MBA 699 (9-1)

Essay Instructions:

MBA 699 Project Guidelines and Rubric Competencies In this project, you will demonstrate your mastery of the following competencies: Manage stakeholder relationships to sustain a competitive advantage Align and integrate a short-term goal with a strategic plan Create a change management strategy Scenario You are a business development manager reporting to the vice president (VP) of business development at one of the largest life sciences organizations in the Midwest. While the organization has shown constant growth and profitability since its inception in 1999, the owners have decided that it is time to sell. Given the current uncertainty in global markets, the organization’s board of directors is not convinced that this is the right approach. While work was underway to find a potential buyer, the VP called on you to join the strategic planning team to assess the organization’s exit strategy and make recommendations to its board of directors. You have been working closely with your strategic planning team to make some initial analyses and recommendations to help plan for the sale of the organization. As part of the planning team, your first task was to select people from your organization to build a guiding coalition to help the organization transition during and after the acquisition. Then, you were asked to analyze one of the organization’s core strengths, its talented pool of employees. This included analyzing the attrition data to understand why employees have left the organization and recommending ways to ensure employee stability in the future. This essential information will be provided to potential acquirers to assure them of the organization’s ability to retain talent. While planning was underway, your first potential buyer started to get cold feet. So, you were asked to research an alternative buyer and build a contingency plan. This contingency plan is an important part of your exit strategy and your report to the board of directors. You and your team were also asked to formulate an acquisition road map that lays out the action steps and timelines for the plan. Now that the initial analysis and plans are complete, your VP is ready to make the presentation to the board of directors. The VP has asked you to prepare a formal report that you will send to the board prior to the presentation. This report will include the analyses and plans you have developed over the last few weeks. It is important to note that your report will provide a first impression to the board about the upcoming presentation and meeting. You need to craft a compelling message that provides insights based on all the work your team has done and substantiates your position with data. In addition, as a part of your report, you will also outline a change management strategy that will help ensure a smoother transition after the sale of the organization. Directions Write a merger integration report that includes your analyses and insights and provides a change management strategy for moving forward toward a sale of the organization in the course scenario. Compile your work from Milestones One, Two, and Three in your report. Remember to address and incorporate any feedback you may have received from your instructor on your milestone assignments. Guiding coalition: Use the organizational chart and the employee personas provided to guide your selection of the guiding coalition for the organization in the scenario. Specifically, you must address the following rubric criteria: Recommendation: Use the organizational chart and the personas to identify people who should be part of the guiding coalition. Review the personas to identify the individuals who have the influence and commitment to make a positive impact while providing guidance for the change initiative. Rationale: Justify your choice of guiding coalition team members. Your responses should address the following for each individual you recommend for the coalition: What is the person’s title and how many people do they manage? How long has each person been with the organization? What area(s) of the organization does this person influence? What is your rationale for choosing the person? Consider the person’s characteristics for your rationale. What role will each person fulfill as a member of the guiding coalition? Team-building strategies: Describe activities and strategies you will introduce to build a well-functioning team. Your response should address the following: What strategies will help the members align with the change initiative of the organization in the scenario? What steps or actions will you take to establish a sense of urgency within the team? How do these activities and strategies help build trust? Employee attrition analysis report: First, use the employee attrition data to create visuals in Tableau that capture the trends and possible reasons for retention and attrition in the organization. Then, write a report about the current state of human resources and attrition. Include screenshots from your visualizations to support your report. Remember to consider the employee’s employment status when visualizing and analyzing the data. The Status column in the spreadsheet indicates whether the employee is a current or former employee of the organization. Specifically, you must address the following criteria: Current employee demographics: Summarize the current employee demographics for the organization from the course scenario. Use Tableau to visualize the demographic data such as age, sex, marital status, and experience and include the corresponding screenshots in your summary. Choose the graphs or charts that that are best suited to represent the demographic data. Choose at least two different graph or chart types to represent the demographic data and include the corresponding screenshots in your written summary. Explain why you have selected the specific chart types to represent your data. Attrition analysis : Analyze the given employee data to answer the following questions about attrition in the organization, including its causes and the relationship between attrition and various employment factors. Use Tableau to create a visual summary of the data and include the corresponding screenshots in your analysis. Choose the graphs or charts you believe are best suited to represent the