UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT DALLAS

SCHOOL OF MANAGEMENT

BA4305 SECTION 001

SOCIAL AND POLITICAL ENVIRONMENT OF BUSINESS
Spring 2005
Tuesdays and Thursdays 09:30-10:45
SM 1.110

Instructor: Ekin Alakent

Office: SM 4.410
Phone: 972-883 4481
E-mail: exa025000@utdallas.edu
Office hours: Tuesdays and Thursdays 10:45-11:45
Web page: www.utdallas.edu/~exa025000 Check the web page regularly!!!
Text Book: Strategic Management: Creating Competitive Advantages Dess, G. G.
and Lumpkin G. T.. McGraw Hill (Text & Cases – 1st edition)

Course Objectives: The emphasis of this course is on developing a general understanding

of the administration of business firms from the point of view of top management. The
course emphasizes application of theory-based knowledge to real world situations through
the use of lecture and case studies. The course is divided into discussions of:
1. the role of strategic management
2. analyzing the industry and macro environment
3. analyzing the internal resources of the organization
4. corporate strategies
5. business-level strategies
6. implementation of strategic decisions

By the end of the course, you should have an understanding of how strategic issues are
framed, the range of generic strategic decisions that are faced by most organizations, and
how some of the concepts learned in other classes (i.e., NPV, breakeven analysis, ratio
analysis, etc.) can generate information used for strategic problem solving.

Class Format: This class is structured differently from other classes you have taken.
There is an emphasis on using case analysis as a way of practicing your business thinking
skills, your oral presentation skills, as well as your writing skills. The goals of this class
are 1) to learn about strategy and 2) help you make the transition from education to work.
Because of this, professionalism and integrative thinking are emphasized. Our use of
cases provides a mechanism to help students learn skills and techniques associated with
oral presentations and written briefs. These skills can often make the difference between
getting and keeping a job and losing one.

Most strategic issues are non-routine and unstructured. This is your opportunity to use
what you have learned in lecture and other classes to solve problems presented in the

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case. The quality of the case analysis usually determines the quality of the solutions.
The primary responsibility for the quality of the case analysis comes from the student
participants.

Grading Grading Scale:

Mid-term 20% 99-100 A+

95-98 A
90-94 A-
Case Analyses (3) 15%
87-89 B+
Group Project
84-86 B
Presentation 10%
80-83 B-
Report 15%
77-79 C+
(including peer evaluations)
Final Exam 30% 74-76 C
Participation & daily assignments 10% 70-73 C-
67-69 D+
64-66 D
60-63 D-
Below 60 F

Individual Case Analyses (15%):

You will be assigned 3 case-write-ups (5 pages, double spaced, excluding the references
and appendices). You can choose any case except the one that you will present as a
group. The deadline for each case analysis is the date it is presented in the class. Case
write-ups will be read and graded by a writing tutor separately apart from me. You need
to turn-in two hard copies, one for me, one for the writing tutor. I will grade your report
for content and the tutor will grade it for grammar, punctuation and writing style. You
need to get a passing grade from both of us in order to pass this course. The tutor will
grade your report from 1-10 and any assignments receiving 6 or less will be rewritten. If
you can’t get the sufficient score on any write-up you can not pass this course. If you do
not return your re-write, it is your responsibility.
Your write-ups should include brief overview of the case, description of the
problem, industry analysis, business analysis, alternative solutions to the problem
and your own solution. Please spare equal space for each part. Do not forget to include
references. You do not need a cover page.
Writing Tutor
LaVada Strickland
E-mail: lavadaas@aol.com,
Phone: 214-477-0621
Office hours: 4:45pm to 6:45pm Monday and Wednesdays in the library at one of
the open tables in the front area.

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Exams (50%):
There will be one midterm (20%) and one final exam (30%). You are responsible for all
the material covered in the class including class discussions. Exams will be a mix of
multiple choice and short essays. Detailed information will be given in prior classes to
the exams.

