Strategic Audit Of Apple: A Comprehensive Approach Term Paper Samples

1.Company Selection: An Argument

Question 1

Answer: Apple remained a leading innovating force in the technological industry when Steve Jobs was alive and professionally engaged as well. He was significantly committed towards the well-being of his commercial child, but his demise had catastrophic consequences for the company because it became rudderless in innovational terms. The replacement of Jobs could not continue the winning streak that his predecessor established in the previous years and even decades. The best leader who the industry has known so far was an orphan, and therefore, he had developed a craze of proving his professional capabilities on a regular basis. He did not have any educational degree that could have provided him with the sense of contentment in life. However, he had significant skills that helped him in terms of gaining developmental grounds as an effective leader.
The organizational structure of Apple was coincidental with the personality of Steve, but after his death, the company lost the ability to develop successful, innovative and inventive products, and its market share suffered a great deal recently because the competitors learned and applied the methods of Jobs in order to gain competitive ground in the industry. The leaders of Apple engaged in organizational changes that introduced a trend of bureaucracy that killed the notion of innovation because the employees did not have the freedom to contribute toward the product developmental process, and they initiated to miss their deceased leader. The job turnover levels are notably growing in the organization as well so there is a need to study the basic and fundamental reasons that played some kind of role in causing the partial demise of an innovative giant.
2.Evaluating Apple’s Board of Directors

Tim Cook

Tim Cook is an active member of the board, and he is holding the office of the company’s Chief Executive Officer as well. Before landing a job of managerial leader at Apple, he was performing the function of Chief Operating Officer, his duties involved managing sales globally, and therefore, he had the courage to make things appear possible when they look as if they were impossible. Prior to joining the iPhone maker, Cook served at Compaq in the capacity of Vice President, Corporate Materials, and he was to retrieve supplies for the company. In his present job, he is bringing the element of energy and commitment to Apple.

Angelina Adhrendis

Angelina Adhrendis is responsible for managing online stores and marketing operations of the company. She reports directly to the Chief Executive Officer. She renovated the sales model of the company, and she reached the loyal customers of Apple through creation and empowering of online sales stores. The milestones that Adhrendis achieved are Genius Bar, personal setup and personalized training sessions with the design to help the customers regarding installment and usage of technology as well.

Eddy Cue

Eddy Cue is managing the online stores of Apple, he is creating a significant percentage of organizational sales globally, and he is handling the facilities such as itunes, and other online stores.

Craig Federighi

Craig Federighi works as Vice President, Software Engineering, and he is responsible for keeping various operating systems of the company up and running. He is considered to have the most innovative position because he had to debug and create new versions of iOS, OS X and Apple’s common operating platform as well. He rejoined Apple during 2009, and gave the company a boost as he created a flexible operating system that is known as OS X.

Jonathan Ive

Jonathan Ive, Senior Vice President of the design department and his function is to design the products of the company in physical terms. His team is considered as the leader at what they do in the entire industry with global reach.

Luca Maestri

Luca Maestri, Chief Financial Officer works in order to generate and publish financial literature of the company, he makes key financial decisions, and he orchestrates the cost structure of the company.

Dan Roccio

Dan Roccio, Vice president, hardware engineering engages in order to create new technical equipment that houses the technology produced by the company. The hardware design needs to be changed according to the recent digital developments, and therefore, his department has to work with the department headed by Craig Federighi.

Philip Schiller

Philip Schiller, Vice President of Worldwide Marketing, has the duty to promote and launch the new and existing products of the company. He became the part of Apple once again during 1997, and he played a significant role in upbringing the evolutionary measures of developing iPod, and the iTunes store as well. He is currently working in close proximity to Angelina who is responsible for introducing newness in the sales department of the company.

Bruce Sewell

Bruce Sewell, General Counsel for Legal and Governmental Affairs manages legal and administrative issues, and he works directly underneath the position of CEO. He signed up at Apple after leaving Intel Corporation in 2009, and nowadays, he is working to operate the legal side of Apple.

Jeff Williams

Jeff Williams is the Vice President of Operations, and he fulfills the responsibility of synergizing all of the services’ aspects, and he creates the organizational balance that usually has a crucial value in the puzzle of creating organizational success on the strategic level.

