Abbott Risk Consulting Ltd. SWOT Analysis | Porters Five Force Model Example

Introduction

The following report includes a discussion about Abbott Risk Consulting Company. The report includes a description of the business performance of Abbott Risk Consulting. The report also includes the SWOT and value chain analysis of the company. The report also includes the proposed changes for improvement in management and business performance and the assessment of business objectives in order to incorporate proposed changes. The report also includes the assessment of change management solutions and finally, a conclusion has been drawn based on this analysis.

Scenario 1: Business performance of Abbott Risk Consulting

1. Profile of Abbott Risk Consulting

ARC is one of the independent consultancies which are established in the year 2002. The company has grown from 22 consultancy staff to 90 staff by the year 2011; the company has offices in Australia and UK from which it manages its operations globally. The company has a high reputation of delivering quality services within time and proposed budget. The company has achieved this reputation by delivering quality services by using is robust project management skills of its employees and business processes. The company is highly committed towards it services and its employees always tries to walk an extra mile to meet the client requirements. The company mainly works for government projects and corporations but the company operations are highly flexible and can also provide services to small enterprises. The company is mainly owned by the staff and directors of the company. The company main aim is to grow and develop its staff along with the clients and the market. The company mainly provides services related to consulting, drilling, engineering, environment safety, personnel development, professional services, training, transportation etc (About Us 2012).

2. SWOT of Abbott Risk Consulting

SWOT
Strengths: The Company has the strength of talented staff with which it caters its clients and provides them with effective services. The company also has a good base of clients who are loyal towards the company services (Abbott Risk Consulting 2012).
Weakness: The Company has the weakness of small operations, due to which it cannot provide services to large organizations due to the lack of man force and infrastructure. The company also has the weakness of lower level of capital which restricts the company to take contracts of larger firms and larger government projects and organizations (Pahl and Richter 2009).
Opportunities: The Company has the opportunities to grow by the expansion of staff and by infrastructure development. The company also has the opportunity in the coming period as in today’s period there is a great need of energy and related consultancy which is required by all the organizations in this field (Pahl and Richter 2009).
Threats: The Company has the threat of being taken over by the larger firms due to its low level of staff and turnover. The company also has the threat of facing competition from large firms who are also planning to enter this field of business (Pahl and Richter 2009).

3. Value chain analysis and Porters five force model

Porters five force model
Bargaining power of suppliers: The suppliers have low bargaining power as the company provides services to its clients and does not require major inputs from the suppliers.
Bargaining power of buyers: The buyers have medium bargaining power as the consultation provided by the company saves several costs of the businesses.
Threat of substitutes: The Company has a low level of threat from its substitutes as the consultation provided by the company has least substitutes and the service needs to be used by the clients necessarily (Abbott Risk Consulting 2012).
Threat of new entrants: The Company faces a moderate the threat of new entrants, as the capital required for the establishment of such company is lower and also the entry is also not restricted (Ahlstrom and Bruton 2009).
Threat of existing rivalry: The Company faces lower level of threat from the existing rivalry as there are few competitors in the market among which the company has the largest market share as compared to the competitors (Abbott Risk Consulting 2012).
Value chain analysis
Value chain analysis can be said to be as the function in which inputs are converted into outputs by adding some value in it. In the value chain analysis of Abbott Risk Consulting it can be said that the first process is taking of orders and analyzing them for meeting the expectations of the customers. Then the next step in the company value chain process is to define the specifications and the description of the changes and the list of activities the company is going to perform and deliver the service. Finally the scheduling is done in order to provide the client with the timely services and meet the commitments done (Ahlstrom and Bruton 2009).

Scenario 2: Proposed changes for improvement in management and business performance

1. Actions to be taken to overcome the weaknesses

The actions that the company needs to take in order to overcome the weakness described above mainly includes the increase in the number of staff and increase in the capital requirement or the working capital of the company in order to take up larger projects and provide services to larger clients. The company needs to hire more staff and train them in order to increase its level of operations and also try to borrow or plug in more capital in the company for expansion of its business operations and apply more working capital. The company can also overcome this by training its existing staff and increase their efficiency to handle more and more work. The actions may also include the company to take loans for attaining projects by several financial institutions and contact with some consultancy for increasing its operations in an immediate manner (Abbott Risk Consulting 2012).

2. Way in which existing performance can be maintained and strengthen

There are several ways in which the company can maintain its existing performance and can also strengthen the performance for meeting the future demand from the customers the main activity which the organization can do is to increase the level of training of its staff in order to update their knowledge from time to time with the changes in the technology and business practices. The company can also strengthen its performance by making it compulsory for its staff to get equipped with the updated knowledge by the way of training and increase their performances from changing time. The company can also strengthen its performance by the increase in its level of staff as well as increasing its working capital requirement to cater services to big companies which will help the company grow in short time period (Company Overview: Abbott Risk Consulting Ltd 2012).

3. New areas where the business can expand

There are several areas where the company can expand its operations it mainly includes the expansion in the consultation field. As there are several areas in which the company can provide consultation related to the exploration and natural mining fields. There are several issues related to the mining and their impacts on the environment, the company can increase its operations to aid the companies related to exploration and mining and production and can provide them consolation related to the environmental impacts of their operations can how they can manage them. This can be justified by analyzing that there is a high requirement for the sustainability of the environment and in the current period there are several issues related to the conservation of environment and there are strict rules and regulations related to the environment conservation for the mining and exploration companies. So this can easily be said that the company can expand in this area in an easy and effective manner and can grow its operations by providing this service to the existing clients as well (Neely 2002).