Group Project (35%):

1) Group Report: You need to form groups of 5-6 and prepare a written
analysis and submit a 15 pages of doubles spaced report on one of the
cases that is in the syllabus. I want you to go beyond the material in the
book and incorporate current information into your report. You can
refer to the guideline in Chapter 13 for additional sources. You need to
make copies for yourself since I will keep the original copy for my self.
Due date for all the reports and presentation is the class session when
that case is assigned in the syllabus. For example if your group is
responsible for “Jay’s Foods LLC” you need to turn in your report and
do your presentation on the 3rd of February. All of the group members
will receive the same raw grade from your report however, you will
grade each other based on your contribution to the team work. This
grade will affect your final report grade. You need to contribute equally
to all the work.

2) Case Presentations: Almost every Thursday we will have case

presentations. You will present your case in one those classes as a
group. Oral presentations should be approximately 20 minutes in length
with approximately a 10 minutes discussion period. The oral
presentation will count 10% of the assignment grade. You need to turn
in your report at the class date you are presenting. All of you should
contribute equally since you will get separate grades from the
presentation.

Participation and class assignments (10%):

Participation is very important for this class. You need to contribute to the lectures and
case discussions. Quality of class contributions will be weighted more heavily than
quantity. Frequent and valuable participants are who attend most of the classes,
participate regularly in every class attended, and at least make one significant
contribution in each class attended. In addition, you will be assigned some assignments
for some of the classes, you need to do those assignments in order to ensure a good grade
on participation. You need to bring nameplates to every class.

Class Policies

Absences/Make-ups: There are no excused absences from the exams without a written
excuse from a doctor or the academic dean. If there is a serious scheduling conflict, it is
your responsibility to let the instructor know well in advance. No work will be accepted

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after the date that it is due. Exams and case analyses can be turned in earlier than the
designated dates with written excuses, but not later.

Honor Code Information: No case write-ups, exams, or student's notes from current or
previous business school students should be consulted in doing your case analysis. You
can, however, consult your notes and reading materials as well as information in the
library. Any material quoted directly or paraphrased should be referenced in your written
and oral cases. Plagiarism is a serious infraction and will be dealt with accordingly.

INFORMATION FOR CASE ANALYSIS:

1. Your position is that of a business consultant team to the chief executive officer of the
company. You have been hired to do a strategic analysis of the company and the
industry using case materials, library research, electronic data sources, and tools
suggested by the text. The goal is to determine what direction the company should
take and make specific recommendations about what the company should do next and
why. Sometimes the printed case will call attention to certain problems that exist and
other times you’ll be on your own to determine problem areas.

In all of your presentations you should be addressing the company (i.e. “This is what
YOU should do.” Not “This is what THEY should do.”) The basic question is “What
must this company do to improve it’s performance in the long run?”

2. Identify the current position of the company using concepts from Chapter 2 and
information from the library and electronic resources.
• What is its current strategy to compete in the industry?
• What are the key characteristics of the industry and the industry competitors?
• What forces shape the industry?
• Identify key threats and opportunities that exist in the environment.

3. Identify the internal characteristics of the company. What gives the firm an
advantage over its competitors? Use concepts from Chapter 3 as well as information
from the case and your research to understand this.
• What are the tangible and intangible resources that the firm has?
• How does the financial strength of the firm stack up against other firms in the
industry? Other potential competitors?
• What core capabilities and core competencies give the firm a competitive
advantage?
• Is the competitive advantage sustainable over time? Is it valuable, inimitable,
rare, hardly substitutable, and organizationally exploitable? (VIRO analysis
from Ch.3.)
• Identify the key strengths and weaknesses apparent from your internal
analysis.

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 • How do the strengths and weaknesses compare to the threats and opportunities
apparent in the environment?

