Managing organizational change - Free Essay Example

Sample details Pages: 8 Words: 2373 Downloads: 4 Date added: 2017/06/26 Category Management Essay Type Narrative essay Did you like this example? Background Information The content of this white paper is based on information from ODR, a consulting firm with more than 23 years of experience in helping organizations successfully implement change. ODRs emphasis is on giving organizations information about how to accomplish strategic and tactical change decisions on time and within budget. Managing a World of Change Why Organizational Change Management Is Important Organizational change is a reality of the modern world, and that reality isnt likely to change anytime soon. If anything, organizations can expect to face the need for even more change in the future, at an ever faster pace. Organizations have to deal with new technology and with upgrades for existing technology. They have to cope with reorganizations, process improvement initiatives, and mergers and acquisitions. So, with all that change going on, how are organizations managing to cope? Not very well. The reality is that relatively few of the organizations that institute change or are forced into it realize the benefits they had hoped for, and, in fact, end up worse off than they were before. That doesnt mean its impossible to engage successfully in change. Many organizations do succeed. How? They succeed by integrating any technical solution that was part of the change mix with a thorough and proactive orc hestration of the non-technical human aspects associated with the change. In other words, the organizations that succeed at change do so by considering the people who are affected by, will have to live with, and are often crucial to effecting the change in question. Even better, not only does managing the human aspects of an organizational change initiative help ensure the successful implementation and use of the technical solution, it sets the groundwork for implementing future solutions. This paper describes how organizations can be successful at change by using a framework for assessing and addressing the non-technical human aspects associated with organizational change. ODRs experience has been that applying this organizational change management (OCM) framework improves the success of technical implementations and reduces the inevitable drop in productivity and quality that typically accompanies change. And, in ODRs experience, succeeding with the framework establishes momentum for success with future versions of a given technical solution. Specifically, this paper covers the following topics: Don’t waste time! Our writers will create an original "Managing organizational change" essay for you Create order Defining the terms. The typical approach. Objectives of organizational change management. The organizational change management process. Defining the Terms What Are Organizational Change and Organizational Change Management? Change has several meanings, but for the purposes of this paper, change or, more precisely, organizational change will be defined this way: Organizational change is the implementation of new procedures or technologies intended to realign an organization with the changing demands of its business environment or to capitalize on business opportunities. Organizational change typically encompasses the introduction of new and perhaps unfamiliar processes, procedures, and technologies, which represent a departure from what affected individuals generally view as the established, practical, and familiar ways of doing their work. Thus, at the individual level, change can engender emotions and reactions that range from optimism to fear, including anxiety, challenge, resistance, ambiguity, energy, enthusiasm, helplessness, dread, motivation, and pessimism. Organizational change management is the process of recog nizing, guiding, and managing these human emotions and reactions in a way that minimizes the inevitable drop in productivity that accompanies change. The Typical Approach Why Change Efforts Typically Fail It seems inevitable that advances in technology, the maturation of markets in developed countries, the integration of international economics, and the economic fallout from the fall of communism have fueled, and will continue to fuel, an escalation in the amount and rate of organizational change. 1 But the success rate for organizational change is downright dismal. Consider these statistics: Fewer than 50 percent of companies undergoing restructuring, de-layering, and/or downsizing realize lower costs or higher productivity as a result of those changes. 2 About 80 percent of Total Quality Management (TQM) initiatives fail to achieve tangible results. 3 Roughly 90 percent of Business Process Reengineering (BPR) initiatives fail to produce breakthrough results. 4 Approximately 30 percent of all mergers and acquisitions fail outright, while most fail to realize expected synergies. 5 Between 55 percent and 90 percent of all technology initiatives fail to achieve their objectives because human and organizational problems are not adequately addressed. 