Identification of the Internal and External Stakeholders - Ellis & Co - Case Study Example

Managing Communications Table of Contents Introduction 3 Brief Overview of the Case 4 Conduction of Audit 4 1 Identification of the Internal and External Stakeholders 5 1.2 Illustration of the Information Flows 6 1.3 Discussuon and Evaluation of the Concerned Areas and the Existing Strengths 7 2.Strategy Formulation for Improvements 8 3.Proposed Methods 11 4.Methods for Communicating the New Strategy 13 5.Conclusion 15 6.References 16 Introduction Communication within an organisation provides a foundation for proper understanding of every human being and human process. In other words, organisational communication may be defined as the process of sending and receiving understandable messages between two or more individuals who are part of the organisations for creating and maintaining a conscious coordination. Thus, it becomes relatively important for managing and maintaining constant communication in order to effectively carry out day-to-day work roles. There can be various ways of communication within an organisation, but the main focus always remains at conveying an idealistic and clear message for easy understanding. It can be often observed that the work performance of an organisation fails to meet its optimal expectations. It may be due to multiple reasons out of which ineffective communication can also be a part. Moreover, there can be multiple causes for raising communication problems within a specific organisation. The reasons being inability of the employees to properly align with organisational mission along with vision, employees showing fuzziness towards expected goals, ineffective micro-management of the employees, employees’ indiscipline towards timelines and inefficient working habits (Fielding, 2005). With this concern, the essay intends to prepare a briefing sheet with the title ‘Communication problems that can occur in organizations.’ While preparing this, various aspects have been taken into concern for discussion. These aspects comprise conducting a communication audit in order to determine the reasons for the occurrence of communication problems in the sales team of Ellis & Co and formulating effective strategies for dealing with such issues. Brief Overview of the Case The provided case study is about a company named Ellis & Co, which is one of the world’s leading manufacturers of electrical cables. A comprehensive insight about the structure of this company including the market in which it operates can be obtained from the provided case study. According to the provided case study, it can be apparently observed that the company desires to bring about changes in its UK branch ‘Milton Keynes’ office for enhancing its business operations and provide utmost benefits to the stakeholders . Observably, the company altogether possesses commercial activity and manufacturing branches in 25 countries. The company conducts most of its sales business through defined channels throughout the globe. As far as the organisational structure is concerned, the company follows a matrix one, which provides multiple strategic approaches for effective business functionality. The company holds 3 sales teams for conducting sales operations in an effective manner. The case basically depicts an issue related to the structure and most importantly communication procedure of the sales team of Ellis & Co for which it is losing sales. The case also describes about the working structure of various departments prevailing within the organisation. It even describes the strategy implemented by the company for preventing alienation of the customers from doing business with the company who possess very less or almost no credit at all. The intention behind such strategy was to keep hold of the business opportunity with such customers until their conditions become favourable for doing business with the company. 1. Conduction of Audit In accordance with the provided case study, Ellis & Co intends to adopt and implement a newly developed communication strategy in order to obtain more number of sales opportunities. However, there seemed to occur certain communication issues between the sales and the finance team of the company in conveying the message concerning the received credit checks. This eventually resulted in losing sales due to delay in providing response to the customers. Keeping this issue in mind, the initial corrective measure needs to be taken into concern is to bring the current communication process under supervision in order to determine the reasons for having such delay. 1.1 Identification of the Internal and External Stakeholders While conducting an effective communication audit on Ellis & Co, it can be affirmed that the internal along with the external stakeholders of the company would be affected by the newly developed communication strategy. In this similar concern, the external stakeholders of the company can be apparently noted as the wholesale dealers and the customers. On the other hand, the internal stakeholders can be viewed as the members of the finance and sales teams of the company. The above identified internal as well as external stakeholders of the company would get affected by the newly developed communication strategy based upon the notion that these stakeholders would require much time to get familiar with the new system for better execution of their respective tasks and also mitigate the communication issue. As the newly developed communication strategy would appear as quite consuming to be implemented, the sales team might face substantial losses. Moreover, the working patterns of the stakeholders might get change with the newly developed communication strategy, resulting in affecting their existing communication procedure by a considerable level. 