required data. Identify the five top reasons for attrition. For those who left the organization, how many years had it been since their last promotion? At what age does an employee typically exit the organization? After how many years of employment does someone typically leave the company? What is the connection between how many times a year a person was trained, how long they stayed at the organization, and whether they have left? Retention: Compare the attrition analysis data with your current employee details to evaluate and prevent future attrition. Your response should address the following: Using the trends from the attrition data identify if more current employees are likely to leave. Explain your findings. What does your attrition analysis tell you about employee stability in the organization? How is it likely to affect your organization’s evaluation by a potential buyer? Actionable steps: Based on finding from your retention analysis, provide three specific actions that the organization can take to prevent employees from leaving. Provide rationale. Alternative buyer research report: Recommend one potential buyer from the alternative buyer options list provided and justify your choice. Visit the potential buyer’s website and research the company's market and financial situation. Include this recommendation as an appendix in your report. Explain your recommendation based on the following selection (and rubric) criteria: Current market: Describe the current market of the selected potential buyer. What types of products does this organization manufacture? Who are their customers? In which industry do they compete? Financial situation: Analyze the organization’s (potential buyer) financial situation, including revenue, expenses, and profitability. Recent developments: Visit your selected organization’s (potential buyer) website and review their news and announcements over the past year. What notable recent events has the organization experienced that might make them more or less attractive to your organization as a buyer? Explain your reasoning. Buyer rationale: Justify why this potential buyer is the best option for the life sciences organization. Use data from your research to support your rationale. Acquisition road map: Develop an acquisition road map as a tool for sharing the project with the strategic planning team and the guiding coalition. Specifically, you must address the following criteria: Acquisition-related tasks: Describe the tasks and steps that have already been taken toward an acquisition since you were appointed to the strategic planning team. Recommend the tasks and steps that would need to happen over the next one to two years to evaluate and complete an acquisition. For each task and step, provide estimates for how long it will take to accomplish them, the responsible parties, and any dependencies. Gantt chart: Using the provided template, create a Gantt chart that visually illustrates the tasks and steps that you’ve indicated above (Note:You can copy the chart to include it in the road map document). Your chart should include the following: Indicate tasks and steps that have already been completed since you were appointed to the strategic planning team. For example, be sure to include guiding coalition, industry, and competitive research aspects. Indicate "in process" tasks and steps that are currently being performed. Exit strategy recommendations and plan: Outline your change management strategy for transition after the acquisition. Specifically, you must address the following criteria: Change management strategy: Using Kotter’s change model as a guide, explain each step of the change management strategy that you recommend. Your response should address the following: How will you create a sense of urgency? How will the guiding coalition continue to guide the change? Who will they impact? Identify which critical tasks from the acquisition road map the guiding coalition should complete. Also, determine the expected timelines for these tasks to be completed. What is your strategic vision for the company, its operations, and its employees after the acquisition? What is the plan for enlisting a group of employees to get other employees united around the common vision? What barriers to change do you foresee? How do you plan to remove them? How will you track progress? How will you communicate short-term wins? Summary: Summarize your strategy and assessment of risks. Describe the overall strategy that you recommend for the organization’s acquisition goals. Explain how the strategy will fit in the business environment of the oncology market segment in the pharmaceutical industry. Consider using an external business environment analysis to inform your conclusions. Risks: Identify three potential risks that may be associated with your recommendation and explain steps the organization can take to mitigate those risks. What to Submit A 16- to 20-page Word document with 12-point Times New Roman font, double spacing, and one-inch margins. Sources should be cited according to APA style. Consult the Shapiro Library APA Style Guide for more information on citations. This report should include the following sections: Guiding Coalition Recommendations Employee Attrition Analysis Report Alternative Buyer Research Report Acquisition Road Map Exit Strategy Recommendations and Plan Supporting Materials The following resources support your work on the project: Resource: HR Employee Attrition Survey This spreadsheet contains employee details such as attrition, demographics, and so on. Resource: Employee Personas Use these personas to recommend individuals for your guiding coalition. Resource: Organizational Chart Use this chart as a reference in order to see where in the organization each of the persons sits relative to other leaders of the organization. The chart will also provide you with a visual of their sphere of direct influence. (There is also a text-only version.) Resource: Alternative Buyer Options Use this list of global biomedical companies to select one company to research as a potential alternative buyer. Resource: Gantt Chart Template Use this template to create a Gantt chart to support your acquisition road map. Resource: Footnotes and Appendices Use the Appendices section of this resource for help with adding an appendix to your report.