6 More often than not, change efforts fail because organizations fail to recognize and manage the human components of change. New technical solutions require involvement by individuals throughout an organization who are willing to alter their behaviors and ways of thinking. Accomplishing that takes time, motivation, skills, and practice. Yet, because changes to behaviors and ways of thinking are less tangible and typically more time-consuming than the technical solution, the human aspects dont get the attention they need. A recent article on enterprise-wide software deployments demonstrates this lack of proper focus. The article estimated that the implementation effort for a successful transformation required 20 percent information technology and 80 percent organizational change management. Yet, most project plans and budgets allocate less than 20 percent of resources for managing change. Objectives of Organizational Change Management How to Change Successfully Organizational change of any type will typically create temporary reductions in productivity, as people absorb and adjust to the change. Therefore, two important criteria for a successful change implementation are the amount of productivity lost as a result of the change and how long it takes for the organization to regain its original productivity levels. The figure below, based on a 1990 U.S. Department of Labor study, illustrates the change impact and recovery process both with and without the application of a formal organizational change management process. Proactively addressing and managing the non-technical, human aspects of change by means of a formal OCM process will help reduce the initial loss in productivity and will typically shorten the recovery period. As organizations seek to implement new technology and take other actions to keep themselves competitive in their chosen markets, they must ensure that the changes they implement achi eve the full scope of their technical, financial, and human objectives. This is the ultimate objective of the organizational change management process: to ensure that tactics for addressing human reactions to change are fully integrated with other aspects of the implementation in order to achieve the full scope of objectives intended by the initiative. The Organizational Change Management Process Increasing Readiness for Change Individuals and organizations increase their general readiness for change by increasing their overall adaptability to change. This is accomplished by implementing a formal organizational change management process consisting of four critical components: Resilience Change knowledge Decisions and implementation Architecture Each component of the process is associated with key actions that can facilitate the timely implementation of a technical solution and speed the recovery time. Weaknesses associated with any of the four components of the OCM process create areas of risk that can inhibit the successful implementation of a change initiative. An organization increases its overall readiness for change by attending to the four components of the OCM process. Each component is described below along with key actions that can be taken to integrate the OCM process with the Microsoft Solutions Framework. Improving Resilience Resilience: The ability to absorb significant disruptive change while displaying minimal behaviors that detract from quality and productivity. Because resilient individuals are better able to adapt to change, helping people to become more resilient and getting already resilient individuals involved in the change process can directly improve an organizations chances for success fully implementing a technical solution. Resilient individuals are able to stay calm in unpredictable environments and are able to recover quickly from the stress of change. In fact, resilient individuals demonstrate an ability to prosper in rapidly changing environments. The higher the level of resilience within an organization facing major change, the better it will be able to avoid or manage such unproductive or dysfunctional behaviors as the spreading of misinformation, employee turnover, or deliberate sabotage, all of which can result in significant delays and costly overruns. Individuals who are highly resilient are: Positive. They view life as complex but filled with opportunity. Focused. They have a clear vision of what they want to achieve. Flexible. They are pliable in responding to uncertainty. Organized. They develop structured approaches to managing ambiguity. Proactive. They engage change rather than defend against it. The key implementation actions associated with resilience are outlined below. Key Implementation Actions Associated with Resilience Match the breadth and depth of the version release and the time assigned for implementation with the level of resilience within the organization. (Note: A preliminary diagnosis may be required to quantify the current level of resilience.) Select highly resilient individuals to participate directly in the implementation as a way to facilitate a rapid adoption of the solution among team members. (Note: Early adoption by team members can speed adoption within the rest of the organization.) Implementing Change Knowledge Change Knowledge: A practical understanding of how people and organizations respond to change. Understanding how change unfolds helps reduce the amount of unproductive behavior that may accompany the implementation of a new technical solution by reducing the amount of uncertainty involved in change. Reduced uncertain ty alleviates surprises and better equips people to focus time and energy on the technical solution. The manner in which change unfolds can be broadly grouped into seven key concept areas. These areas are: Nature. The impact of change on the individual. Process. The typical flow of change. Roles. The positions that are central to change. Resistance. The reactions that accompany change. Commitment. The process by which individuals and organizations align with change. Culture. The organizations past and present ways of doing things and the influence of these