1.2 Illustration of the Information Flows Based on the provided case study, the information flows between the staff of Ellis & Co and their outside contacts can be determined in terms of credit checking procedure for new and existing customers. These have been illustrated in the following. For New Customers In relation to the information flow of credit checking procedure, initially, the customers come to Ellis & Co for clearing up their enquiries regarding credit. Then, the company checks in its database whether those customers are new or existing ones. If no information is obtained in relation to this aspect, then the customers are requested to pay certain credit for opening up a new account in the company’s database. Once the customers are registered with the company, then their requests are transferred to the company’s client service desk. A request is also forwarded to the company’s insurance providers for performing a credit check on the customers. If the customers avail the facility of credit check, then the client service will assist the key account manager to advice the customer and provide suggestions about alternate ways of making payment for goods. For Existing Customers In the case of existing customers, the company initially receives customers’ enquiry. After this, an account check of that customers are performed in the company’s database. Once the customers’ accounts are found to be active, the financial team of the company calculates the entire valuation of the customers’ requirement. It also checks out the available balance in the customer’s account. If their available credit is not sufficient, the key account manager will be notified, who will be discussing about the value of the left over credit against the calculated value of the order internally with the accounts team. After this, the finance team and the key account manager will decide the course of payment, offering necessary advice to the customers. 1.3 Discussuon and Evaluation of the Concerned Areas and the Existing Strengths From the provided case study, it can be apparently observed that there are certain areas of concern within Ellis & Co, which can be related with the occurrence of multiple faults in the operations amid the staff of the company. The first concerned area can be recognised as the customers’ credit checking process, which is considerably ineffective. The reason being that after the credit checking process gets over, the finance team needs to inform the credit insurance company about the credit confirmation, which again conveys the data to the sales team. This entire process is quite time consuming, making the customers to get irritated due to late attention provided to them. This eventually results in losing the sales of the company at large. The second concerned area is the key account managers’ inappropriate understanding about the excel worksheets while emphasising price management externally as well as internally. The third issue is about inappropriate exchange of information between important staff member due to lack of knowledge towards effective utilisation of excel worksheets. The fourth concerned area is about the ineffective utilisation of the ‘Buddy systems’, which is mainly enacted for facilitating effective customer orientation through partnering ‘Internal Sales Advisors’ (ISA) with external BDM’s. The system was enacted two years back and was not updated till date, which in turn hampered the business performance. As per the existing strengths are concerned, the company offers a training course on excel worksheets for supporting the staff members in improving their knowledge levels. 2. Strategy Formulation for Improvements Ellis & Co. is the global manufacturer of electrical cables and its products are being circulated throughout the global markets through various marketing channels. However, due to lack of proper communication channels, it has been apparently observed that the company was losing its huge volume of customers. Fundamentally, the company possessed four departments’ i.e. sales, finance, accounts and customer services departments, wherein the entire process of manufacturing and distributing was carried on efficiently. However, it was also found that there were improper communication channels or lack of cooperation and coordination between each of the departments, especially sales and finance department. Thus, looking into all these problems of Ellis & Co, it is suggested that the company must identify why the development of communication channels are of utmost important for any business and frame the strategies accordingly. The understanding of the importance of the communication channels within a particular organisation will help the company to design effective strategies in such a manner so that these will be effective in handling, processing along with communicating information within the site of Milton Keynes (Portsmouth City Council, 2012).. In this regard, the top-level managers of the company must pay utmost attention on the segregation of the roles as well as the responsibilities of various departments in the organisation. In precise, it can be affirmed that handling, processing and most vitally communicating information within the site of Milton Keynes can be developed through the introduction of a working environment wherein all the employers of various departments will work in a collaborative manner (United States Environmental Protection Agency, n.d.). In case of Ellis & Co, a major problem can be apparently observed that various departments of the organisation were not working under similar roof of the company. Justifiably, the three divisions of the sales department of the company were situated in different locations and also followed diverse work culture. Due to the following of varied work culture, the working and leadership style of the officials of the company was also differing. With regards to this problem, it can be suggested that the company must emphasize the merging of the departments into a single roof along with the introduction of a similar work culture. The similar work culture will certainly allow the development of proper and effective communication among the departments and the employees. The other strategy, which can be adopted by the company, is to bring together the finance and sales department within a similar environment and culture, so that there develops better coordination and cooperation amid the departments and the staff members. This will certainly make the decision-making ability