Essay Sample Content Preview:

MBA 699 Project Student’s Name Institution Affiliation Course Name & Code Instructor’s Name Date MBA 699 Project Guiding Coalition The guiding coalition will comprise several members, with each member making a special contribution based on the persona, along with influence and commitment to drive positive change. The first member will be John. As the company’s research director, John has been handling scientific research activities. In addition, he has served for 22 years and has a high level of job satisfactionCITATION MBA \l 2057 (MBA 699 Lecture Notes). In terms of performance, John has been posting impressive performances and has attained workplace promotions. Within the guiding coalition, John is responsible for overseeing scientific research and providing critical scientific information to influence the coalition's decisions. Mattson will be the second member of the guiding coalition. He is the company's manufacturing director. During the 3-years that Mattson has been at the company, he has expanded the Middle East's supply chain CITATION MBA \l 2057 (MBA 699 Lecture Notes). He has also been effective in delivering the company's goals; hence, he will ensure the timely completion of the coalition's production activities. The third recommendation is Leslie. She holds the position of a sales representative and has been at the company for 14 years CITATION MBA \l 2057 (MBA 699 Lecture Notes). The rationale behind her recommendation is that Leslie has assisted the company in meeting sales targets. Leslie’s impressive performance is manifested by exceeding the quotas for each quota. The justification for the inclusion of Leslie is that she will provide expertise to the coalition based on her tenure of experience. She will also enhance interaction among the coalition's members due to her exposure to customer interactions. Ultimately, Leslie will boost positivity by enhancing focus among members of the guiding coalition. The fourth recommendation is Elaine. She holds the role of the acting director in the company. Elaine has gained the reputation of a true visionary due to her uniqueness in appreciating complementary strengths from other people. She has worked in the company for the past 10 years, hence indicating that she has experience in the company's practices CITATION MBA \l 2057 (MBA 699 Lecture Notes). Strong leadership when adapting to new situations is the most outstanding trait that justifies her inclusion in the guiding coalition. Based on this trait, she will effectively handle the role of managing other managers in the guiding coalition. In terms of team-building strategies, diagnosis of resistance will be an applicable approach. The strategy will enable the guiding coalition to counter resistance from staff who may oppose the change initiative (Shahbaz et al., 2019). Diagnosis of resistance will involve the assessment of individuals who are likely to counter the change effort and the potential reasons for opposition. Using the strategy will enable timely intervention to address the matter prior to the emergence of negative outcomes from change opposition. Another strategy is addressing divergent self-interests. The pursuit of self-interest is based on the fear that an employee may lose on personal gains when pursuing the company’s objectives (Shahbaz et al., 2019). Therefore, addressing the fear through reassurance will be vital. In addition, the company will counter any misunderstanding among employees. Failure to understand requirements during the change process may slow the change initiative. Clarifications on changes will counter employee resistance. The creation of a sense of urgency will also be integral. The change process must occur quickly; hence, the definition of deadlines will be essential CITATION Ove19 \l 2057 (Overby, 2019). Specific and realistic deadlines will be critical to break down milestones and tasks. The process will enhance employee motivation. Visualization of outcomes will also be necessary. Employees will connect emotionally with the goals through visualization, thereby boosting goal achievement. Further, demonstration of change implementation will be essential. The approach will create a sense of urgency in implementation since employees will be aware of the positive impacts of fast change implementation CITATION Pri20 \l 2057 (Primeast, 2020). The combination of all the activities will build higher levels of trust among employees. The involvement of employees in the change process will prove that the company values employee input and cooperation for the attainment of the change process. Employees will also embrace the vision due to high involvement, understanding, and clarity CITATION Pri20 \l 2057 (Primeast, 2020). Personalizing the change process will also be essential in enhancing trust since employees will gain from integrating employees' ideas into the change initiative. Employee Attrition Analysis Report Employee Demographics Area Graph Figure 1: Age The rationale for the graph is for the clarity of the employees count in each group. In addition, the Figure 1 graph covers categories of employees through age bins. Each bin has a length of five years to allow a fair distribution across all the ages. The bins enable clarity on the age distribution across different age groups. Bar Chart Figure 2: Gender The reason for choosing the bar chart is the few items under visualization. The bar chart allows for simplicity in comparison since only two items are displayed. The color chosen is based on the need to create a visual contrast. The order of items is smallest to largest for effectiveness in attaining a visual