Paul Deneve

Paul Deneve is a Vice President, Special Projects that lead to new product development that revalidates the competitive advantage of Apple in the most dynamic industry of the world. Paul is working in order to carry out the process of research and development in simpler terms.

Lisa Jackson

Lisa Jackson, Vice President, Environmental Initiatives operates at a civic level, and she is not influenced by the economic stand of the company much, she presented and partially implemented the notions of renewable, and green energy while keeping the focus on enhancing the efficiency in the key offices owned by Apple worldwide.

Joel Podolny

Joel Podolny, Dean of Apple University has worked at Yale School of Management, and gathered academic expertise in the field of sociology, management, and academic research while serving as a professor at Harvard from 2002 to 2005. The academician is working to provide the company with highly trained employees in various professions.

JohnySrouji

JohnySrouji, Vice President of Hardware Technologies is rather engaged in order to support the coherent development of software and hardware of technological products so that there remains a harmony in between both aspects of the marketed offerings.

Denise Smith

Denise Smith, VP for worldwide Human Resources, works to recruit and select people in order to meet the increasingly dynamic employment needs of the company. She served the company for more than a decade, and she contributed massively towards the creation of Apple’s retailing force.
All of the top management of the company had major corporate experience under their belts, and they have proven to the world that they not only have creativity, but they can also translate it into practical products and services. The only problem lies in the role of CEO who cannot replace the former one, Steve Jobs because both of them are quite different in their personal attributes. Jobs was intuitive, but Cook is methodological in nature. He has to follow Jobs’ ways in order to make the company click again.

EFAS, IFAS, SFAS, TOWS Matrices for Apple

Businesses cannot make decisions in the dark, and therefore, they have to follow the course of scientific method in order to devise a detailed strategic plan that will allow the companies to align their internal resources along with their organizational culture with the external needs of the industry. The organizations have to form a proper linkage with the external environment, and the most valuable player in this regard would be the customer to say the least. The companies should have an adequate idea and information about the active and dormant needs and wants of the clientele that they are intended to serve. However, Apple is either lethargic in terms of responding to the outside world, and with the innovative spirit dying, the company is facing countless and numerous problems . The ways of strategic management will allow the managerial levels working in various fields of life to evaluate their standpoint with reference to the external atmosphere. Additionally, the process of strategic management generates suggestive results, and then, the managers have to pick and choose what they can and cannot do from the list of suggested strategic actions. The inventive managers do not like the idea of following the guidelines precisely. They tend to modify them in order to add the element of surprise so that the competitors cannot respond immediately. The art of war has its basis in the notorious concept of deception, and therefore, the strategists have to develop their plan of game by entertaining the fact that they are indeed playing a game of chess. They have to continue guessing the moves of their opponent on regular basis. According to Steve Jobs, one should always carry the courage to listen to his or her heart, and he did that in order to help the company in reaching the heights of organizational history. The death of its founder affected the organizational culture and structure in more than one way, and therefore, this paper will develop various types of matrices in order to accomplish its abovementioned goals and objectives. At the same time, this document will produce a list of strategic choices that the company has regarding development of uncanny ability to respond to the challenges that are currently confronting.

Internal Factor Analysis Matrix

The internal factors of the company pack the weapons and means that an organization can apply in order to respond to the external environment of the industry. Here is the IFAS Matrix pertaining to the current strategic outlook of the Apple: -
The strengths and weaknesses of the company interact in such a way that gives the organizational a compromised look at a strategic level, and therefore, intensive makeover is needed. The company is having a history of following innovation as a religious value, but it has recently lost its touch and way in this regard as well. Apple has not been listening to the word of their customers, and therefore, the inventive approach towards marketing is required in order to revolutionize the culture of the company. Apple had a structure that was flattened enough to facilitate communication and teamwork across the whole organizational setup, but nowadays, the new management is tearing apart the whole identity of the innovator to introduce the trend of bureaucracy that promises one thing and one thing only to destroy the spirit of entrepreneurship. The innovation is the driving force behind technology industry, and with limited ability to bring newness into the market, the companies are destined to be doomed. In the current perspective, the Apple is on the road of damnation because it is not listening to the customers, the innovative vengeance is down, and the structure is becoming rigid with the passage of time. All of the discussed factors contribute towards one inevitable outcome that is creation of organizational culture that will eventually fail to cope with externalities of the market.

