Edexcel Level 5 BTEC Higher National Diploma in Business

ASSESSMENT ACTIVITY :

Unit Name: Unit Number: Assignment Submission Date: Assessor: Mode of submission:

BUSINESS STRATEGY 07 17-04-2011 AREEBA ZAFAR LIVECAMPUS

Summary of Learning Outcomes To achieve a pass learners must demonstrate the ability to deal with each of the following outcomes and present these in report form scripts will be checked against each of these:

1. Analyse how the business environment is considered in strategy formulation 2. Understand the process of strategic planning 3. Examine approaches to strategy evaluation and selection 4. Analyse how strategy implementation is realised.

Scenario:
Select any small, medium or large organisation of your choice. You are required to do an indepth research into the various aspects of that organisation including: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. Its history, Mission, Vision and strategic Objectives and stake holders Changes within and outside organisation in the past 5 years Competitive Trends and Change in Customer Behaviour Past business strategies implemented by the company people who were involved in implementation

Based on the above research, you are required to answer all the assessment criteria to meet the learning outcomes. Up-to-date information has to be used when required and supported by theory where appropriate.

Tasks 1. Analyse how the business environment is considered in strategy formulation

Task 7.1.a & 7.1.b In order to formulate a strategy define the Vision, mission = Group) and strategic objectives of your selected organization and explain the importance of stake holder analysis in the formulation procedure. Task 7.1.c & 7.1.d Conduct an Environmental and Organizational audit along with strategic positioning techniques to the analysis of your organization.

2. Understand the process of strategic planning

Task 7.2.a Analyse the future competitive moves and customers anticipation of the company which can affect strategic planning.

3. Examine approaches to strategy evaluation and selection

Task 7.3.a & 7.3.b Theoretically evaluate the possible alternative strategies; substantive growth, limited growth or retrenchment. Based on your situational analysis (7.1.c) and strategic thinking (7.2.a) select an appropriate strategy for the company to achieve the strategic objectives and Vision.

4. Analyse how strategy implementation is realised.

Task 7.2.b, 7.4.b & 7.4.c For the selected strategy develop a detail strategic plan of implementation. Clearly identify and evaluate resource requirements to implement the strategy and propose targets and timescales for achievement to monitor a given strategy. Use diagrammatic representations where required. Also discuss how your Organization can create a Strategic fit, if required. Task 7.4.a Create an Organization breakdown structure identifying the roles and responsibilities

for strategy implementation and compare it with another Organizations OBS of the same industry. Assumptions need to be identified.

Marking and Grading:  Pass Assessment Criteria To achieve PASS grade the student must meet all the learning outcomes mentioned below:

 Merit Assessment Criteria

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Assignment should be very high standard with appropriate academic writing skills Identify and apply strategies for appropriate solutions. Effective judgment and approach to study and research must be used. (M1) Range of sources of information should be used in making the formal report. Selection and design of methods and techniques should be justified. (M2) The presentation of the thought should be logical and a range of methods for presenting the data should be used. (M3)

 Distinction Assessment Criteria

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Assignment should be very high standard with appropriate academic writing skills Contents are presented in logical and accurate manner. Conclusions and recommendations must be justified and realistic proposals regarding the need for change should be mentioned. (D1) All the research and information should be planned and organized and recommendation should be discussed. (D2) Creative ideas be mentioned and recommendations to adapt to change should be discussed. (D3)

Submission Guidelines: Your submission should be in a report format. 3000(10% +/-) words Excellent Formatting: y y y y y Preferred writing styles Arial, Verdana, and Times New Roman Line spacing 1.5, Font Size 12 Consistency in Heading Scheme, bullets and numbering Consistency in top, bottom and left, right margins Alphabetical Harvard referencing and bibliography

Report Structure y y y y y y y y y y Cover Title Page Contents page. Acknowledgement (optional) Abstract/Executive Summary Main Body (Tasks) Conclusion. References (including weblioreferencing) Bibliography (including webliography) Appendices

*For Late Submission policy, please refer to your student course handbook available on Live Campus.

Plagiarism Rules and Regulations No plagiarism is accepted in assignments and students are advised to do the referencing correctly according to the Harvard Referencing System. o Students are advised to submit assignments with a similarity in below 10%. Any student submitting an assignment with a percentage of more than 20% will fail and get an official academic warning. o Reduce your plagiarism by not sharing assignments and doing in text citations of sources used, using the Harvard referencing method
o

What is Turnitin? Turnitin is the software that EThames uses to calculate the similarity of your assignment to any other document submitted in the same system all over the world. What happens when you submit an assignment on Turnitin? You submit your assignment on Turnitin by submitting it on Livecampus on the assignment submission link. Your assignment is then compared with all of the assignments for all the different units submitted on Livecampus as well as assignments submitted by other students in other colleges and books and documents all over the world. The report generated is not the final report. The final report will only be generated after the final deadline which would mean that once the submission link closes and once every student submitted assignments at EThames for the specific unit, only then the final report will be generated. This means that if you have shared your assignment with anybody and they have submitted part of it or the full assignment the initial report your friend got would ve indicated the similarity, but your report would ve remained unchanged. This is because the report is refreshed every time that you upload your assignment and then finally after the deadline. After the deadline their plagiarism will be high as well as your own. What can you do to avoid getting a high Turnitin score? Do not copy pieces of work from any book or website. It needs to be rewritten in your own words and proper in text citation should be done according to the Harvard referencing method Do not share your assignment with any friend, not even to assist them

Plagiarism Plagiarism is passing off the work of others as your own. This constitutes academic theft and is a serious matter which is penalised in assignment marking. Plagiarism is the submission of an item of assessment containing elements of work produced by another person(s) in such a way that it could be assumed to be the student s own work. Examples of plagiarism are: the verbatim copying of another person s work without acknowledgement the close paraphrasing of another person s work by simply changing a few words or altering the order of presentation without acknowledgement the unacknowledged quotation of phrases from another person s work and/or the presentation of another person s idea(s) as one s own. Copying or close paraphrasing with occasional acknowledgement of the source may also be deemed to be plagiarism if the absence of quotation marks implies that the phraseology is the student s own. Plagiarised work may belong to another student or be from a published source such as a book, report, journal or material available on the internet.