impression. Pie Chart Figure 3: Marital Status The items in the chart illustration are few, which simplifies visual comparison. This visualization covers each item since each employee falls under either of the categories. For visual effectiveness, the three colors were the best option, with a high contrast enabling viewers to notice the count in each of the three chart segments. Bubble Charts Figure 4: Education Levels The use of the bubble charts for presentation produces a visually appealing illustration. The bubble size matches the capacity of the respective item (Qin et al., 2019), and the use of distinct colors enables clarity in the presentation. In addition, it is advantageous to use the bubble chart as it is good for analyzing diverse data sets in the same chart. Bar Chart Figure 5: Experience The rationale for choosing the bar chart to visualize the employees experience is that it presents data summaries in a succinct manner (Qin et al., 2019). The bar chart in Figure 5 shows data on 3 aspects that describe the scope of working experience. The three aspects captured in the chart are the duration worked for the company, the years that an employee has served in the current role and the total working years. The data analysis combines three variables and briefly displays the findings. Attrition Analysis One root of employee attrition is a wish for growth opportunities in their career (Subhashini & Gopinath, 2020). The absence of channels and lack of opportunities for career growth frustrates employees, and they may lose interest in their current jobs and seek alternatives. Subhashini & Gopinath (2020) propel the idea that organizations must adopt a culture of continuous learning and offer career pathways to counteract attrition. These techniques reduce attrition rates by enhancing employee motivation and engagement. The following section visualizes data to demonstrate attrition rates in line with the variables under consideration. Figure 6: Attrition and Years Since Last Promotion Attrition is precisely comparable to an employee's duration for a promotion based on Figure 6. Nevertheless, the curve is positive up to a certain point in the graph due to the positive correlation between attrition and duration since the last promotion. The curve demonstrates a negative connection up in the graph where there is a sharp turn. There is the likelihood that an employee will resign if they stay longer in one position CITATION Placeholder1 \l 2057 (Subhashini & Gopinath, 2020). Figure 6 above justifies the likelihood of employees being frustrated by the longer durations in the same working position. Subhashini & Gopinath (2020) argue that the lack of career growth opportunities pictures in high attrition rates, which aligns with our finding in Figure 6 above. Since employees who stay in the same position for a long time may already have diminished occupational mobility and age, the deviation from the association above is logical. Occupational and geographical mobility reduces with age (Budie et al., 2019), and therefore, employees who have served for 15 years in one working position are presumably aged and less likely to go for position changes. Figure 7: Attrition and Training Times Figure 7 findings imply that low attrition levels occur when employee training is high and low. If training times are at a moderate range, the attrition levels are high because employees who received fewer training sessions might be new. In addition, attrition is infrequent since the work duration is short. When training times are extremely high, attrition is high. Employees who encounter frequent sessions are likely to fall behind in performance and skills, although employee training for skill growth motivates employees. Therefore, attrition rates are apt to be high when training times are extremely high. Figure 8: Attrition and Age Figure 8 indicates attrition is low for young and old employees approaching retirement. The attrition rate sharply increases between the ages of 20 and 30 years. Afterwards, the rate decreases until retirement. The trend concurs with the finding by Budie et al. (2019) that geographical and occupational mobility are low among aged employees. On the other hand, low rates of attrition for teenage employees are likely to align with low skills. Since the cohort has low skills, changes in position are unlikely, the aim being stable in a particular position. Figure 9: Attrition against education field and education levels Based on findings in Figure 9, attrition rates are high among employees with academic qualifications in life sciences and the medical field. The trend is consistent with all education levels. Figure 9 also indicates that attrition rates are highest among undergraduate-level employees. In contrast, employees with doctorate qualifications have the lowest attrition rates across all fields of education. The trend of high attrition rates among employees in the medical and life sciences field may be due to the scope of specialization necessary in the areas. On the other hand, employees with undergraduate qualifications have adequate skills to fit in multiple organizational settings; hence, flexibility is high. Employees with doctorate qualifications are likely to be of advanced age and work in senior leadership positions; therefore, shifting from the organization is unlikely. Figure 10: Attrition against gender and marital status Figure 10 indicates that male employees have higher attrition rates. In addition, the figure also indicates that divorced employees have the lowest attrition rates, follow...

Updated on September 2, 2024

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