Marketing Management and Leadership all documents about the criteria of the assignment case study.

Marketing Management and Leadership all documents about the criteria of the assignment case study.

Individual Case Study Report                                              90%

This element takes the form of an individual case study report and should be no longer than 4000 words in length.

It is designed to follow on from your filmed presentation and so it is important that the organisation you choose in your filmed presentation is the same one that you focus on in your written case study.

The way in which you choose to conduct your analysis is up to you. We would encourage the use of an opening argument and then the demonstration through research and analysis of your argument and a robust conclusion and bibliography with full citations. If you use interviews then you should attribute these accordingly.

You are required to introduce your report with an organisational summary of no more than 500 words (not weighted) covering the following background information into your chosen organisation:

• Organisation name
• Type of organisation for example whether it is B2B, B2C or a combination, along with 
details of the market sector in which it operates
• Size of the organisation in terms of turnover and/or the number of employees
• Details of the range of products and services provided
• Main competitors
• Any other information that you consider relevant to the assignment may also be included, in order to assist the examiner in understanding the context of your report

You will then have the full 4000 words to address the following:

Assessment Criteria

1. Demonstrates a clear understanding of the organisational structure, the marketing leadership and management structure, the organisation’s brand and brand culture. Explores how the brand’s current internal and external marketing including customer relations and sales exemplifies the brand culture (20%)
2. Critically evaluates the marketing and business challenges (insofar as they impact marketing) facing the organisation including the “health” of the organisation and prioritises them. Sets clear marketing/brand objectives for the organisation to address these challenges (20%)
3. Explores different creative/innovative marketing leadership and management approaches that the organisation might adopt in order to resolve the identified challenges and which will enable the organisation to achieve the objectives set (20%)
4. Identifies the steps needed to be taken by marketing leadership / management to implement the new approach within the organisation and to gain support from key internal stakeholders (e.g. Board/senior management) and business functions (e.g. HR / finance) (20%)
5. Explores the possible challenges/conflicts that as you as the “Marketing Champion” for these changes might face and considers steps you might take to mitigate those challenges including a critical evaluation and summary of your marketing led change management plan (20%)

RECOMMENDED READING AND STUDY SUPPORT

There is no one set text for this module.  Students are encouraged to make use of a range of sources to underpin and develop their thinking.  We have included a selection of texts below but you are not limited to these.

Armstrong, M. Armstrong’s Handbook of Management and Leadership: developing effective people skills for better leadership and management. London: Kogan Page.

Baker, M. Marketing Strategy and Management. Basingstoke: Palgrave

Capon, N. and Capon, R. Managing Marketing in the 21st Century. New

York: Wessex Publishing

CIM. Managing Marketing: Study Text. CIM Publishing and BPP Learning Media

Donaldson, B. and O’Toole, T. Strategic Marketing Relationships Chichester: John Wiley & Sons

Drucker, P. The Practice Of Management. Abingdon: Routledge Drucker, P. The Effective Executive. Abingdon: Routledge

Drummond, G. and Ensor, J. Strategic Marketing: Planning and Control. Oxford: Elsevier Butterworth Heinemann

Jobber, D. and Lancaster, G. Selling and Sales Management. London: Pearson Education Ltd

Kotler, P. Marketing 4.0: Moving From Traditional To Digital. New Jersey: John Wiley and Sons

Kotler, P. and Keller, K. Marketing Management. New Jersey: Pearson Education Ltd

Kotter, J.P. and Choen, D.S. The Heart Of Change. Harvard Business Review Press

Kourdi, J. (ed) The Marketing Century: How Marketing Drives Business and Shapes Society. Chichester: John Wiley & Sons

McDonald, M. and Mouncey, P. Marketing Accountability: How To Measure Marketing Effectiveness. London: Kogan Page

McDonald, M. and Wilson, H. Marketing Plans: How To Prepare Them, How To Use Them. Oxford: Butterworth-Heinemann

Mullins, L. Management and Organisational Behaviour. New Jersey: Pearson Education Ltd

Northouse, P.G. Leadership: Theory and Practice. London: Sage

Palmer, R., Cockton, J., and Cooper, M. Managing Marketing: Marketing Success Through Good Management Practice. London: Routledge

Ryals, L. and McDonald, M. Key Account Plans. Oxford: Elsevier Butterworth Heinemann

Wilson, R. and Gilligan, C. Strategic Marketing Management. Oxford: Elsevier Butterworth Heinemann

