Chapter 14: The International Business Plan Flashcards
Steps in the planning cycle
1. Step 1: Defining the Mission Statement
○ The mission statement describes the firm’s primary purpose, its direction and what management expects to accomplish. It explains what the company does and what needs the company fills. These objectives should be expressed in a concise manner to ensure they are clearly and quickly understood.
- Step 2: Defining the current status of the business
○ This step involves preparing a comprehensive summary of everything that is significant about current operations. A skills audit is a component of this and may include:
§ Language capabilities
§ Existing contacts and personal relationships
§ Summary of ability to handle tasks associated with new international business opportunities
§ Recent in-market travel experience
§ Experience with logistics and documentary requirements
- Step 3: Determining corporate strategy
○ The results achieved in the second step enable planners to identify ways of improving the company’s performance and to build those into the plan. The planners can use their planning tools to test various scenarios and devise an optimal corporate strategy
- Step 4: Identifying international opportunities
○ Once an optimal domestic strategy has been articulated, planners can use the results to identify promising international business opportunities
- Step 5: Revising the Business plan
Once one or more potentially attractive ventures are identified, they should be incorporated into the overall corporate plan. The plan itself should be adjusted to accommodate any impacts on the existing business arising from the proposed international transactions.
Assembling International Business Plan Components
- corporate structure
- corporate history
- strategic objectives
- description of top management and key staff
- description of business
- market analysis
- product evaluation
- competitor analysis
- human resources
- suppliers
- current financial performance
- financial forecasts
- financing strategy
- corporate structure
Ownership, management, divisions, key assets
-corporate history
Foundations, key milestones, awards, major changes
- strategic objectives
Mission statement,, short-and long-term objectives, timetable
- description of top management and key staff
Names, positions, qualifications, contributions, job-output measures
- description of business
Industry served, customer base, assets, operations
-market analysis
Market location, size, characteristics, trends, opportunities
-product evaluation
Features, advantages, life cycle, replacement, extension
-competitor analysis
Number, size, market share, advantages, disadvantages
- human resources
Number of employees , skills levels, performance gaps, development programs
- suppliers
Functional areas, supplier relationships, replaceability
- current financial performance
Sales, gross and net income, financial goals, achieved , trends
- financial forecasts
Sales projections, income forecasts, cash flow forecasts, profit forecasts
-financing strategy
• Financing needed
Sources of financing
Planning:
- Market size
- recent/future trends
- specific segments/products
- imports
- customers and what they care about
- purchasing
- influencing factors
- competitors
- competing products/services
- emerging opportunities
- sales techniques
- sources of market intelligence
- sources of marketing assistance
- regulatory framework
-Market size
- In absolute dollars
* As a percentage of the economy
-recent/future trends
- Growth or contraction
- Technological changes
- Likely future developments
- specific segments/products
- Description of segment
- Size of the market for the product
- Current and future trends
-impact of imports
- Volume
- Value
- As a percentage of the total market
-customers and what they care about
- Ideal customer profile and characteristics
- Income levels
- Spending on the sector or product
- Priorities
- Preferences
- Price, features, quality timeliness, service , other factors
- purchasing
- Purchasing decision makers
- Reasons for making purchases
- Channels through which purchasing is conducted
-influencing factors (influencing buyers)
- Cultural characteristics
- Level of development
- Religion
- Attitude to foreign products
- Consumerism
- Fashion
- Poiltical attitudes
- Social consciousness
- Technology
- Importance of the buyer
- Seller relationship
- competitors
- Names
- Countries of origin
- Description (background, resources, strategies)
- Annual global revenues
- Employees worldwide
- In-market employees
- In-market sales
- Annual sales in this sector
- Market share
- Strengths and weaknesses
-competing products/services
- Product or service names and descriptions
- Features relative to our offerings
- Price comparisons with alternative offerings
- Share of the market
-emerging opportunities
- By product and service
- Prospects and forecasts
- Emerging trends
- Special projects
- Government procurement
- New market entrants
-sales techniques
- Distribution channels
- Available promotional techniques
- After sales service
-sources of market intelligence
- Own government resources
- Target government resources
- Customers
- Sector specialists
- Intermediaries
-sources of marketing assistance
- Professional marketers
- Agents and distributors
- Media representatives
- Consultants
- regulatory framework
- Customs and tariffs
- Quotas and import restrictions
- Health and safety regulations
- Environmental regulations
- Hiring standards
- Technical standards
- Corporate law
- Incorporation
- Taxations
- Investment and partnering