behaviors on the change. Synergy. The impact of teamwork on the change. A sufficient level of change knowledge can have a substantial impact on the success of change implementation. Change knowledge can either be applied to specific organizational change projects or to general education in advance of specific projects. The key implementation actions associated with change knowledge are listed below. Key Implementation Actions Associated with Change Knowledge For a specific project: Educate the implementation team on the key concepts of change knowledge and how they relate to the specific organizational change. Assess which concept areas are most relevant to the specific organizational change and plan for how the risks can be managed and the opportunities can be leveraged. For general purposes: Prepare individuals within the organization for what to expect from changes they will face in the future. (More information about the critical role change knowledge plays in the implementation of an initiative is available in a separate white paper titled Concepts of Change Knowledge, which is also located on this Web site.) Making Good Decisions Decisions: The alignment of an organizations current and planned changes with the resources available for implementing the initiatives. For an organization to be successful in implementing change, it must ensure that the demands created by its change initiatives do not exceed the organizations capacity for executing the changes. When change demands exceed the organizations capacity for change, key resources become overwhelmed by the number of changes competing for their time. The result is an increase in dysfunctional behavior that detracts energy from the implementation effort and, in many cases, impedes its process. Ensuring adequate capacity for existing and planned change demands generally involves: Inventorying current and planned changes and evaluating them to determine their potential value, impact, and resource requirements. Prioritizing changes according to this evaluation. Determining current capacity to implement changes. Trimming current and planned changes as necessary according to capacity limits. Developing and implementing strategies to increase overall change capacity to expand organizational adaptability. When implementing a technical solution for a customer, other ongoing or planned organizational changes can compete for required resources. This is especially true of the time and attention needed from key leaders within the organization, which frequently can be a scarce commodity. Several key actions can be taken to mitigate the inevitable risk of having inadequate resources for a technical implementation. Key Implementation Actions Associated with Resource Allocation Decisions Proactively assess other organizational changes to gauge their potential impact on the technical solution. Design an implementation plan and timeframe that takes the impact of competing changes into account. Determine the urgencies driving the implementation of the technical solution and continually leverage these urgencies with key leaders and constituencies to make the technical solution a priority within the organization. Implementing Architecture Structured Implementation Architecture: The structured plan for achieving the desired goals through implementation of the perceived change solution. Following a structured, yet flexible, implementation framework reduces errors and oversights and allows a team to proactively address issues that are routinely associated with the failure of organizational changes. Such a structured framework consists of seven phases which, when applied as a system, facilitate successful implementation of an initiative. The seven phases are: Clarification. Development of a comprehensive vision and measurable outcomes that are wholly shared by key leaders. Announcement. Development and execution of a detailed communication plan. Diagnosis. Assessment of critical risks and key levers associated with the change. Planning. Development of comprehensive strategies to mitigate risks and use levers identified in the diagnosis phase. Execution. Implementation of developed strategies. Monitoring. Continuous assessment and augmentation of an implementation sequence. Evaluation. Assessment of a complete implementation sequence, and documentation and transfer of key learnings. The steps involved in this implementation architecture parallel, in many ways, the existing Microsoft Solutions Framework. The key action, then, for executing a structured change management implementation architecture for customers technical solutions is as follows. Key Implementation Actions Associated with Implementation Architecture Integrate organizational change management concepts and practices with the Microsoft Solutions Framework to balance the technical and non-technical (human) aspects of change implementation. References Kotter, J.P. Leading Change. Harvard Business School Publishing: Boston, MA, 1996. Schneier, C.E., G. Shaw, and R.W. Beatty. Companies Attempts to Improve Performance while Containing Costs: Quick Fix Versus Lasting Change. Human Resource Planning, 1992, 15 (3), 1-25. Kearney, A.T. Study cited in Business Intelligences report entitled Managing and Sustaining Radical Change, 1997. Ibid. Maurer, R. Transforming Resistance. Human Resources Focus, 1, October 1997, 9. Kabat, D.J. Information Technologies to Manage the Next Dynamic. In Berger and Sikora (Eds.). The Change Management Handbook. Irwin Professional Publishing: NY, 1994, 221. Wall, Stephen J. and Robert S. McKinney. Wall-to-Wall Change. Across the Board. May 1998, 32-38.