4. From the analysis above, identify the KEY STRATEGIC ISSUE or PROBLEM the
company must face. To what extent will this key issue affect or be affected by the
current strategic orientation of the company. Is there a problem with the current
strategy? Should it be changed? Or does the problem concern how well the company
is implementing a strategy that should work? The strategic orientation of the
company can be identified as:
• Business Level Strategies: Low cost, differentiation, or focus (See Chapter 4
in the text.) These categories are broad and you should be able to discuss
specific tactical strategies that fall into the categories.
• If you embark upon a strategy, what is the probability that a competitor will
respond? How will they respond? (See Chapter 5 in the text.) How should
your company respond to the competitor?
• Corporate Level Strategy: Related or Unrelated Diversifications are strategic
categories. Under these broad categories are decisions to emphasize one
industry over another within the company. Acquisitions and divestitures are
corporate level strategies. Comparing one division to another and trying to
improve overall performance also come under this category. See Chapter 6 for
descriptions of the strategies and tools to evaluate information.

5. Once you have evaluated the case, identified the strategic problem, and evaluated the
impact of the problem on current and/or future strategy, you must form some
conclusions and recommendations regarding the future position of the company.
Support your evaluation with appropriate research.
• What alternatives can the company consider? Alternatives should be mutually
exclusive. Mutually exclusive means the company can go down only one
road. It cannot pursue both strategies simultaneously.
• What are the tradeoffs associated with the alternatives? You should NOT
think in terms of “good” versus “bad”, but rather what does the company
GAIN from an alternative and what does it LOSE. That way you can compare
gains and losses across the alternatives. Gains and losses may be in terms of
customers, revenue, cost competitiveness, market share, profitability, core
competence, time to market, future growth, survival, etc.
• Select an alternative to recommend. Make a logical, clear, and integrated
argument, backed by research to support why the gain and loss tradeoff from
this alternative is better than the other alternatives.
• Recommendations should be made only if backed by analysis and logic.
Trivial or unrealistic recommendations or recommendations that are
inconsistent with the firm’s goals, resources, the industry environment, and
the culture of the company must be avoided.

6. FINALLY, go back to the strategic issue or problem you identified earlier. How does
your solution SOLVE or at least improve the strategic problem? Will your
recommendation allow your firm to improve its financial performance in the long

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 run? What implementation issues might come up? What is the realistic probability of
success if the company follows your plan?

INFORMATION FOR THE ORAL PRESENTATION

1. Each team is scheduled for one oral presentation which should be approximately 20 –
30 minutes in length. Visual aids must be employed, including the use of handouts,
overhead projectors, PowerPoint, crash carts, etc. Ask the instructor about equipment
availability. You are encouraged to use slides on disk and crash carts rather than
printed color transparencies.
2. Oral Presentation Teams are required to dress professionally and exhibit the same
level of decorum and consideration that you would in a real business setting.

3. All team members must be involved in the oral presentation with each team member
presenting a segment. Segment definition is the responsibility of the team. Teams
making the oral presentation of a case do NOT prepare a written report. However, a
printout of your slides as well as a bibliography should be given to your instructor
and other class members. The title page of your presentation should list the case
name, the date, the names of each team member, and the segment each member will
cover. The instructor in each class may ask for full sized black and white copies of
the slides.

4. Library and online research beyond the case are REQUIRED. Research must be
limited to information reasonably available to company executives at the time of the
case. All of the cases in this quarter date after 1990; thus you should be able to make
use of online sources available in the library. Analysis in hindsight is not permitted in
either oral or written reports. “What a company did” is not justification. There are
many possibilities that companies do not consider. Also, in the long run, the
company’s action may not be successful.

5. When presenting, indicate the outside sources used. If you present industry averages,
for example, or demographic data, indicate where you got them.