of the managers of Ellis & Co more creative in solving the problem of customer loss. The loss in customer volume was caused due to the lack of coordination between the finance and sales department, which again resulted in delay in customer services. The credit business of Ellis & Co passes on from the finance department to the sales department, which was observed to be a lengthy process. Thus, with regards to this problem, it is suggestible that the company must focus on the improvement of work culture and promoting favourable work environment (Borough, 2014; Cheshire Fire & Rescue Service, n.d.). According to Jensen & et. al. (n.d.), communication is all about cooperation and coordination. According to this statement of Jensen & et. al. (n.d.), it can be affirmed that Ellis & Co. is in lack of developing proper communication channels as there was non-existence of cooperation and coordination among the hierarchical levels. On the other hand, the company must focus on the adoption of integrated technology so that it can improve its communication procedure through the use of effective technological appliances. It has been apparently observed in this regard that the employees of the company were not much acquainted with the use of excel worksheets. In this case, the use of technological advancement will be a beneficial tool. Ellis & Co can also improve its use of information and communication technologies for handling and processing of information internally, so that there grows the prevalence of proper communication channels among the employees and various operational departments. Communication must be looked as a coordinated effort between the employees with the intention of making the respective works more effective that perform by the officials of the company. Therefore, for the improvement in handling and processing of information between the departments of the organization, it is suggestible that the high-level hierarchy including the other staff members must create an environment of cooperation and coordination amid the employees. Apart from this, the top officials belonging to the company must adopt and execute advanced and integrated technological tools for making the communication process smooth and effective within the operational departments of the company (Jensen & et. al., n.d.). With the adoption of the aforementioned strategies, it is believed that Ellis & Co. can make greater enhancements in handling, processing along with communicating information within the site of Milton Keynes. 3. Proposed Methods The effectiveness of a newly developed strategy mainly depends on how good is its implementation process. As per the communication issue identified in Ellis & Co and the communication strategies formulated above as corrective measures, following are the methods through the company will be able to evaluate the effectiveness of the developed strategies in future. Conducing Staff Group Meetings As a measure of strategy evaluation, the management team of the company can periodically conduct staff meeting sessions, wherein the working staff can be asked to project their feedbacks on the functionality improvements that they experience. They can even be asked for improvement opinions that they see fit for mitigating the communication issues. This method seems to be very effective in determining the necessary improvements that are needed to be amended for obtaining optimal output (Preskill & Jones, 2009). Focus Group Meetings of the External Stakeholders External stakeholders that include wholesale dealers, distributors, retailers, installation teams and customers can be called up and make them to attend a focus group meeting in order to make discuss about the performance as well as the service improvements of the company. A discussion can also be held with them about the projection of their own reviews on the developed communication strategies that will be implemented for improving the internal works and customer service efficiency. This seems to be another effective way through which the company can evaluate the effectiveness of the communication strategies in future, as it is the external stakeholders who will be witnessing service improvements more as compared to the internal ones (Wilson, 2006; Hose, 2014). Continuous Monitoring of the Sales Figures Since the problem of losing sales due to ineffective communication within the sales and finance team of the company is already identified, thus it is quite important for the management team of the company to keep a tight supervision of its sales figures. This is another essential method, through which the company can evaluate the effectiveness of the communication strategies. The increase in sales figures will definitely prove the system and functionality improvement. Questionnaire Survey Method The management team of Ellis & Co can also provide open-ended service review questionnaires to the external stakeholders for obtaining their reviews and opinion feedbacks about the service, and customer handling efficiency (Henry Lester & Associates, LTD, n. d.). Quantitative Data Collection and Evaluation Since Ellice & Co already possesses a system for creating new and checking existing accounts for its customers before providing any sort of service to them, this can provide quantitative data to the management team of the company. The increase in the number of newly created accounts along with decreasing customer response time will certain project the improvement in communication system between the finance and sales department (Berkeley, n. d.; Office for National Statistics, n. d.). 