Journals:

There are a range of full text journals in marketing available via the online library including the Emerald and the Business Source Premier catalogues including:

European Journal of Marketing

Harvard Business Review

Journal of Leadership and Organisational Studies

Journal of Leadership Studies

Journal of Managerial Psychology

Journal of Marketing Management

Journal of Marketing

Journal of Personal Selling and Sales Management

Journal of Strategic Marketing
Strategic Direction

Further Report info:

This analysis will include the current organisational brand, the organisational culture, operational structure, the cross functional role and effectiveness of external and internal marketing, the approach to innovation and creativity, evaluation of the managerial/leadership performance including the CEO / leadership team, business development, process of change that the organisation has undergone in recent years (e.g. change in CEO / change in product focus / expansion / change in marketing approach), the role of L&D, the role of external marketing agencies / suppliers in facilitating change/innovation, the application and discussion of relevant management/academic theories in relation to the organisation. All these topics will be covered over the duration of the course so you will gain insight in how to conduct your analysis over the course of the year”

What the report is not is a random piece of market research on a topic of your choosing.  The report is an opportunity for you demonstrate your deep understanding of a contemporary management/leadership topic, which has to be supported with extensive fully referenced readings around that topic and your ability to apply that understanding to a particular organisation.

Further Clarification of requirements

“The context of the assessment is the student’s selection of a well known, contemporary UK / international organisation with active business in the UK. The student is required to provide an in-depth analysis of the way in which the chosen organisation has developed its leadership and management models in recent years. We want to keep the analysis contemporary so we encourage you to focus on approximately the past 5 years”(unique_solution)

Marking criteria are provided as below along with further clarification:

2.1. Situation analysis: (25 marks).

The first three learning outcomes can be considered to be part of an audit of the organisation in the context of its marketing environment, to include its leadership and management style i.e.

1. Demonstrates a clear understanding of the marketing leadership and management challenges facing the client (10)

2. Demonstrates a clear understanding of the organisation’s marketing environment (5)

3. Critically evaluates those challenges and prioritises them (10)

Considerations: ● Carry out research on the organisation to identify the major issues facing the organisation. To do this you will need to look at the overall marketing environment, identifying issues within the macro, micro and internal environments using frameworks such as PESTEL ● Suggest you include a SWOT in your answer and then pick out what you consider to be the major issues, no more than 10, explaining what the issues are, why they are important, then critically assess the implications of these issues.   ● Make sure that you support your comments with credible Harvard references and, where possible, give examples of the points that you’re making. ● Don’t confuse the construction of a SWOT with a discussion of the major issues, the difference being that the major issues are picked out from the SWOT as they are considered to be the most important issues which have been identified as part of the process of compiling the SWOT. Those issues are then discussed in depth ● Suggest that you prioritise one or two of those issues as key, and that it is these key issues which the report sets out to address

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2.2. Aims and objectives: (5 marks).

The situation analysis and the resulting key issues should lead on to the setting of management and leadership objectives, around which the rest of the report is based i.e.

4. Sets clear marketing objectives for the organisation, in the context of marketing (5)

Considerations: ● Formulating aims and objectives is one of the most important aspects of this report, because they determine the scope, depth and overall direction of your report.   ● Research aims specify exactly what is being studied and research objectives comprise a number of steps that address how the research aim will be achieved. As a rule of thumb they would normally be one major research aim and then several research objectives which explain in more detail what is being explored. ● Having prioritised one or two key issues around which you are basing the rest of your plan, you need to set clear marketing objectives but these are not marketing objectives in the traditional sense of, for example, market share, brand awareness etc. It’s recognising “marketing” is a wider discipline that delivers stakeholder satisfaction and solutions to challenges and opportunities identified in the marketing environment. ● In this context stakeholder satisfaction includes motivated and empowered employees, as well as cultures of innovation, which allows you to set objectives for the report/case study to explore relevant leadership and management and cultural models in the context of contemporary challenges identified within the wider marketing environment. ● So a typical “Marketing” aim in this report might be:

Research Aim(s): “To assess the effects of Virgin Atlantic organizational culture on business profitability.”