6. After you have presented; be prepared to receive questions regarding your

assumptions, your use of data, your conclusions, your logic, and your
recommendations. Other class members may not agree with your analysis. Your
instructor may challenge your evaluation of environmental or internal characteristics.
DO NOT BECOME DEFENSIVE. This is a natural part of the process. You are
being asked to think on your own and demonstrate that you have a deep
understanding of the case issues. ALL team members should participate in the
question and answer session. Rigorous probing by the instructor reflects the high
expectations that he/she has for the class. Everyone learns from this experience, even
class members who are not presenting.

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7. Your classmates will be asked to evaluate the quality of team’s presentation.

8. You will receive specific feedback from the instructor concerning the content of the
oral presentation as well as feedback on your presentation style.

INFORMATION FOR THE WRITTEN PRESENTATION

1. The individually written analyses of the assigned cases are due at the start of class. A
satisfactory job will take a maximum of 15 double spaced pages, plus exhibits and a
bibliography of outside references. Exhibits may use charts, tables, and professional
strategic planning tools found in the text. DO NOT add charts just to the sake of
length. All exhibits should ADD VALUE to the written analysis. Summarizing facts
of the case through a SWOT analysis or using tables for evaluation of alternatives can
save space and improve clarity.

2. Hand in two copies of your written report. Keep an additional copy for yourself. One
graded copy will be returned. DO NOT USE REPORT BINDERS OR COVER
SHEETS. Library research AND online research (called “due diligence” in the
business world) is REQUIRED and must be limited to information that would have
been available to the executives at the time of the case.

3. Suggested format:

Course Number and Section

Class Time
Group Number
Your Name
Date

Name of Case (centered)

A. Introduction

B. Analysis of Environment, Company, Current Strategy, Competitors

C. Identification and Justification of Key Strategic Issue that comes from the Analysis

D. Identification and Evaluation of Alternatives

E. Selection of Recommendation and Justification

F. Exhibits and References. (Exhibits should be labeled sequentially and in the order
they are discussed in the text. If you do NOT talk about an exhibit in the text, it
probably isn’t doing anything except taking up space.)

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STRONG POINTS IN REPORTS
1. Evidence of thorough case study.
2. Judgements supported by evidence from the case or outside sources.
3. Organization and clarity of the presentation (whether orally or in writing).
4. Identification of the key drivers and/or forces in the external environment and how
that may affect the future of the firm or the industry.
5. Identification and evaluation of pertinent company’s capabilities, weaknesses,
resources, and sources of competitive advantage in the context of the industry and
competitive environment.
6. Clear articulation of the strategic issue you are addressing.
7. Use of professional tools and concepts from the text and lectures. (This includes tools
used in other courses such as ratio analysis or market share analysis.)
8. Alternatives that are realistic and fall from the analysis.
9. Examination of tradeoffs associated with alternatives.
10. Justification for the recommendation that is consistent with company strategy and
resources.
11. Use of a “company-wide” view…not just a functional, short-term perspective.

WEAKNESSES IN REPORTS

1. Not well organized or presented clearly.

2. Failure to proofread ANY written material (in written or oral presentation) and
correct obvious misspellings, errors, and sloppy grammar.
3. Mere repetition of case facts without analysis. (I.e. Rehash of the facts of the case is
not value added.)
4. Failure to identify outside sources.
5. Exhibits that are extraneous to the analysis. The reader or viewer is left to draw
his/her own conclusions and wonder why the exhibit is there.
6. Failure to ANALYZE. Don’t just give facts, do ANALYSIS!
7. Lack of consideration of non-economic issues (i.e. culture, values, ethics, etc.) if it is
relevant.
8. Failure to support opinions by evidence or logical explanation.
9. Failure to perceive or present an “organizational” or “strategic” viewpoint.
10. Lack of adequate outside research.
11. For oral presentations: Lack of coordination, rehearsal, and preparation.
12. For oral presentations: Dominance by one individual.
13. For oral presentations: Speaking too quietly and/or too quickly.

