This week, you will construct a response to one of your fellow learners based on their assessment of a company for the Unit 1 Discussion Assignment essay. Your professor will pair you with a learner that posted a Discussion Assignment essay in Unit 1 by posting an announcement with a list of names. You will work with your fellow learner throughout this Discussion. You may only work with the learner your professor pairs you with for this Discussion activity using the following criteria:
- Evaluate the business strategy essay your fellow learner (see below) posted on the Unit 1 Discussion Board. Create a written response (250 word minimum) debating the facts related to business strategy.
- Identify the pro’s of your fellow learner’s assessment of the strategy concepts.
- Using a minimum of one peer-reviewed research resource, build on the knowledge in your fellow learner’s essay.
- Identify the con’s of your fellow learner’s assessment of the strategy concepts.
- Using a minimum of one peer-reviewed research resource, explain the strategy concepts your fellow learner might have missed covering in their essay.
Fellow Learner Essay:
Momentum Group is a company that is listed as a Baldrige Award Winning Company for their excellence in textiles. This organization is based out of Irvine California and was established in 1994. Having started out in California, they have grown to have warehouses in North Carolina and Michigan as well as showrooms in Illinois, New York, and Texas. They started out as a small textile manufacturing company but have grown to be a leader in commercial interiors industry. They design for architectural and design firms and commercial furniture manufactures. In the past 20 years, their sales have grown over 400%. They have prided themselves in how they recycle what they can to try and reduce their carbon footprint and give back where they can (National Institute of Standards and Technology, 2017).
The vision of Momentum Group is to be the undisputed leader in innovative and sustainable contract textiles (National Institute of Standards and Technology, 2017). In the textbook, it states that the vision statement should be graphic, forward-looking, focused, have wiggle room to be adjusted, feasible accomplishments, and memorable. The vision statement should not be vague, dwell on the present, be too broad, generic, and not be too long (Thompson, 2018). The vision statement of Momentum group seems very generic and says very little about the direction that they are trying to take to become an undisputed leader. It does not seem memorable even though it is trying to let people know what they want to become in the future.
The main focus on creating objectives is to try and turn a company’s mission and vision statements into performance targets. This helps for the company to focus organizational attention serve as a type of yardstick for keeping track of performance, and to motivate employees (National Institute of Standards and Technology, 2017). The Momentum Group has many strategic and financial objectives they want to strive for, however it is not the only objectives they take into consideration. They also look for objectives in their vision, consumer, and people/culture. When they put objectives into place, they consider short term goals as 1 to 2 years and long-term goals based on 3 to 5 years. They use the SWOT analysis in planning their objective in a 7-step process (National Institute of Standards and Technology, 2017). One of the main strategic objectives is to reduce their environmental impact. Momentum group has an strategic objective to make every product GREENGUARD certified as well as holding up to ACT standards as well. They have hit both of their goals converting all of their products to 100% reduction in environmental impact by 2014 which was a year earlier than they had planned. Their strategic goal of surpassing the competition has also been met. They have financial objectives to reduce improve yield per yard by 20%. Their main financial objective, however, is to perform through revenue growth per product, which they have every year except on 2011 from the 9/11 attack (National Institute of Standards and Technology, 2017).
The mission statement is created to describe the organization’s current business and purpose. It is supposed to describe who the organization is, what they do, and why they are here (Thompson, 2018). Momentum Group’s mission is to create textiles that not only inspire, but to always create great work for their clients. Their mission also states that they are not only committed collectively, but also individually to try and give superior service and contract textiles that are sustainable (National Institute of Standards and Technology, 2017). They have efficiently described in their mission statement what they are trying to accomplish and how they are trying to accomplish it.
The Momentum Group has earned many awards over the past two decades. They have won several awards in their product such as Interior Design of the Year, Good Design Award, and the Green Good Design Award to name a few. When it comes to corporate, they have won awards such as The Malcom Bridge National Quality Award, Best Places to Work Award, America Graph Design Award, the Best Practices Award, and the Vision award. They use and Aggravation Index within the company which is a compilation of the performance measures that are used within the company. It gives management a way to track the level of dissatisfaction of customers in order to be able to proactively fix the issue to reduce the number of complaints. Inside sale agents are trained to help rectify the issue for the customer first before investigating what the issue is (National Institute of Standards and Technology, 2017).
Momentum Group have many core values they stand by. They believe in fairness, honesty, and respect not only within their organization, but in all interactions. They also value advancing and developing their employees to strive for excellence. They stand by bettering the world and try to reduce bad experiences for consumers. They also strive to increase their shareholder value all while trying to continuously improve their product and customer service (Momentum Group, 2019). The core values of this organization are realistic. They started a Quality Process Improvement System to help in areas of leadership, problem-solving, as well as provide their employees with quality training. With their mission to reduce their carbon footprint, they have created products that are more friendly to the environment. Their employee’s average tenure is being employed for more than 10 years. 73% of their promotions have come from job rotations and succession planning (National Institute of Standards and Technology, 2017).
Sustainable Competitive Advantage is a strategy that an organization uses to gain a competitive advantage over their competitors. It is done by making customers feel that they are getting superior value and customer service in areas such as quality, price, delivery, and service (Thompson, 2018). There are several ways that Momentum Group has set themselves apart by their competitors. They have introduced more products each year than their competitors. Their products are more innovative and sustainable than others. They offer product lines per the market to keep customers engaged, which none of their competitors have taken this approach. They also try to exceed customer’s expectations by providing innovative first products solutions help provide best solutions for the consumer (National Institute of Standards and Technology, 2017). By using the strategy of providing the consumers with an environmental friendly product while giving the consumer more choices and better customer service, Momentum Group can continue to be the leader in their market.
References
Momentum Group. (2019). Who We Are. Retrieved from Momentum Group: https://www.memosamples.com/about_momentum_group.s…
National Institute of Standards and Technology. (2017). 2017 Baldridge Award Recipient Momentum Group Summary. Retrieved from National Institute of Standards and Technology: https://www.nist.gov/sites/default/files/documents…
National Institute of Standards and Technology. (2017, June 6). Momentum Group. Retrieved from National Insititute of Standards and Technology: https://www.nist.gov/baldrige/momentum-group
Thompson. (2018). Crafting & Executing Strategy: The Quest for Competitive Advantage 21st ed.McGraw-Hill ISBN: 9781259732782.