About the Topic
Teamwork is an essential part of any coursework. Teamwork helps in improving the various skills of the students and prepares them for the organization they will be a part of in the future. A society is an interdependent body. No one can exist individually in an organization and therefore they should make sure that they indulge in a teamwork habit in the very beginning so that later on in their professional lives they already have the adequate skills in order to communicate and perform within a group (Canagarajah 2013). The given report highlights the team member`s contribution in the Poster assignment that was given out to our group. There were certain team members who were assigned with specific tasks and each team member was given the responsibility to submit the task on time. In the given report, I shall be discussing my contribution in two sections (Peppard and Ward 2016). That will include by contribution with respect to the academic material and the second section shall include my managerial and operational contribution as a member. I was also involved in designing the product. Our group comprised of six members.
The assignment required the students to prepare and an academic poster, which was based on the clothing, and accessories brand H& M. An external environment assessment with respect to the given business had been presented along with the strategic options available to the country (Boud, Keogh and Walker 2013). A timeline, SWOT Analysis, Porter`s Five Forces and similar strategic tools had been taken into consideration
In the given poster, I was given a variety of topics for which I had to provide an academic content for it. The various areas where I had to present proper research work ad details are given as follows:
- Estemple
- Good practice
- Bad practice
- Worst practice
- Next Practice
- QR Code
I will be describing in detail my research and practice behind assembling and presenting the data for the given areas
In order to research upon the external business environment of H & M, an ESTEMPLE Framework was used. An ESTEMPLE Framework can be described as an environmental ecology framework whereby the various environmental threats as well as the opportunities shall be analyzed in a greater depth (Collins and Gallinat 2013). This kind of a research helps in the evaluation of the future, present as well as the past environmental forces which have an impact on the firm`s strategic development and growth.
In order to conduct the ESTEMPLE analysis, I had followed a systematic research framework. I used the internet to gather various newspaper articles related to H and M in order to understand the factors present in the external environment (Hm.com. 2018). This also gave me an insight to the media aspect of the ESTEMPLE. I also used my university library to analyze and research upon the given Strategic Management tool in order to have a clear concept of it. Various governmental agreements and journals also helped me to contribute the given material for the research (Graham, Gillespie and McKeown 2013). I believe, this aspect of the report is extremely important in the sense that it gives a clear understanding of the macro environment at one glance.
Contribution to the Academic Content
This is an evaluation of the various practices that are undertaken by the clothing brand in order to improve its operations and to improve its image. The good practice, as stated in the poster was that it indulges in a new supplier management task whereby the company works with the suppliers to help them improve their operations (Slack 2015). This information was obtained by me while I was going through the company website on sustainability and management of suppliers. After reading the article, I could observe that this is the adequate practice taken up by the company.
This bad practice information was obtained from various newspaper articles and numerous lawsuits, which have been filed against the company. It had been stated that managers of the company force their workers to indulge in bad working habits in their sweatshops. The workers are made to work in inhuman working conditions and this tends to have a negative impact on their health and safety (Tsai and Lau 2013). Various lawsuits had been filed against the company by the trade unions. Secondly, the burning of stock had also been stated in a newspaper article where the executives of the company had agreed that they do not conduct sales, which they believe, shall lower the image of the brand and instead they burn the stock at the end of the year. This was deeply criticized and the company had to face the wrath of many associations.
This component of the poster is suggestive and derived from the worse practice component. In the worse practice of the company as per my research, I had found out that the company indulges in burning of its stock in order to keep its value constant and not pull it down by putting it on sale. In order to improve this next practice to be adopted (Mitchell, O’Reilly-Scanlon and Weber 2013) . The next practice that can be adopted is that it can optimize their supply chain so that moderate amount of stocks are produced and then they cannot be wasted. I had adopted this idea from various texts on logistics and supply chain management cases of its competitor companies like Zara, which has a zero inventory policy.