I Am A Body Massage - 1485 Words

As part of my HND unit in Anatomy and physiology I have been required to complete and research a project desired to my chosen therapy. My chosen therapy that I will be writing my report on will be Body Massage, I will be describing the physiological or physical effects that it may have on the human body, as well as the structure and the functions. I am also required to research the benefits of it as well as explain it and show my knowledge to the best of my ability. The systems that I will be covering in this report will include the Skeletal, muscular, nervous, Cardio Vascular, Lymphatic, Respiratory and Urinary. Body Massage What is Body Massage? Massage can be used as a therapeutic treatment, as It manipulates the superficial†¦show more content†¦The benefits are that When the muscles are fully relaxed and are lengthened the circulation of nutrients to the joint will have been improved and this will nourish the structure that has surrounded it. When massage is being performed blood is stimulated and flows into the periosteum (connective tissue) which will help increase the supply of blood to the bones. Another benefit from massage is that with regular treatments a person may be able to have a range of movement again. Muscular System By doing massage on the muscular system you can help to decrease tension within the muscles that builds up overtime by adding deep pressure movements up the muscle to help relax and lengthen it. The tension may reduce movement and be quite painful. Blood supply to the muscle is important as when massaging it will dilate capillaries and allow more blood flow through, this increase of blood heals quicker and may restore oxygen and nutrients to the specific injured or painful area. The benefits it has on the muscular system are; It may help to reduce the amount of pain or tension built up in the area, Blood supply has been increased through warming of the muscle and movement, Waste is eliminated removed, May prevent adhesions which may have been through injury. May increase movement and flexibility as well as increasing the strength of the muscle. It will muscle spasms will be

Yahoo †Strategic Management Analysis Free Essays

string(94) " ready to adapt to change in market trends and respond with calculated and responsible steps\." EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Yahoo! Inc. , over its journey of almost 17 years has become the world’s largest online network integrated services provider with users exceeding 500 million in numbers worldwide (Yahoo FAQ, 2012). It has a presence in more than twenty markets and regions across the globe and is best known for its search engine and host of other services like finance, e-mail, advertising and social media. We will write a custom essay sample on Yahoo – Strategic Management Analysis or any similar topic only for you Order Now Yahoo! Inc. was started as a personal website directory by two doctorate candidates at Stanford University named David Filo and Jerry Yang. Filo and Yang realized the potential of generating revenue from their web directory by allowing companies to advertise their products on their online directory. Soon, Yahoo was notable enough to gain the attention of Sequoia capital, a venture capital firm. Sequoia provided much needed capital to Yahoo and Tim Koogle, a Motorola executive was hired as Yahoo’s Chief Executive Officer. Koogle’s excellent management skills and vision took Yahoo to the new heights of success i. . Yahoo! Inc. ’s stock price rose from $5 a share to almost $244 a share in 1999 (Jones, 2007) However, despite the leadership that the company enjoyed in its initial years, the company over the past years seems be losing market share to its arch rival Google Inc. Google has been outdoing Yahoo for the past many years now, gaining market share and increasing its customer base manifolds. Over the course of past few years, Yahoo! Inc. ade a slew of changes in its objectives, business model and t o its external, internal environment and strategy to shore up its performance and regain lost ground to its main competitor Google. Herein, we shall take a close look at some of such factors through defining the company’s mandate, internal analysis as well as external analysis. INTRODUCTION The company under consideration Yahoo! Inc. (referred to hereinafter as â€Å"Yahoo†) is one of the world’s largest online network integrated services provider with a combined user base in excess of 500 million. Yahoo provides a whole host of network based services, however over its existence of past 17 years, many such similar service providers have shored up especially after the dot com boom. Some of these new players took the path of specializing in a particular form of service while others brought a whole gamut of new services with the old ones. World Wide Web has grown exponentially over the past years giving rise to the intense rivalry between companies involved. This intense rivalry especially with the likes of Google is one of the biggest challenges for Yahoo. In this case study, we try to first understand the backdrop in which the company is operating including its mission and vision for the future, its ultimate goals and philosophy regarding its business, its business model, external analysis based on Porter’s five forces model and finally internal analysis based on distinctive competencies, competitive advantage and profitability. This document is prepared based on the