Nothing Special   »   [go: up one dir, main page]

Assignment II: Maple Case Study: Strategic Choices

Download as pdf or txt
Download as pdf or txt
You are on page 1of 4

Assignment II: Maple Case Study

Strategic Choices

Submitted To
Mr. Ajay Shrestha, KUSOM

Submitted By:
Sudan Khadgi (18511)

 
 
 
Q1. Analyse the evolution of the MLCFL in terms of strategy, implementation, and performance

from 2004 to 2014.

When Mr. Saigol took charge of the family owned business Maple Leaf Cement Factory

in 2004, it was underperforming. The business was facing challenges in two key areas,

production and distribution. It was tangled in the industry dominated by the monopolistic

distributors and a management team with that viewed lowering the cost of the cement was the

only way they could boost their sales. This view and taking care of the distributors was the

closest thing to a strategy they had in order to survive in the market. The company despite

being considered as a premium brand was already fetching lower prices compared to their

competitors due to the physical location of their factories which was twice as far. The high cost

of production and transport of goods to the market were the major challenges they faced. Mr.

Saigol then hired Mr. Ijaj as his consultant to mitigate the hurdles to pull back the company as

leaders in the industry. They both started to work on systematically transforming the company

and focusing on the people to grow their business. Just as they were preparing their strategic

vision a price war had started, so they shifted from the transformation to surviving in the present

condition. As the war ended both Mr. Saigol and Mr. Ijaj decided that this was the right time for

them to remould the organization. The new strategy was based to focus on retaining existing

customers. Mr Saigol and Mr Ijaj both decided this was the strategy that would differentiate

them from its competitors. They needed to be efficient in the operations and reduction in the

cost of production was equally important as well. The energy consumption was the costliest

production factor and needed detailed study to tackle it.

In 2008, Some layovers were made as new minds were required in the transformation of

processes as traditional views are hard to override. In order to achieve their strategic vision
Cross functional teams each with a different purpose were created. The energy team looked

after the consumption, cost factors of energy, the reliability centre mechanism took charge of

the standards maintained in the company operations, an improvement team for all processes

and a cultural team to manage the human resource relations. The company now had a vision

and strategy to operate in the market. This was passed on to the mid-level management who

executed them well.

The new teams improved the production and helped to increase interaction and maintain

good relationship with the employees. To understand the transportation and logistics side of the

business new Marketing Manager, Mr. Yahya Hamid and IT manager, Mobin Ahmed were hired.

With the help of information acquired from the studies on world class logistics and supply chain

setup and Information Technology the company was able to position itself as a distributor

maintaining relationship down the supply chain line. Training programmes related to TQM, 5

WHYs were used to improve employee capacity and maintain a stable workforce.

By 2012, the transformation had started to bear fruits tripling the overall performance of the

company in terms of EBITDA and placing itself in top three in the sector. The employees too

acknowledged the accomplishment. The strategy of Mr. Saigol and Mr. Ijaj faired well for the

company, they transformed the organizational structure and processes in a such a way that it

aligned with the strategic vision they set which was well executed by the responsible

stakeholders down the line in the organization. This illustrates the importance of having a

legitimate strategy and knowing how to implement them and monitoring the process could

change the path of the company.

Q2. What key challenges do you, as Sayeed Tariq Saigol, face in early 2015 and what would

you do to address those challenges?


Now that the company had a clear vision and strategy in place Mr. Saigol and co. need

to add to the brand which they had created with the transformation from a mere surviving to a

top three company in the sector. The relationship maintenance cost is expected to be higher

and its importance needs to be visible to the investors as they look on the return on Investment.

They need a mechanism to prove that the investment made in the maintaining relationship with

the stakeholders in the supply chain across the global market has a fruitful return. A senior

management team is required to build on the existing strategy and to tackle unforeseen events.

To add to this i believe they should enhance their IT systems make it more compatible to the

global market as this is the world we are heading to. They should make use of technological

improvements across other industries mostly services industry (eg banking industries) like

online payments. As they start to grow they need to maintain the quality of the products and that

requires highly skilled human resources from labor to manager therefore a very robust HR

department is another challenge ahead for the company.

You might also like