4. Methods for Communicating the New Strategy Communicating strategy to the employees and work groups by the top-level management of a company is a vital task towards converting an improvement strategy into success. This forms the final stage of bringing about improvement. The communication message should be very clear and should also be backed up by strong objectives. There are multiple ways of communicating strategic plans to the staff members of an organization. The first method is direct face-to-face communication, which is a form of interpersonal communication approach (Vocate, 1994). The company can use this method as an effective way of elaborating the formulated strategic plan to the staff members. It will provide a clear understanding about the intentions for formulating such strategies. However, Ellis & Co require to segregate the entire workforce into small groups, instead of individual members before conducting such face to face communication sessions, as it might prove to be quiet time consuming (National Association of VOCA Assistance Administrators, n. d.). The second method of communicating the new strategy to the staff at the site of Milton Keynes can be the execution of email notification process. The top- level management of the company can easily forward messages to every workstation of the operational departments about the implementation of the ne communication strategy. This can even act as a two-way communication approach (National Association of VOCA Assistance Administrators, n. d.). The third way through which Ellis & Co can communicate the new strategy to the staff at the site of Milton Keynes is video conferencing presentation, which is a form of huge communication approach (Vocate, 1994). Through this way, the management of the company can convey the message to a huge portion of the workforce in limited time span (Salwen & Stacks, 1996; National Association of VOCA Assistance Administrators, n.d.). The fourth way can be conducting training sessions. This is also viewed as a form of huge group of communication approach, wherein the management can make the staff members of the sales and finance team to operate in artificially created scenarios. The fifth way through which the company can communicate the new strategy is website interactions wherein the details and the requirements for such strategy will be elaborated to the staff. The sixth way of informing staff members about the planned strategy is providing individual notices to every member of the finance and sales team (Salwen & Stacks, 1996; National Association of VOCA Assistance Administrators, n. d.). 5. Conclusion As per the above analysis and discussion, it can be explicitly understood that without bringing proper improvement in the communication process between the sales team and the finance team, it might become quite difficult for Ellis & Co to retain its existing customers and attract the newer ones. A customer’s interest about a product or service depends on multiple factors out of which response time is an essential one. With the increase in response time, the customer will become annoyed and finally the company can face huge losses in terms of sales. As already stated above, the company must concentrate its focus more on improving the response coordination between its sales team and finance team through proper training procedures if necessary. The above discussion also describe the need of a variety of communication approaches for addressing along with mitigating the communication issues that faced by the company. In this regard, the company can communicate the newly developed strategy to its staff members through the combination of interpersonal, small group, large group and public communication approaches. These communication approaches might significantly help the company in gathering data about the areas that caused the issues and the areas required to be improved. The company also need to focus on certain other important related issues such as deliverance of proper training to the staff members, ensuring that the company does not suffer any further loss. Thus, it can be concluded that the above discussed newly developed communication strategy would certainly aid Ellis & Co to solve the identified communication related issues and attain its predetermined business targets. 6. References Berkeley, No Date. Evaluation Methods. Tip Sheet, pp. 5 – 1- 5 – 2. Borough, S., 2014. Corporate Communications Strategy. Let’s talk, pp. 3-4. Bournemouth University, No Date. 6.1 Questionnaire Design and Coding. 6. Survey Methodology. [Online] Available at: http://www.cippm.org.uk/downloads/Survey%20Methodology.pdf [Accessed March 01, 2014]. Cheshire Fire & Rescue Service, No Date. 2. Context. Corporate Communications Strategy 2012-15. [Online] Available at: http://www.cheshirefire.gov.uk/Assets/1/Corporate%20Communications%20strategy%202012-15.pdf [Accessed March 01, 2014]. Fielding, M., 2005. Effective Communication in Organisations. Juta and Company Ltd. Henry Lester & Associates, LTD., No Date. Questioner Survey Method. Questioner Survey Method, pp. 1-2. Hose, C., 2014. How to Conduct Employee Focus Groups. Business Opportunity. [Online] Available at: http://smallbusiness.chron.com/conduct-employee-focus-groups-17420.html [Accessed February 28, 2014]. Jensen, C. & et. al., No Date. The Effect of Communication Modality on Cooperation in Online Environments. System Design, pp. 1-8. National Association of VOCA Assistance Administrators, No Date. Section 5. Communicate. Marketing the Strategic Plan, pp.5-4-5-5. Office for National Statistics, No Date. Quantitative evaluation of data collection methods. About ONS. [Online] Available at: http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/guide-method/method-quality/general-methodology/data-collection-methodology/services-available-from-dcm/quantitative-evaluation-of-data-collection-methods/index.html [Accessed February 28, 2014]. Preskill, H. & Jones. N., 2009. A Practical Guide for Engaging Stakeholders in Developing Evaluation Questions. Step 5: Select a stakeholder engagement strategy, pp. 19-20. Portsmouth City Council, 2012. Corporate communications strategy. 1. corporate communications, pp. 3-4. Salwen, M. B. & Stacks, D. W., 1996. An Integrated Approach to Communication Theory and Research. Psychology Press. United States Environmental Protection Agency, No Date. Communication Strategies. Required Activity. [Online] Available at: http://www.epa.gov/superfund/community/pdfs/toolkit/comstrats.pdf [Accessed February 28, 2014]. Vocate, D. R., 1994. Intrapersonal Communication: Different Voices, Different Minds. Psychology Press. Wilson, D., 2006. External Focus Groups Summary Report. External Focus Groups, pp.2-3 Read More