The promising practice may be the something that the organization can perform in order to improve their image in front f its customers. The promising practice which I suggested keeping in mind the various groups and their oppositions against the company. They can make sure that the working environment within the company and their sweatshops is healthy and that the workers are provided with optimum working conditions (Moon 2013). This idea was collected from various suggestions as given in various articles by the various experts.
Good Practice
The QR code was made by me as a reference for the poster. When the QR code will be scanned, it will take the user directly to the h and m online website. We got this concept by looking at the sample posters, which made us, realize that if we give a QR Code along with our poster it will be easy for us to show the relationship between our poster and the website or company plans. I applied some programming and formed the given QR Code.
Apart from the given roles, I had also prepared a rough draft for the Porter`s Five Forces Model. I got the relevant reference from various Strategic Management Books.
In a group, various members have different roles to perform apart from gathering academic data. The academic roles that I adopted, have been given in the previous section.
I was also the schedule planner and meeting organizer of the team. It was my responsibility to make sure that the various meetings that to be held among the team members were organized on time and attended by all. I used to make the schedule of the meeting keeping in mind the conflicting time availability of the various members. It is always not possible that the various members in a group will have adequate time for the various members. Therefore, I made sure that all the meetings, which were held, were made keeping in mind the schedules of everyone.
However, there were certain members who were not able to attend the meeting and then it was my duty to see to it that those members would be aware of all the details about the poster that were discussed in the meeting and they were aware of their role (Zimmerman 2013).
I also used to carry my laptop to the meetings in order to form a rough draft of the meeting. This helped in discussion and forming of the framework. I believe that my managerial role was extremely relevant and that I was the ultimate meditation among the various team members. I performed my job with due diligence
However, I believe that the team in general could have performed well if it had:
- Formed a database or kept a record as to what it had discussed in the previous meeting and what it had not. This would have mitigated the redundancy in the given data.
- I could have been more organized and kept separate file, which kept the record of various roles played by the members in order to have a clear understanding of the contribution of all the team members (Hill, Jones and Schilling 2014).
- Had my research skills been more relevant I could have been able to avoid any mistakes that might have taken place.
Conclusion
Therefore, it can be said that although a team comprises of various members, it is the role of an individual to make sure that his contribution is adequate and it is seen to it that all individuals work together as one team and contribute towards the success of the team. This move shall help the team in being appreciated and achieving their targets.
References
Boud, D., Keogh, R. and Walker, D. eds., 2013. Reflection: Turning experience into learning. Routledge.
Canagarajah, A.S., 2013. Critical academic writing and multilingual students. University of Michigan Press.
Collins, P. and Gallinat, A. eds., 2013. The ethnographic self as resource: Writing memory and experience into ethnography. Berghahn Books.
Graham, S., Gillespie, A. and McKeown, D., 2013. Writing: Importance, development, and instruction. Reading and writing, 26(1), pp.1-15.
Hill, C.W., Jones, G.R. and Schilling, M.A., 2014. Strategic management: theory: an integrated approach. Cengage Learning.
Hm.com. ,2018. H&M offers fashion and quality at the best price. [online] Available at: https://www.hm.com/in [Accessed 17 Jan. 2018].
Mitchell, C., O’Reilly-Scanlon, K. and Weber, S. eds., 2013. Just who do we think we are?: Methodologies for autobiography and self-study in education. Routledge.
Moon, J.A., 2013. Reflection in learning and professional development: Theory and practice. Routledge.
Peppard, J. and Ward, J., 2016. The strategic management of information systems: Building a digital strategy. John Wiley & Sons.
Slack, N., 2015. Operations strategy. John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Tsai, W. and Lau, A.S., 2013. Cultural differences in emotion regulation during self-reflection on negative personal experiences. Cognition & emotion, 27(3), pp.416-429.
Zimmerman, B.J., 2013. From cognitive modeling to self-regulation: A social cognitive career path. Educational psychologist, 48(3), pp.135-147.
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