information provided in the case, â€Å"Yahoo† (Jones, 2007) as well as numerous external sources such as Yahoo’s website and its annual reports circa 2011. COMPANY OVERVIEW Yahoo was incorporated as an Internet service provider that would serve both the users and the businesses globally. Yahoo was founded by two Stanford PhD candidates in January 1994 named Jerry Yang and David Filo. However, today Yahoo has become one of the world’s largest global online network integrated services provider. Yahoo today has a user base of 500 million per month. It has a presence in more than 30 countries worldwide and provides services in more than twenty different languages. The company presently operates out of Sunnyvale, California in the United States. Yahoo first went public on the NASDAQ (YHOO) in the April of 1996. The stock had opened for $ 13. 00 per share of the company and by the very day’s end; it had reached a closing of $ 33. 00 per share (Yahoo Overview, 2012). In Dec 1999 the company was also added to the SP 500 index. Recently, in early 2012, Yahoo had appointed Scott Thompson as the new CEO who was then replaced by Marissa Mayer in the month of May (Perez, 2012). Also in June 2012, the company also hired the former director at Google, Michael Barrett, as its Chief Revenue Officer. In April 2012, the company announced a cut of about 14 % of its workforce. This was expected to save the company around $ 375 million annually and is scheduled to be completed by end of this year (Liedtke, 2012). MANDATE The mandate of a company sheds light on why it exists, what it hopes to achieve in reference to the expectations of the stakeholders. Yahoo changed it mission statement from just â€Å"focusing on being a search portal† to â€Å"want to connect people to their passion, communities and world’s knowledge† (Baker, 2007). Yahoo’s mission Statement refers to the fact that the company envisages to achieve two major objectives; first one is to provide personal digital experience to their customers so that they remain happy doing things they like especially in the web and secondly to provide a unique way to the advertiser to connect to the consumers and help to build their business (Yahoo FAQ, 2012). In simple terms, as Yahoo enables people to connect with their passion in various fields i. e. sports, music etc. , it will in turn provide Yahoo with an excellent opportunity to generate advertising revenue from music and sports companies etc. The core values of the company provide a sense of direction that the company adheres to and the way it is going to do it, and the goals it wishes to achieve via the same. The company on its website has outlined six Core values that drive the company forward. These are namely (Yahoo Values, 2004). a. Excellence: The Company mentions of it always seeking quality and knowing that the success should never be taken for granted and hence learn from own mistakes. b. Innovation: The Company believes in creativity and is ready to adapt to change in market trends and respond with calculated and responsible steps. You read "Yahoo – Strategic Management Analysis" in category "Essay examples" c. Customer Fixation: The Company is always looking to maintain the trust of the customers and respond to the customers need and try to exceed them. d. Teamwork: The Company believes in and tries to encourage the best of the ideas from the entire organization and to foster collaboration and yet maintain individual accountability. e. Community: The Company seeks to serve both communities globally and the Internet Community as a whole in general. f. Fun: The Company also possesses a sense of humour and believe that the same is essential to the success of the company and also do appreciate and celebrate their achievement. From the aforementioned Core Values and the present scenario of the company, it seems Yahoo’s main challenge is keep up with its two very important core values namely Innovation and Customer Fixation which are integral for it to be the market leader in web portal industry. The main stakeholders of Yahoo are; its stockholders that invest their capital in the company, customers that use Yahoo’s web portal, advertisers that market their products through Yahoo’s online services and employees who provide it intellectual capacity leading to the creation of innovative new online products and services. Yahoo’s employees want a fair, ethical treatment and a stable job, advertisers expect to connect to their market segment by advertising on Yahoo, customers want enjoyable and innovative products that make their daily life easier and most importantly stock holders have an expectation that Yahoo will pursue strategies that increase company’s revenue and profitability maximizing shareholder value. EXTERNAL ANALYSIS COMPETITIVE FORCES Yahoo operates in â€Å"the Internet products, services, and content markets, which are highly competitive and characterized by rapid change, emerging and converging technologies, and increasing competition† and that their most significant competition is from â€Å"Facebook, Google, Microsoft, and AOL (Yahoo 10K, 2011). Yahoo is a part of web portal industry where revenue generation is dependent on online advertising which in turn requires a large number of user base to generate any significant revenue. Advertisers prefer to advertise their products through web portals that have a large user base and offer products and tools which help them reach their target audience. In web portal