MGT309 Introduction to Management

Common Assessment – Company Analysis Report

Instructions:
The report is individual. Students should choose a company as the subject for the report.
Guidance on which type of companies may be chosen for the report will be provided by the instructor.

Required Format:
12 pt.Times New Roman, double-spaced
Title page
Between 750 and 1000 words
Citations: APA

Don’t Plagiarize! In academia, one of the worst sins you can commit is to plagiarize. To
plagiarize means claiming someone else’s ideas or writing as your own. When you don’t
acknowledge that you are using someone else’s ideas or writing, that is plagiarism. In
academic writing, you acknowledge the ideas of others by citing them in the body of your
paper and in the bibliography. The use of unacknowledged ideas or writing is plagiarism.
This includes published works, but also includes using papers written by other students.

Don’t procrastinate! The due date for your paper will arrive rapidly and it will coincide with
other demands in this course, as well as demands in your other courses.

Task: Company Analysis - Individual Report

The report will involve choosing and researching a company, conducting a SWOT analysis of the
organization (i.e. strength, weakness, opportunities, and threats) and identifying two or more ways to
create a competitive advantage (i.e. Efficiency, innovation, responsiveness to customers and quality).

The report should provide:

a) A general description of the organization, its situation and history.

This section provides an overview of the company, in particular the markets (products and services,
geographies) that the company is active in and a brief history of how the company reached to where
it is today.

b) A SWOT analysis of the organization.

The SWOT analysis tool is explained in the course materials (Chapter 8). Besides a summary matrix
of the key Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities and Threats, each of the items mentioned in the
matrix needs to be explained briefly. In particular, there needs to be relevant data or other evidence
that explains why the item you mention is part of the SWOT. In total, there need to be at least 10
items mentioned and explained in the SWOT analysis.

c) Two or more ways to create a competitive advantage.

Based on the SWOT analysis, in particular the Opportunities and Threats, what are the main
sources of competitive advantage that the company currently has or should develop? Use the
four building blocks of competitive advantage explained in Chapter 1 as your framework
(Efficiency, Quality, Responsiveness to Customers, Innovation). By explaining the actual or
potential sources of competitive advantage of the company, this section provides two basic
recommendations for the company regarding how they should build or maintain a
competitive advantage.