MGT501 Business Environment: Coca-Cola Stakeholder Analysis

This report provides a comprehensive stakeholder analysis of Coca-Cola, examining both internal and external stakeholders. It identifies key functional areas, utilizes PESTLE analysis to understand the business environment, and details the roles and responsibilities of various stakeholders, including customers, suppliers, and employees. The analysis explores the nature and degree of stakeholder interests, potential conflicts, and the levels of influence exerted by each group. A stakeholder matrix is created to visually represent stakeholder power and cooperation. The report also compares Coca-Cola's stakeholder dynamics with those of other industries, offering a holistic view of the company's stakeholder relationships and their impact on business operations and strategy. This analysis is crucial for understanding the complexities of the business environment and for effective stakeholder management.

STAKEHOLDER ANALYSIS

Executive Summary
Coca-Cola is an American multinational organisation who produces retails and markets the
non-alcoholic beverages and syrups. The organisation is headquartered in Atlanta and it was
incorporated in Delaware. Coca Cola’s stock is as listed on NYSE as its part of DJIA, S&P
index and it is among the Russell 1000 stock index (Coca-Cola, 2017). This report discusses
on examination of how and to what extent business operations are affected and how it affect
the stakeholders. The discussion will lead to discussion on analysing the stakeholders with
the help of identifying their roles and responsibilities. Further, in order to test the influence
which the stakeholders can exert has been analysed by the stakeholder`s matrix.

Contents
Executive Summary...............................................................................................................................1
Introduction...........................................................................................................................................3
Identify functional areas........................................................................................................................3
PEST analysis.........................................................................................................................................4
Identify internal and external stakeholders and their roles...................................................................4
Identify the nature and degree of main stakeholders’ interests, and implications of Conflicting
interests.................................................................................................................................................6
Identify the level of main stakeholders’ influence.................................................................................7
Comparison with different industry.......................................................................................................8
Create a stakeholder matrix..................................................................................................................9
Conclusion...........................................................................................................................................10
References...........................................................................................................................................12

Introduction
The company is the largest manufacturer of carbonated drinks. The products are linked to
licensed bottles, which have two most important ingredients coca leaves and the kola nuts.
The company manufactures beverages and distributes the products. The company offers more
than 2800 products in 200 countries. Some of the important flavours, which the company
offers Coca-Cola that has cherry, lemonade, lime vanilla, citra, orange and raspberry. The
organization maintains a network of 2.6 million retail stores in the world (Coca-Cola, 2018).
Moreover, the organisation has developed the local market that distributes to the grocers,
restaurants, and the supermarket. It has been reported that the company has earned revenue of
3185 Crores. With the growing preferences of healthy lifestyle, the demand of the beverage
industry products has been collapsing. It is seen that the company already owns 48.6 percent
of the share in the industry. The industry has been growing 5 percent and till 2030 it is
expected to grow to US$ 20 trillion. The report identifies the functional areas of the Coca-
Cola, internal stakeholders, external stakeholders, their roles, their responsibilities, analytical
tool such as PESTLE to search the stakeholders. A stakeholder`s matrix has been used to
identify the power, potential and the competitiveness of the different stakeholders (Coca-
Cola, 2018).
Identify functional areas
The crucial functional areas of the Coca-Cola includes-
Human resources
Production management
Process design
Supply chain management
Value chain management

Marketing
Finance
Research and development
Administration
Human resource
PEST analysis
It includes several steps, which are undertaken to identify the stakeholders. This starts from
the brainstorming and prioritising people who affect the operations of the business. PESTLE
analysis helps to identify the certain groups who affect the business in one or the other way.
Political factor- this factor is inclusive of political parties, government agencies and other
legislative empowering, which affect the business operations. Law and legislations are
integral part of the influencing group.
Economic factor- the group under this factor classifies customers such as fiscal policy
makers, monetary formulator, and purchasing power of the people to whom the company is
targeting. Further, inflation rate, interest rates decided by the economic deflators in the
banking sector.
Social factor- demographic groups, psychographic groups and the targeting group based on
segmentation are the important customers of the organisation.
Technological factor- Scientists and other technology developer are some of the influencing
groups that exert impact on operation of the business.