industry, degree of rivalry amongst competitors is quite high, competitors compete aggressively against each other through innovative new product offerings and/or by lowering prices for advertising but Product differentiation is becoming increasingly difficult due to the fact that over the years industry has gone through consolidation and main players such as Google, Yahoo, MSN etc. ave gained a significant amount of market share creating an oligopoly. Industry has entered a mature stage in the western hemisphere such as Europe and North America but a lot of potential is available in emerging markets of Asia and South America where it is in growth stage. Due to the nature of internet, entry in to the web portal industry is relatively easy but based on the amount of capital, innovative skills and technolo gical knowledge required to attract and maintain a large user base in the web portal industry, the threat of new entrants that can compete directly with Yahoo is quite low. Yahoo does charge some fees for certain premium services but generally its main services such as email and search are free of cost which is common amongst competitors in web portal industry. The range of services offered in web portal at little or no cost means that switching cost for users is quite low. Buyers also include those advertisers who would buy ad space on the website. Even though Yahoo’s revenue stream is not concentrated at any individual advertiser or user but low switching costs for users combined with the intense rivalry in the industry to gain advertisers puts bargaining power of the buyers at medium. Yahoo’s search engine essentially is a mechanism that provides users with an ability to search through content present on the internet. This content is freely available on the internet for Yahoo to collect and categories hence supplier power for Yahoo’s search engine is quite low. Web portal industry in which Yahoo operates does not have a lot of substitutes. Some possible substitutes for Yahoo’s products and services are; postal service is substitute of Yahoo’s e-mail service, financial newspapers are a substitute for Yahoo’s financial section, etc. but most importantly there are no efficient substitutes for search engines on web portal industry in both online or offline world. Because of the lack of efficiency of substitutes to products and services offered by web portal industry, the threat of substitutes is low. Recently Web portal industry has gained a possible complementor in the form of latest smart phones with high speed mobile internet acce ss which gives user an ability to be online at any place at any given time. Smart phone technology combined with the web portal industry gives both parties involved a better opportunity to satisfy customer demands. MACRO ENVIRONMENT Aforementioned analysis was based on Porter’s five forces model which is subject to macro-environment. We shall now analyse different forces in the macro-environment. Economic conditions might affect Yahoo as it derives most of its revenue from businesses and individuals who advertise their products and services on the internet. Any slump in the economic growth may lead to a reduction in advertising budget of businesses which will eventually affect Yahoo. In the emerging markets such as those in Asia and South America, Yahoo is presented with an excellent opportunity to expand its business. Along with the opportunity, Yahoo may also face stiff competition in emerging markets such as China where local competitors have gained considerable market share i. e. Baidu, Inc. in China has 63% of the market share and is Yahoo’s main competitor in that region (Barboza, 2010). Political and legal forces tend to affect businesses operating in the web portal industry especially in the emerging markets. Regulations on the internet service providers generally vary from country to country i. e. in certain countries local providers enjoy special protection through regulations giving them competitive advantage over Yahoo. Yahoo was successfully sued in France for its failure to keep Nazi memorabilia off its Web pages as it is considered a crime in France (Claburn, 2006) and in 2010 Google pulled out of China after failing to negotiate with Chinese government (Carlson, 2010). Internet is a rapidly growing industry, and with low barriers to entry and low switching costs, technological forces heavily influence Yahoo. With the advent of new technologies, competition and rivalry between players in web portal industry is likely to be more intense driving down revenues as a result. Development in technology may give rise to newer forms of advertising media which can potentially take away revenue from Yahoo. Yahoo mainly operates in the online world and number of users with access to internet is growing rapidly and user base in the developed countries is very well spread out across all demographics. More and more people in the developing countries are getting access to the internet which is likely an opportunity for Yahoo. INTERNAL ANALYSIS We shall now discuss the internal environment of the company and how can it have any sort of material impact on the performance of the company. The internal Analysis of the company would include the distinctive competencies of the company, the competitive advantage and the profitability of the company. The first and foremost distinctive competency of the company is the ability to enable people relate to their passion. This is as per Yahoo’s mission