The report focuses on the comparative understanding of the business plan of a Sydney based consultancy service with a given business plan. Accenture Sydney has been selected as the focus organization. Comparison of the business plan will be made with a given business plan in order to understand the effectiveness of the potential strategies to realize crucial business opportunities. Accenture a management consulting service that operates around the globe. The major functional areas of the company are consulting strategies, digital technology, and operation service consultation. The comparison of the business plan and related strategies of Accenture in and around the Sydney area is being done with a model plan concerning the establishment of a small venture that will specialize in the provision of consultancy services. The organization has been named Blueprints Business Planning Pty Ltd. The comparative understanding of Blueprints and the Sydney business of Accenture will help to form essential understanding of the various aspects that are intrinsically connected with business plan. The business goals, marketing function, operations and financial objectives will be compared. The comparison has been done is order to find out the relative significance of the differences and similarities of business plans of established and newly formed organizations.
Every business needs to have a well-defined business goal. In order to achieve this, the management of the concerned business needs to form certain strategies and policies which will help them to increase their level of production. The more the production level increases, the higher will be the generation of revenue and the profit margin. The Blueprints Business Planning is an organization which is still in its developing stages. The organization has been set up recently and hence, the business goal of this organization is still at a minimal level. The organizations falls under the category of providing consultancy services to the small and medium sized enterprise. The financial resources required for its inception is relatively less, when compared to the financial requirements of the big organizations (Accenture.com 2018). Moreover, the immediate goal of the organization is to increase its productivity margin. The services which are offered by the Blueprints Business Planning are formulating the business plans of various organizations, training the employees of the concerned businesses in business management skills and also making them familiar with the concept and procedure of book sales. The short term business goal of this organization is to employ one full time employee for the time being who will handle the functions of the organization. With the gradual expansion in the business, the organization will further employ more people who will handle the functions of the business (Simón-Moya and Revuelto-Taboada, 2016).
This business goal of Blueprints Business Planning is in sharp contrast with the business goal of the organization named Accenture. Accenture is a multinational company, operating out of Dublin in Ireland. It was instituted in 2009 and the organization now has a presence in almost all the countries of the world (Accenture.com, 2018). The company has a dominant market share in most of the economies of the world and a sizeable portion of the labor work force of an economy is employed within the branch of Accenture in that country. Accenture is a global consultancy firm and provides important business solutions to the various businesses of the world. The management of this organization is strong and stable and has already achieved the threshold level of production. It now has the business goal of achieving a gender balance amongst the employees working for the organization (Baliga and Rodrigues, 2015). Accenture is now focusing on the recruitment of more female candidates to work for the company as there is already an excessive number of male employees within the organization. Gender issue has become an emerging concern in the contemporary world of today. Accenture is trying to fulfill its obligation to the society by investing into more societal related issues. Achieving gender would mean that many females within the labor work force will get employed and hence, will be able to assert their independence in the society. The financial assertion of the women is very important in the modern world and Accenture is one of the organizations who is facilitating this noble cause of the society.
The business plan of Blueprints Business Planning is concentrated at a micro level. The main intention of this business is to provide business solution and marketing strategies to the small and medium sized businesses situated in and around Sydney. The Blueprints Business Planning also aims to provide training to the employees of the local businesses in Australia. This focus of the organization on the small and medium organizations by the Blueprints Business Planning is due to the newness of the organization. The company is a recently formed organization and hence, it still does not have the requisite financial support to expand its operational activities. Moreover, the management of the Blueprints Business Planning believes in self-financing the entire organization. This means that the business will face financial constraints in regard to the creation of the brand image in the minds of the people. Furthermore, they will not be able to create elaborate advertisement hoardings as much of the finances will be redirected to take care of the operational needs which will help to increase the productivity of the organization. The pricing strategy of the organization cannot also be very high as the organization seeks to serve the small and medium sized enterprises (Schaper et al. 2014). This is because of the fact that the client of the Blueprints Business planning themselves do not have the finances to pay extravagant prices to the organization.