Then the marketing objectives might be to: o Analyze the nature of organizational culture at Virgin Atlantic  o Identify factors impacting Virgin Atlantic organizational culture  o Analyze the impacts of Virgin Atlantic organizational culture on employee performances o Provide recommendations to Virgin Atlantic strategic level management in terms of increasing the level of effectiveness of organizational culture

• Avoid choosing topics which are two broad, which is a common mistake. For example, an aim of the report to “analyse management and leadership practices” within the chosen organisation can be classified as too broad because the title fails to address which aspects of leadership practices, as leadership has many aspects such as employee motivation, defining purpose, ethical behaviour, change management, innovation, cultural practices etc

2.3. Strategic management and leadership options: (20 marks).

This is about demonstrating your understanding of contemporary concepts, theories and frameworks which you have learnt whilst studying this module and showing that you can apply relevant material in the context of the issues which you identified, the aims which you have set, the organisation you have chosen

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and the environment in which it operates. For example, a charity operates within a different environment to what a commercial organisation might

5. Explores different creative/innovative leadership and management approaches that the organisation might adopt in order to resolve the identified challenges and which will enable the organisation to achieve the objectives set (20)

Considerations:  ● Critically assess different contemporary leadership and management concepts and explore the relevance of those concepts to the situation which you have identified within your chosen organisation. ● Avoid the temptation to present a “shopping list” of concepts i.e. presenting too many concepts without providing the depth required at this level. ● As part of the discussion consider how these contemporary concepts may, or may not, address the issues which you identified in section 2.1 and might help achieve the aims and objectives set out in 2.2. ● Make clear recommendations about the changes that the organisation might need to make in order to implement your recommended approach, recommendations which need to be fully justified.

2.4. Implementation: (40 marks)

“Management and leadership planning undertaken without a means of integration with other functional areas of the business at general management level will be largely ineffective.” (McDonald 2016)

6. Identifies the steps needed to be taken to implement the new approach within the organisation and to gain support from key business functions. (20)

7. Explores the possible challenges that as you as the “Marketing Champion” for these changes might face and considers steps you might take to mitigate those challenges (10)

8. Critical evaluation of the effectiveness of your proposed change management plan (10)

Considerations: ● You need to identify the steps involved in constructing an internal marketing plan for the organisation and to do this you need to draw upon recognised conceptual material which you have researched ● As part of this internal marketing plan you need to identify the key cross functional business units that would need to be involved in delivering this internal marketing plan ● You also need to address the possible challenges which you, as the lead Marketing Champion, might face in implementing your recommendations and executing your internal marketing plan. As part of this process you also should consider steps that might mitigate those challenges.  It’s important to recognise that any changes to the organisations approach to management and leadership will be contentious and you need to draw therefore upon contemporary change management theory to help identify those challenges and the steps taken to reduce their effect

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• Finally, any plan these to be measured in terms of its effectiveness, as key stakeholders will be looking for this, so you need to be making recommendations as to how you might show how your plan might be measured and to discuss the evidence that you might look for to show increased effectiveness of its management and leadership style

Structuring your report:

• Title page ● Contents page ● Intro to the organisation and executive summary (up to 500 words additional to word count) ● Key issues facing the organisation ● Aims and objectives ● Leadership and management approaches ● Implementation process ● Implementation challenges ● Measuring change ● Bibliography ● Organisational summary (one page, using guidelines set, additional to word count)

Magic formula:

The ‘magic formula’ has been developed to facilitate a standardised approach to teaching and marking assessments, with the relative weightings of these elements used to inform different grades within a level and to differentiate between levels. The significance being that examination question papers, assignments and marking schemes are written with these weightings in mind. It  comprises four elements: ● Concept i.e. knowledge of relevant concepts, theories and frameworks   (30%) ● Application i.e. relating those concepts, theories and frameworks to different scenarios and business settings, which requires making and demonstrating associations between concepts according to set criteria (30%) ● Evaluation i.e. assessment of a course of action against a standard or set of objectives, requires justifying actions, reviewing whether the course of action taken was the right one and assessing whether resources have been used effectively (30%) ● Presentation i.e. format, presentation, evidence of wider reading, understanding of contemporary issues and Harvard referencing (10%)

Command words:

Pay close attention to the command words being used each question as they indicate both the level of depth required and also the style of writing expected. Also marks are allocated in line with the command words being used. So for example: ● Identify means that you are required to provide detailed information in the context of the question being asked ● Explore means that you should provide an in-depth discussion of a topic looking at different perspectives about the same issue ● Consider means that you should write in an objective way, presenting a clear argument in the pursuit of a certain outcome