Identify internal and external stakeholders and their
roles
Although every individual, other regulatory organisations and group which affect the
organisation directly or indirectly. Some of the important internal stakeholders of Coca-Cola
include employees, owners and the manager. On the other hand, external stakeholders include
customers, non-government, government, and suppliers. All the mentioned stakeholders have
their own needs and wants from the company as their way of influencing the operations and
decisions. External stakeholders play an important role in offering huge range of resources.
Primary stakeholder and the key business partners are the internal stakeholders. On the other
hand, internal stakeholder consists of employees, manager, owners and the whole
management team.
Coca-Cola`s stakeholder
The stakeholders of the company include the employees in 70,000 offices, distribution, sales,
production department, local territories, and communities. Other more stakeholders are
government, non-governmental, and suppliers, which are inclusive of more than 80000 who
provide ingredients, packaging and other more material. The company sells its product to
more than 440,000 outlets where the drink is sold. Moreover, 400 million in the whole world
are the consumers. Further, it also includes a wide range of investors and also there are
stakeholders that include conducting surveys, partnerships, programs, research scholars, and
sponsors, health and wellness concerns centres around them and, performance of the
organization (Mäenpää, Kojo, Munezero, Fagerholm, Kilamo, Nurminen, & Männistö, 2016).
Customers- this group is a major group of the company “Coca-Cola” as they are able to
evaluate the quality of the products and services. Further, they are able to decide the rationale
price in lieu of that the customers make payment for the products. It is important for the
company to consider whether the needs of the customers are satisfied or not (Rodrigues,

Nikhil, & Jacob, 2016). The company should offer a regime for the preferences of the
customers with the help of marketing strategies by offering the promotion and other discounts
so that it will be able to establish a healthy relationship between the company and the
customers in the sustainable manner. They are identified as the external stakeholders and they
significance is due to generate revenues (Read, 2013).
Suppliers- this group plays a vital in influencing the company and its activities. The company
has several suppliers that provide ingredients, goods, services, and packaging and machinery
to them with the diversified products to the customers (Rodrigues, Nikhil, & Jacob, 2016).
On the other hand, suppliers often ensure to avail raw material, which are of good quality by
ensuring greater quality with the appropriate prices, quantity in the end. The company will
make sure that it provides greater payment system, flexible terms for cash and credit
(Rodrigues, Nikhil, & Jacob, 2016). This group differs from materials to materials according
to the packaging (Sadeghirad, Duhaney, Motaghipisheh, Campbell, & Johnston, 2016). At a
particular side, the organization has to comply with regulations and legal frameworks, which
is related to food safety act, and suppliers help them to serve best for their raw material
before thinking of producing and creating transparency regarding the calorie chart, other
information and ingredients. Therefore, it can help the customers to have direct access to the
information (Read, 2013).
Employees- these are the internal stakeholders as employees help to execute operational
existence at Coca-Cola. The company`s system in the Vietnam provides employment to
nearly 2000 people of which the company have hired 99 percent local hires in all three
factories (Rodrigues, Nikhil, & Jacob, 2016). Employees expects several opportunities such
as employee stock option, remuneration, salary, healthcare benefits, and other benefits.
Vietnam`s system exerts sustainability pressure so that business can provide them with safe

and progressive workplace. The employees expect training and development sessions for
their personal growth (Read, 2013).
Identify the nature and degree of main stakeholders’
interests, and implications of Conflicting interests
Exerting pressure groups are both internal as well as the external but the degree of pressure
differs from stakeholder to stakeholder-
The customers have greater influence on the formulation of the business strategy of the
company as the organizations run to fulfil the demand of the customers (Hueske, & Guenther,
2015). The conflicts occurring between the stakeholders depend on the degree of their interest
in the organisation (Kent, & Zunker, 2017). For instance- in recession economic
environment, employees may suffer from cutting off form their jobs that is not at all from the
part of the employees towards the employees (Hueske, & Guenther, 2015). Whereas, this
would be preferable for the owners as they will be able to reduce the unnecessary cost with
the help of eradicating people from employment including to the organisation in the recession
times (sustainable-event-alliance, 2018). Internal stakeholders such as top-level management
and owners may impose restriction to do overtime for the peak seasons without any extra pay.
In this case, the employees may not agree, as they are exploited (Hueske, & Guenther, 2015).
However, the owners feel profitable. While considering all the external factors, the top level
management makes decisions, which are in favour of the organization and its profitability.
On one hand, the organization can extract greater profits if it starts exploiting the
environment and the resources (Kent, & Zunker, 2017). Whereas, on the other hand it is not
viable on the part of the community. Another example can be buying the new machinery so
that the organisation can replace it and buy a new one but at the same time, it will reduce the
cost of employment and their salaries (Hueske, & Guenther, 2015). The shareholders and top-
level management can enjoy the huge profits with low cost of manufacturing through