In contrast to this, the organization of Accenture will be able to pursue very stringent and effective marketing strategies. The finances of Accenture is at a much higher level than that of the Blueprints Business Planning which means that Accenture is able to pay more for advertisement purposes. Moreover, Accenture has a brand value in the minds of the people. This means that the people who require consulting services for their organization will approach Accenture in the first instance to help them to resolve their problem, signifying that Blueprints Business Planning will always be a secondary choice to the people. Furthermore, Accenture do not have to stress about their pricing policy as there is an idea amongst the people that Accenture has the capability to perform their activities flawlessly and efficiently (Gruber et al. 2015). This ensures that Accenture can follow a high pricing policy. The organizations approaching Accenture have the ability to pay this as they have considerable financial resources and these clients are more concerned about their work rather than the money paid for the services.
The operations of Accenture are worldwide. Hence, the operations of the Sydney division of business of the organization is devised on the same lines. The operational aspects of Accenture are dependent on providing expert solutions to the issues of the clients with effective speed. Accenture has over 246 thousand employees globally. The business model utilized by the organization is same throughout the global business within which the organization operates (Watson, McGowan and Cunningham, 2018). The basic elements on which the operations are based are core business of Accenture, strategic initiatives and geographic expansion. The operations are based on the elements of communication, technology, financial services, public service and products and resources. The projects handled are generally outsourcing projects where the organization provides effective assistance to large businesses around the world. The workforce of the organization consists of experienced business professionals, technology professionals and operators, service workforces that work on the projects of the organization and the internal workforces of the enterprise. The most important operational functions of the company are dependent on speed and quality. The operations are highly diversified as a result of which, the company has to depend on many departments. The company operates in accordance of the laws and regulations of the specific country of operation. The functional aspects of Accenture are effectively controlled through systematic handling of work functions. The company utilizes effective technology to implement the operational plans. The frameworks are developed in accordance with the requirements for productivity. The operations like any other business consultancy firm, depend essentially on delivery of effective solutions to the various business problems of clients.
The operational aspects can thus be compared with the given business plan of the Blueprints business planning. The legal structure will be the same as the organization also operates in Sydney. The major shareholders are the institutional holdings. The total holders are more than 13 hundred. The largest shareholders are the Vanguard group Inc., Blackrock inc. and Massachusetts financial services. The organizational structure is a bit better in Accenture. The company takes effective training activities in order to help improve the operational performances of the workers (Barton, 2016). The managing directors and the various consultants very much have the same functional positions within the operational frameworks. In both the organizations training has been given much importance. The training is important for enhancing the performance of the employees this is much required for enhancing workforce performance. Insurance and security issues greatly affect the operations of Accenture as well. Unlike blueprints the location of the company is worldwide. Hence it becomes more important that Accenture provide more importance to their worldwide productive functions along with the local functions of the organization. The equipment that are used by the organization are very much the same. The answering machines, telephone lines, printers, mobile phones, computers and all the other equipment are also utilized by Accenture (Baliga and Rodrigues, 2015). However, the quality of these equipment that are utilized by Accenture are much better than the small scale operational businesses. The offices of Accenture are located around major city business centers just like the given business plan. This helps in maintaining the speed in which the solution is delivered.
