Monday, February 13, 2012

The five competitive forces that shape strategy

Of all the topics in the Organizational Analysis this is what I love most. Simply because it can be easily understand and applied to almost all types of business and industries. It’s amazing how useful looking at the graph of this five forces on how will you formulate your strategy in gaining strategic advantage over your competitors/rivals. Let me say something about this first force: THREAT OF NEW ENTRANTS- Here in our country today, our parents now a days are so conscious in spending every dime they earned. So, spending in terms of paying their student’s tuitions fee in school must be also a smart choice. Parents must see to it that they children are getting what they are paying. But most of the cases, parents are looking a much cheaper school but without compromising the quality of the education of their children. So in this case, those new schools or education centers offers much cheaper tuitions or much lighter mode of payment will surely have a big bite in the market shares. So in developing enrollment strategy we must incorporate to our plans how can we combat this type of treats in our organization?! One of the most concrete evidence how our management combat this type of threat is by offering a very low entrance fee for the students for them to enroll in their desired course without worrying the entrance fee anymore. Additionally, when I say new entrants it doesn’t always mean that there is a new competitor. Sometimes the business is long before exists but this is the first time that they are offering this new course. So, if this new course belongs to a prestigious school so normally those who can afford will go to that school. Second Forces: BARGAINING POWER OF THE BUYERS- well student has a strong implication/ effect to the education sector where there are the direct clients of organization. The suggestion or complaint of the student cannot be set aside or simply cannot be taken for granted. One example, student now a day are now so very particular with the bills that they are paying. If they see that they are paying this service and they are not getting the most of it then for sure a complaint will be brought to our attention and if not be taken carefully will lead to a bad reputation to our organization and I’m sure we don’t want that to happen. So it forces our management to deal with it. Another example of this is that Local politicians are offering a significant big amount of money for sponsoring educational scholars among the local population. Normally, politicians give their budget to the schools who offer much convenient ways for paying the bills of scholars so the management must come up with a strategy how to meet their needs of the client. Let’s go to the third forces: THREAT OF SUBSTITUTE OR SERVICES – Normally people always look at first the price before the quality right. Weighing between the two the price and quality. In our community we cannot deny that there are some students who can afford the expensive schools and those schools that are within their budget. So, surely among the total number of students who are going to school will be divided into two. Sometimes student wanted to study in your school but cannot afford it so they force to choice to their second choice. Saying that schools are all the same, it depends only to the student where it might be right. But are we just going to let this scenario always to happen? I mean is there a way to combat this threat? Maybe in the financial matter we can’t do anything but if we just encourage them or let them understand that every cent that they spent to our organization will be back to them a million times then it might change their minds. So much for that let’s go to the forth forces: BARGAINING POWER OF THE SUPPLIERS- it this case we are referring to the parents of our students. Well without the parents of our students we won’t also have our students right now. Dealing with parents is as important with dealing with our students. Parents always so to it that they children will be in good hands or the future of their student are in the right hands. Parents tend to see all the necessary documents and accreditation of the schools before enrolling their students to that particular school. So if this is the case, schools must possess recommended accreditation certifications such as PACUCOA or such as the PAASCU accreditations. There are still a marginal parent who sought after a quality education and for them to know is by looking for any recognition and awards achieve by schools. This is why almost every year, school head quarters always giving recognition luxurious trophies to their branches and displaying it their gallery where it can be seen. The last forces: RIVALRY AMONG EXISTING COMPETITORS- for me instead looking at this in a negative way lets use this as a tool for us to develop our organization. Advertising is a good way to attract new enrollees but I guess to best way to prove it is by letting our student experience what we promise to deliver. If every school can find a unique need that they can set up to meet, if schools try to deliver something different from its rivals, multiple rivals can be successful. Instead of this destructing each other maybe it good to let them know what service you are trying to deliver and maybe they will choice a different one. I hope I share to you some my insights and thought about how can we make our respective organization become more successful. These five forces will always be around for as long the businesses exist.

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