustainability (Dinh, Karmakar and Kamruzzaman, 2020).
Recommend a suitable leadership style.
Meaning of leadership:
Leadership is the process of motivating the group of people towards achieving the set
objectives. A leader play a very important role in improving the different things and provide a
clear vision in attaining the goals. In case of M&S, the following leadership style of Daniel
Goleman’s has been recommended:

Democratic leadership style:
This leadership style is also known as shared leadership style in which the every team
member of the organisation can take part in the decision making process of the organisation. In
this leadership style every member has value of his voice and management of the organisation
genuinely wants to here their suggestion (Dhir, 2020).
Some of the characteristics of Democratic Leader style are as follows:
 Each and every group member of the company are engaged in the decision making
process and have authority to share their ideas and opinions in favour of the company
growth (Junior, Oliveira and Yanaze, 2019).
 Because of this process every member of the group feel more engaged and motivated.
 Creativity and analytical thinking of employees has been encourage and also being
rewarded.
 Employees can easily work because of the flexible and collaborative environment.
If M&S adopt Democrat Leadership style in its management process then the employees of the
company feel always motivated which help the company not only in increasing the employees
retention rate but also help the employees to work with free mind. Due to this the member of the
organisation work with full hard work and achieve the set objectives of the company with full
productivity.
Following are the advantages of the Democratic Leadership style:
 This leadership style not only encourage the engagement of the employees but also take
input from them. This motivate the moral of the members and increase the productivity
of doing the task. When a democratic leader properly listen the issues of the employees and give them a
satisfied solution then it boost up the employee moral. Because of this job satisfaction
rate has been increased.
Following are the Disadvantages of the Democratic Leadership style:
 Because of the involvement of the many people in the decision making process, it will
take time to make a choice which ultimately slow down the workflow.
 Each member put their time and effort in the decision process, the leader have to reject
some of the view point which are not great. These rejection demotivate the employees.

Corporate Social Responsibility
Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is a term which refers to the different practices
and policies which help the organisation in becoming socially accountable to public, employees
and shareholders. To engaged in CSR means that, the company operates their functions in such a
manner which enhance the environment of society in ordinary courses of business. The M&S
always do their business in a very responsible manner (Janiesch, and Kuhlenkamp, 2019). The
company become a brand and take every issue of the society very sensitively and positively.
Some of the CSR of M&S are as follows:- Charity and donation: Donation and charity through the local stores of the M&S has
been done to small trust and charitable organisation. The company always focus on the
local issues and support their local community. Equipment and clothing: The M&S donates their returned cloths to the different
charitable trust like Newlife and Shelter. Sometimes the clothing sample, unwanted floor
fittings and unwanted garments to the local charity shops. Fundraising: The M&S raise funds from the corporates by doing campaigns and other
activities. Recently the company raise the fund for one of their charity partner like
Breakthrough Breast Cancer.
 Waste management: According to the five year “eco plan” of the M&S the company stop
sending their waste in the field of UK and also reduces the use of plastic packing (Jamel,
Saidani and Nurcan, 2018). Along with this the company also stop sending their waste
food material in the field of UK and start producing green energy by anaerobic digestion
and decomposing of food material.
CONCLUSION
It is concluded from the above report is that context of business deals with several factors
existing in the environment which affects in the decision-making of the organisation. The report
is based on the discussion of several internal and external factors which affects the profitability
of business. To analyse the internal and external factors, SWOT analysis is the appropriate tool.
With the help of this tool, it is concluded that company is having more strengths than its
weaknesses, and can grab more opportunities by overcome the threats. PESTLE analysis is used
to examine the macro-environmental factors which also needs to weighed by the brand.
Leadership plays an important role to influence and encourage others to work accordingly. The

leader must choose his leadership style wisely that can help to guide and communicate with
others. CSR deals with corporate responsibilities towards society, employees, customers,
partners and suppliers.

REFERNCES:
Books and Journals:
Davis, S., 2017. Strategic CSR in the Japanese context: From business risk to market
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Dhir, S., 2020. Developing a scale to measure institutional effectiveness in the context of Indian
business schools: Using exploratory factor analysis. Global Business Review,
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context. International Journal of Organization Theory & Behavior.
Jackson, K., 2018. As a context for business and management research, how ‘unique’is Japan?.
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