Scenario 3: Assessment of business objectives in order to incorporate proposed changes

1. Existing business objectives and plans of Abbott Risk Consulting

The company main goal or objective is to build and maintain effective relationship for long term with the clients and genuinely benefit the client with the expertise and support the company has within. The main objective of the company is to cater services to its customers in an effective and efficient manner. The core value of the company is continuous improvement in its performance and services to be provided to its clients. The company has the plans of expansion in the coming period but not in terms of services but in terms of its size with steady growth. The company also tries to increase its customer base and cater its services to clients across the globe. The company works across all the sectors which are mainly treated as hazardous industries and cater its services to them, so the company is planning to increase its area of operations and apply its expertise in different processes related to these industries.

2. Revision of the existing business plans and suggesting of new plans in accordance with the proposed changes

The company is suggested to revise its existing business plans of increasing its operations and catering services to its existing industries. The company is suggested to apply new business plans which are associated with the increase its operations in the mining are where the company does not operate currently. The company can plan for increasing its services to the mining companies and guide them several factors related to the environment sustainability which is the needs of the current period. In accordance with the proposed changes or areas where the business can expand the company can hire some experts and try to train its existing employees who can guide the new clients who are in the exploration field and try to capture them and make them the company clients for longer period and cater them with the services (Ahlstrom and Bruton 2009).

3. Action plan for implementing suggested changes

The action plan which is required for the application of the propose change or entering into new area, mainly includes the first activity as the hiring of some expert or staff which can provide guidance related to the environmental conservation to the mining companies, and then hiring of training who can provide training of the existing staff related to area of service. The second step in the action plan will include the interaction with the mining and exploration companies regarding the services which the company can provide and the potential benefits the company has regarding the environmental conservation. The action plan then requires providing service to the positively converted clients. The plan also includes the analysis of the processes and activities applied by the mining company in its exploration activities and the factors that needs to be taken care of and the proper audit of the activities of the company is done in order to provide proper guidance to the mining or client company (Taticchi 2010).

Scenario 4: Assessment of change management solutions

1. Changes to be made in the revised plan suggested

The major changes that the organization need to make in its revised action plan mainly includes the changes in its work force and the recruitment of some staff related to the services which the company is planning to provide to the mining and exploration companies. The changes also include the major improvement in the training activities and the patter of service providing by the company. The company service processes will also be changed with respect to the changes in the operations of the company. The changes in the revised plans also include the changes in the timings of the recruitment process and the changes in the training modules and the trainers who will be training the employees of the organization for their personnel development and the application of the changed process (Taticchi 2010).

2. Impact of proposed changes on business

There will be high impacts of the changes in the business activities. As the changes made will increase the overall activities of the business and also change the process the company was performing earlier. There will also be an impact on the business activities and also the scale of operations of the business.  The impact will also be on the level of operations of the business and also on the activities which the organization performs for its existing clients. The business process will also be changed in order to cater services to the new clients and also the patter of working which was earlier adopted. There will also be changes in the overall number of employees as the number of employees needs to be increased with the changes in the operations and the expansion of the area of operations. There will also be changes in the skills and knowledge of the employees as they will be trained for further increased processes and providing quality work and service to the employees. The personnel will become more advanced and knowledgeable with respect to the advancement in the services to be provided by the clients. There will also be impact of the overall requirement for the working capital of the company and the increase in the demand for the requirement of new staff in the organization.

3. Explanation of how the changes will be managed

The changes in the organizational functioning will be managed with proper application of the training facilities and training staff. The staff will be trained using adequate resources and proper training modules in order to provide proper guidance to the employees so that they can effectively manage the new activities and provide excellent services to the new clients. The changes in the level of operations will be managed by the requirement of new staff that were experts in this field and can easily attain the desired objectives of the organization. The changes will also be managed by proper planning of the overall activities of change that will be applied in the organization. The impacts will have the minimum negative impact as all the activities have been planned in advance in the organization. The changes in the organization has been properly planned and has been properly implemented with proper allocation of resources and time and proper evaluation and monitoring of the activities has been done in order to manage the activities efficiently (Taticchi 2010).

Conclusion

From the analysis of the company and the proposed change management solutions it can be said that the company can easily expand in the consulting area and also can grow with a fast pace in this area. It can also be concluded that with the changes proposed in the report above the company can also grow with a fast pace and can attain its objectives in long term and can remain competitive.

References

Abbott Risk Consulting. 2012. [Online]. Available at: http://features.thesundaytimes.co.uk/public/best100companies/live/template [Accessed on: 23 August, 2012].
About Us. 2012. [Online]. Available at: http://www.consultarc.com/content/aboutus.asp?session_id={1A775A97-119D-4EF4-A143-99C0DE5A0D0A} [Accessed on: 23 August, 2012].
Ahlstrom, D. and Bruton, G.D. 2009. International Management: Strategy and Culture in the Emerging World. Cengage Learning.
Company Overview: Abbott Risk Consulting Ltd. 2012. [Online]. Available at: http://www.rigzone.com/search/sites/Abbott_Risk_Consulting_Ltd6984.asp [Accessed on: 23 August, 2012].
Neely, A. 2002. Business Performance Measurement: Theory and Practice. Cambridge University Press.
Pahl, N. and Richter, A. 2009. SWOT Analysis – Idea, Methodology And A Practical Approach. GRIN Verlag.
Taticchi, P. 2010. Business Performance Measurement and Management: New Contexts, Themes and Challenges. Springer.