For every business, it is essential to follow a clear and effective strategy that corresponds to its vision. A balanced scorecard helps develop such a vision and strategy that would be the most beneficial for a firm. The concept of a balanced scorecard was created by Kaplan and Norton (1997) and implies the metric that estimates the company’s performance and reveals its weak and strong sides. The current paper reflects the strategy of the company that produces furniture and discusses how it should act to remain competitive in the global marketplace.
Businesses must pay attention to the cost structure, quality of production, satisfaction of clients, management development, and flexibility (Baldegger, 2012). The scorecard signifies that the company’s administration regards the perspectives of learning and growth, internal process, customer, and financial as interconnected. The first perspective means that the company is ready to change and improve if it helps achieve the set vision. To satisfy the customer, the company analyzes the demand and produces goods of high quality. The financial perspective implies that stakeholders would be pleased to support the company if they see that it manages to keep promises and satisfies the clients. Finally, the company should appear to customers as a strong player that answerable for the products and guarantees the quality at a reasonable price.
To remain competitive, any company should be innovative, recruit the most talented employees, and analyze the data on trends and consumers preferences. Thus, the company should anticipate consumer trends and invent such products, before the existence of which clients did not even know that they wanted it. Though it is somewhat risky, it would ultimately lead to success. Besides, highly qualified employees are the key to the creation of innovation and the prosperous existence of a company. Finally, the accurate analysis of the existing data would help understand if a company moves in the right direction or change its strategies.
In the previous research, it was concluded that one of the best markets for the company producing furniture is Hong Kong. It is supposed that the firm will be able to compete in this market in case if it develops competitive strengths that would differentiate this company from all others. This statement is based on the fact that even though this country is densely populated and presents a significant demand for the furniture, there are already a lot of other furniture companies that are relatively well-known. This way, the company will remain competitive if it, as it was said in the preceding paragraph, manages to be innovative and will take a vacant niche. For instance, it could focus on the production of multifunctional furniture of excellent quality that economizes space in a room.
One could retort that the company has no chances to sustain because the older firms will displace a competitor. Nevertheless, the company should target customers that prefer foreign companies to local ones. In this case, is they purchase a good from our firm, they would save a significant sum of money on delivery from overseas. Indeed, the company is highly likely to appear uncompetitive if it offers the identical goods and services at the same or more expensive price.
In the future, the global marketplace’s evaluation would involve the detailed investigation of trade legislation, the performance of potential partners, and the level of interest. Apart from this, before entering the global market, it is essential to accurately estimate its maturity and the extent of the company’s competitiveness since it might occur that the firm will be better off if it remains local.
References
Baldegger, R. (2012). Management in a dynamic environment. Springer Gabler.
Kaplan, R.S. & Norton, D.P. (1997). Balanced scorecard: Implementing strategies successfully. Schaffer-Poeschel.