External Factor Analysis

External Factors are as important and valuable as the internal ones, and therefore, their study is imperative as well. Following is the EFA Matrix for the Apple: -
The competitive forces are sheer in the industry of hardware and software. The competitive landscape is intensive, and therefore, the industry is showing an environment aligned with red sea philosophy of market dynamics. The turnover rate in the company is growing as well, and the companies are leading the show in the industry where Apple once crowned as a leader. The former Chief Executive Officer, Steve Jobs led the company with extraordinary energy and he developed his own understanding and operationality of leadership. He invariably revitalized the charismatic school of thought in the changing world of technology. However, the threats are internal that the featured commercial entity is facing are more of internal nature rather than having external one. The company in the given circumstances needs the impartial consultant because the behavioral problems are significant in the prevalent social order of the company so they require a logical and non-influential analytical report that can provide the basis for strategic plan that the company will follow in the future. The employees are leaving because they do not find their work at Apple fulfilling and satisfactory so they started to hunt down new, interesting, and lucrative opportunities in the market.

SO Strategies for Apple

The innovative spirit remained a defining attribute of Apple in all these years. The company has to reestablish the culture of newness and invention once again, if it is ever interested in the redevelopment of Steve’s ways in order to give hopeless employees with faith to have good times once again.

WO Strategies

There are intensive structural and cultural changes required before the company will grow the capability to avail existing opportunities in the market. Firstly, the human resource management has to take a lead in order to hire employees with progressive mindsets that can readily accept the notion of innovative thinking.

ST Strategies

The strengths of the company need to be put to use to remind the clientele that the Apple did not forget the golden principle of offering novelties to the customers, but they were busy in realigning itself after going through tragic death of Steve “the champion” Jobs. The message of upcoming products should be advertised as early as possible.

WT Strategies

The flattening of structure is also recommended because the base for every problem is leading toward one underlying problem. The underlying problem is simple because the current organizational setup is not conducive in the direction of letting people follow their hearts. Steve Jobs was not a magician, but he had the courage to thrust confidence in his employees. However, creation of confidence and empowerment is what the company has lost recently.
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Strategic Factor Analysis Summary

Following is the total summary of all the matrices produced in the preceding sections: -
This portion has a literally design that highlighted the issues that the Apple is confronting in the prevalent times. The only strategic course the company can really follow is involving the notion of innovation that recently died out because the leadership failed to understand the vision of Steve Jobs, and in order to make the system understandable, they destroyed it all. The management has to make some painful decisions in this regard as well. However, they might have to use multidimensional approach in order to gain the notable fruits of the change initiative proposed by this work. The company has to right-size itself according to the needs mentioned throughout this document. Secondly, the company has to empower the workers as well so that the sense of confidence and empowerment can be seeded in them. The leadership of Apple is trying to reinvent the wheel, and they are attempting to innovate with the most innovative organizational setup known to the world. The personality of Steve Jobs was the greatest asset at the disposal of the company, and the ways of Steve is going to save the organization because employees and customers are driving away from the organization because they are missing its founder more than anyone in the present. The leadership philosophy argues that the leading skills can be honed by observing and imitating the behaviors of successful ones.

Financial Statement Analysis: Commonsize Analytics

Liabilities & Shareholders' Equity
This part of the research project will analyze different aspects of the Apple’s financial outlook and determine the overall fiscal health of the company. Following are the common size balance sheet and income statement as well. In the later section various financial ratios will be calculated in order to receive a clearer picture of the situation. The abovementioned gigantic table shows common size balance sheet of the company for past five years, and the following tabular structure develop a similar income statement for last four years,

Conclusion

The company is in dire circumstances because it is facing competitive forces from all over the world, and therefore, its innovative tendencies are dying out with the passage of time. The company’s recent gearing ratio is spiking because its low strategic performance is causing the organization to appear untrustworthy in the eyes of investors, and the outstanding shares are dropping in number as well. The fewer shares are pointing out that there are less investors interested in keeping their money with the top technological innovator and inventor of the past. The liability and expense side of balance sheet and income statement is gaining on the counter-side, and therefore, the company is surviving from preying on its goodwill and economies of the scale. However, the company requires constant and effective innovation in order to ensure lacking organizational effectiveness.

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