statement and is also reflective in the product portfolio. The company is probably the leader in the industry in terms of the number of services and products that the company offers. This range of product offering has not been observed to be present with the other competitors i. e. Flickr, a omprehensive imaging database, Yahoo Finance provides accurate financial Data in almost real time, etc. The second distinctive competency of the company is the brand name of the company, which has helped it retain its users despite its consistent problem in bringing new innovative products like its competitors Google and Facebook. The third and most important is the efficiency of Yahoo marketing services and its ability to attract customers and publishers. Since its beginning the business model of Yahoo has been heavily reliant on contextual advertising and offering premium services. And this segment of business of Yahoo has still kept it in business. And not to forget the next competency of the company is its famous search and portal. Though the search algorithm used by the company has gradually been updated to the changing demographics of the business, but still some work needs to be done on it to make it a sheer strength for the company. Yahoo still possesses some competitive advantage as compared to its rivals. Firstly, Yahoo’s directory is very well-structured and authenticated business library and it can be developed and customized to act as a new and good source of revenue. Second is the ability of Yahoo to provide customized and contextual advertising. Another very important competitive advantage of the company is the hold of Yahoo in the mobile segment with its auxiliary products and even partnerships with third party service providers. And probably last but not the least is the employees of the company, who proved tremendous support, and technical knowhow, that helps Yahoo shore up with customized solutions for its customers and also help in maintain a virtually glitch/hassle free website quality. As far as profitability is concerned, this is something that has not been going right for the company. Over the past four quarters, the company has not seen any significant growth in its revenue and has in fact witnessed a decline in the operating profitability due to a rise in non-recurring expenses (Yahoo Income Statement, 2012). However since the new CEO took over in the month of July, she has embarked on a new strategy of Brownfield expansion via the MA route and other critical decisions, that is set â€Å"to revive growth and boost profitability† which is a very positive and ncouraging news for investors (Womack, 2012). Yahoo’s decision to hire executives Michael Barret as a CFO and Marissa Mayer as a CEO seems to show that Yahoo understands the threat that Google poses as both Barret and Mayer were executive at Google prior to joining Yahoo. From the above analysis, it seems that the company is better poised on its internal environment than external environment. A nd it needs to improvise on its assets and brand to shore up its market share and performance. Yahoo’s recent layoff of 14% of its work force seems to be beginning of new strategy of refocusing the company towards its core competencies, product innovation and growth. REFERENCES Yahoo FAQs. (2012). Investors FAQs. Retrieved from http://yhoo. client. shareholder. com/faq. cfm Jones, G. R. (2007). Yahoo. In C. W. L. Hill G. R. Jones (Eds. ), Strategic Management An Integrated Approach (8th ed. , pp. C102-C114). Boston, NY: Houghton Mifflin Company. Yahoo Overview. (2012). Overview. Retrieved from http://pressroom. yahoo. net/pr/ycorp/overview. aspx Perez, J. C. (2012, 07 16). Yahoo picks google’s marissa mayer as ceo. Macworld, Retrieved from http://www. macworld. com/article/1167728/yahoo_picks_googles_marissa_mayer_as_ceo. html Liedtke, M. (2012, 04 04). New yahoo CEO Scott Thompson cuts 2,000 jobs The Christian Science Monitor, Retrieved from http://www. csmonitor. com/Innovation/Latest-News-Wires/2012/0404/New-Yahoo-CEO-Scott-Thompson-cuts-2-000-jobs Baker, L. (2010). Yahoo ; google’s mission statements: Do they connect?. Search Engine Journal, Retrieved from http://www. searchenginejournal. com/yahoo-googles-mission-statements-do-they-connect/4924/ Yahoo Values. (2004). Yahoo! we value. Retrieved from http://docs. yahoo. com/info/values/ Yahoo 10K. (2011, 12 31). Yahoo 10k Annual Report. Retrieved from http://files. shareholder. com/downloads/YHOO/2120211742x0xS1193125-12-86972/1011006/filing. pdf Barboza, D. (2010, 01 13). Baidu’s gain from departure could be china’s loss. The NewYork Times. Retrieved from http://www. nytimes. com/2010/01/14/technology/companies/14baidu. html? _r=1 Claburn, T. (2006, 01 13). Yahoo loses lawsuit over nazi memorabilia sale. Information Week, Retrieved from http://www. informationweek. om/yahoo-loses-lawsuit-over-nazi-memorabili/177100347 Carlson, N. (2010, 03 22). Breaking: Google pulls out of china. Business Insider, Retrieved from http://articles. businessinsider. com/2010-03-22/tech/29990556_1_google-com-hk-google-s-china-googlecn Yahoo Income Statement. (2012). Income statement. Retrieved from http://in. finance. yahoo. com/q/is? s=YHOO Womack, B. (2012, 08 10). Yahoo strategy review may result in changes to cash plans. Bloomberg, Retrieved from http://www. bloomberg. com/news/2012-08-09/yahoo-ceo-strategy-review-may-result-in-changes-to-cash-plans. html How to cite Yahoo – Strategic Management Analysis, Essay examples