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Date Chapter/Case Assignments

Introduction / Discussion of the course outline

/11/2005-Tue

1/13/2005-Th. Chapter 1: Creating competitive advantages Read the chapter

Chapter 13: Case analysis/ Groups will be
1/18/2005-Tue. formed Read the chapter

1/20/2005-Th. Video- Specialized Bicycle Components

1/25/2005-Tue. Chapter 2: External environment of the firm TBA (to be announced)

1/27/2005-Th Sample case: Fasten your seatbelts Read the case

2/1/2005-Tue. Chapter 3: Internal environment of the firm TBA

2/3/2005-Thu. Case Presentation: Jay's Foods LLC Read the case

Find out some examples of
2/8/2005-Tue. Chapter 4: Intellectual Capital intellectual capital

2/10/2005 Th Case Presentation: AT&T Resources Link (A) Read the case

2/15/2005Tue Chapter 5: Business Level Strategy TBA

2/17/2005-Th Case presentation: Walmart Read the case

2/22/2005-Tue. Chapter 5: Business Level Strategy TBA

Case Presentation :Carly Fiorina -Hewlett
2/24/2005-Th. Packard Read the case
Case Presentation: Kuvo Radio / Midterm
3/1/2005-Tue. Overview

3/3/2005-Th. Midterm

3/8/2005-Tue. SPRING BREAK

3/10/2005-Th. SPRING BREAK

3/15/2005-Tue. Chapter 6: Corporate Level Strategy TBA

Case Presentation: Coke vs.
3/17/2005-Th. Pepsi(RESERVE) Read the case

3/22/2005.Tue. Chapter 6: Corporate Level Strategy TBA

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3/24/2005-Th. Case Presentation: Kikkoman Corporation Read the case
Chapter 7: International Level Strategy Video:
3/29/2005-Tue Coke in Japan TBA
Case Presentation: Hewlett Packard in
3/31/2005-Th. Vietnam Read the case

4/5/2005-Tue Chapter 9: Corporate Governance TBA

Case Presentation: Hans Fritz at Novartis
4/7/2005-Th Thailand Read the case
Chapter 11: Organizational Ethics
4/12/2005-Tue Chapter 12: Corporate Entrepreneurship TBA
Case presentation: Ben & Jerry’s Bring information regarding recent
4/14/2005-Th Video: AOL Time Warner Merger mergers

4/19/2005-Tue REVIEW FOR FINAL

4/21/2005-Th REVIEW FOR FINAL

4/28/2005-Th- 8:00
am FINAL

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 Peer Evaluation Sheet

Team # ______________

Name __________________________

Name Self
Score
(1-10)*
Reasons

• 1 (did nothing) – 5 (unsatisfactory) – 7 (neither satisfactory nor unsatisfactory) –

10 (very satisfactory)
• Then the participation score will be totaled and divided by the number of the
group then this number will be multiplied with the score one gets from the group
written-report.
• Be objective in evaluating other members in your group and specify reasons.
• The evaluation should be turned in on the final exam. Peer evaluation sheet will
be provided along with the exam booklet.
• If one fails to turn in the peer evaluation sheet, then everybody in the team
gets 8.

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 WRITING TUTOR’S GRADING CRITERIA

Criteria 0 1 2 Total
Grammar Several grammar One or two errors No mistakes
errors
Spelling Multiple spelling One or two errors No spelling errors
errors
Word Choice Below average word Good word Excellent word
choices choices choices
Organization and Poor organization Good Very well
Flow organization organized
Citation of Missing citations Minor errors in Correct citation
Sources citations of sources
Total Points

Learning Goal: Students will develop competency in written communications. Each

student will complete a minimum of 15 pages of double-spaced written assignments in
this course. The assignments will be assessed using the rubric above as follows:
1. A paper scoring a zero in any of the five criteria must be rewritten.
2. For all papers totaling 6 or under, the paper must be rewritten.
3. For all papers totaling 5 or under, the student must make an appointment with
the writing tutor.

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