machine. On the other hand, employees will be offended as they will lose their jobs as well as
the community will be offended as there are involving the people who come from community
and their resources are derived as well (pmstudycircle, 2018).
Conflicting interest, which have occurred due to difference in the goal achievement as
explained by the examples above. It is important to respect the interest of each stakeholder to
such an extent so that each stakeholder can be considerably feel satisfied (PMI, 2018).
Identify the level of main stakeholders’ influence
Some of the important stakeholders who are empowered to exert power on the activities of
the organisation (Hueske, & Guenther, 2015). The pressure enforces them so that they can
conduct business-
Customers- the customers have greater important in evaluating the success of the company. It
is not only limited to productivity, performance and the pricing but it also includes CSR
activities related to community assistance (Hueske, & Guenther, 2015). Moreover, the
interest lies in the offerings where the organization offers high quality products with lower
pricing. It includes new trending flavours with the changes in bottle pack of the goods
(Mandere, & Indiasty, 2014).
Employees- this group will have concern regarding the concerns by availing training
programs because the motive of the employees is their personal growth (Kim, 2015).
Government- the partnership is associated economic policies of the country. Government will
force the company to comply with the laws, EPA (environmental protection act), and the
legal regulations (Hutt, & Ferrell, 2016).
Non-governmental organisation- to be the holder of 43.6 percent holder of market share in
the whole industry will comply to fulfil the CSR activities such as charity, community
outreaches, installation of programs to serve underdeveloped area (Gross, 2018).

Comparison with different industry
While comparing food and beverage industry with the construction as well as e-commerce
retail sector (Coca-Cola, 2017). The above illustration signifies that it has to be differentiated
because there is a great difference between an online shopping application and a food and
beverage retail industry (Dobbs, 2014). A comparison can be established with the
construction organisation, as their stakeholders are very different especially the suppliers who
primary see whether the company is able to able to repay the debt incurred through
debentures. The main stakeholders are project sponsors, financial advisor, project manager,
contractors, personal, labour unions, and consultants (Serôdio, McKee, & Stuckler, 2018).
Create a stakeholder matrix
(Source: Cuppen, 2016)
The Stakeholder are dissimilarities in their powers to influence and analyse the differences in
stakeholder interests and influences as each stakeholder will have different interest and will
affect the company accordingly (Coca-Cola, 2017). It depends on degree of interest and
certainty of power, which every stakeholder will have different power to exert (Sadeghirad,
Duhaney, Motaghipisheh, Campbell, & Johnston, 2016).

The matrix signifies the crucial factor of stakeholder in the organisational operations. Some
stakeholders have the feature of potential cooperative with low power such as suppliers and
distributors (Ramus, & Vaccaro, 2017). The stakeholders are divided on the basis of their
potential cooperation in the company`s growth and competitive level which affect the
business. Consumers, governmental regulators and also the sponsors have high level
competitiveness on the operation rather than contributing as the potential assistance (Coca-
Cola, 2017). Categories include tope level management, senior management, and the senior
executives such as high competiveness and high potential to influence the organisation as
(Kearns, Apollonio, & Glantz, 2017). Help desk and the lower level employees have lower
interest and low competiveness while forming the business level strategies (Coca-Cola,
2017). Suppliers, distributors, developers, testers, and the trainers have influencing power but
at the same time, they have high interest (Hueske, & Guenther, 2015). Some of the
stakeholders are known as offensive stakeholders who have high potential and are low at
competitiveness who can affect the company`s goals (Rodrigues, Nikhil, & Jacob, 2016).
These stakeholders signify threat to the sudden change in the organisational strategies. It is
inclusive of stakeholders who have maximum customers to the company. This kind of
stakeholder can impose greater power while influencing and affecting the subordinates in any
of the retail sector especially food sector. Customers in terms of stakeholders are also known
as offensive (Hueske, & Guenther, 2015).
This stakeholder`s group priorities people who have great potential with high competiveness.
The main suggested clue is that to deal with the stakeholders, which will leads to changes in
the laws and finally leading the company to undertake those decisions that remain
differentiated form the prevailing ones (Coca-Cola, 2017). The purpose of the stakeholder is
to approach proper data and information in regards to services that will incur from the
organization (Howse, Hankey, Farinelli, Bauman, & Freeman, 2018). Non-governmental

actions impose competitiveness as its assistance to the society can create its public image.
These stakeholders have further lower potential with much lower competitive threat (Coca-
Cola, 2018). For instance- positive CSR activities will induce the suppliers and imprint
positive image in the minds of suppliers. The main motive of the supplier is to assist the
Coca-Cola and uphold the direct suppliers to a particular level of so that it can uphold the
suppliers in lieu so that it can help to quench the thirst as per the needs of the customers
(Henisz, 2017).
Conclusion
Stakeholders helps the company to operate as without the assistance of any of the group or
individual. It will affect the company by actions, objectives, and the policies. Coca-Cola is
offering its beverage in all over the world. The main purpose of conducting the PESTLE
analysis, which helped the organisation, is to find and analyse the stakeholders, which are
affected by these external factors, which includes political factor, social factor, legal factor,
environment factor, economic factor, and technological factor. Internal stakeholders are
employees, shareholders, directors, and owners. External stakeholders of Coca-Cola include
distributors, suppliers, other business partner, community, national government, and
customers.

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