The financial objectives of Accenture are focused more towards gaining long term profits through the systematic achievement of short run profitability. The company has focused towards gaining effective financial momentum in the global market. Accenture commits itself towards returning effectively the investments that were made by the investors. The company has managed to increase its current assets from 11, 976 thousand to 12, 097 thousand from the year 2016 to 2017. The revenues of the company have been increasing effectively along with the reduction in operational expenditure. However, the growing expenditures of the company have been limiting the profit margins. The revenue has increased from 32,914 thousand in 2015 to 34,797 thousand in 2016 to 36,765 thousand as of 2017. However, along with the same the total operating expenses have increased from 28, 478 thousand to 29, 987 thousand to 32, 132 thousand in the years 2015, 2016 and 2017 respectively (Accenture.com 2018). This has caused the company to focus towards business strategies that can ensure greater differences between the profit margins and the expenses incurred. The return on investment for the company have been decreasing at a significant rate. The main aim of the financial objectives is to help the company to sustain its current financial growth and increase its revenue potential for the future. It is important that the company implements effective strategies to tackle the problems that are faced concerning the realization of financial goals. The company implements strategies that will reduce the cost of operation and increase the profit margins at the same time.
The financial business plan can be compared with the business plan of Blueprints business. The calculation of the income and expenses in case of Blueprints are based on the straight line method. The cost of goods have been estimated to be 60% which is a profit of 20 dollars (Accenture.com, 2018). The initial capital being provided is 10,000 dollar as per the contribution of the chief stakeholders. The profits of the first year are to be retained to be used in the capital investment of the next year. It can be seen that as per the projected profits the gross profit is expected to be 97,600 for the first year. The total expenses however, will be 95,280 (Schaper et al. 2014). This problem is similar to the issue faced by the Accenture, hence the objective should be to increase the difference between the profits and the expenditures. The net assets of the company have been estimated to be 840,000 dollars. In this case, the company needs to proceed considering the total liabilities that have been estimated to be 202, 200 (Accenture.com, 2018). The main strategy here should be to generate effective return on investment for the stakeholders. Accenture considers an effective planning and management functions for achievement of crucial financial objectives. The planning functions are dependent on the financial projections of each year. The objectives are met subsequently after the comparison of the financial achievements with the projection. The positive attributes of the financial plan is that it can help to get effective financial information. The negative aspect is the insufficiency of the plan to be implemented over longer periods of time (Simón-Moya and Revuelto-Taboada, 2016).
Figure 1: extract of income statement of Accenture for the year ended August 31st 2017
(Source- Accenture.com 2018)
Recommendations and Conclusions
In conclusion it can be said that the business plan of the given organization is suitable for the effective progress of business for a significant but limited amount of time. When compared with the business function and objectives of Accenture it can be seen that Accenture takes into consideration a far larger scale of operational information when forming its goals. The operational activities of the organization can provide greater productivity. The business plan is effective and can be compared to the business plans that are implemented by organizations such as Accenture. It is important to consider the comparative understanding of the business plan in order to properly evaluate the business plan of the organizations. The business ideas and goals are important and can provide much future growth to the organization. The marketing plan can be greatly effective towards determining the effective operation of the business. The operational plan is effective and covers most of the areas that Accenture as the larger company follows as the basic element of their operational effectiveness (Accenture.com, 2018). The company can gain greater productivity through this. The financial plan of the given business plan was found to be more short term oriented. In comparison the financial strategies that are followed by Accenture are much vast and effective.
It is recommended that the company takes into consideration better strategies that are much more productivity oriented. The business plan is effective but need to consider more long term profitability functions. As mentioned above more importance should be given by Blueprints toward the development of its brand value. This is important because this way the company can promote itself effectively. The focus should not be towards any specific part of the business plan. Rather the focus should be towards effectively optimizing the business functions of the organization treating the plan as a whole. This way the value added by each separate aspect towards the greater growth of the organization can be assessed and subsequently incorporated within the larger plan. It is important that the plan is modified in accordance with the requirements of time.
References
Accenture.com. (2018). Accenture’s Annual Report. [online] Available at: https://www.accenture.com/in-en/company-annual-report
Authority, N.I.F.H., 2016. Business Plan 2016/17.
Baliga, A.J. and Rodrigues, L.L., 2015. Business Plan-The Secret to Success. The International Journal of Business & Management, 3(4), pp.210-214.
Barton, A., 2016. The Munch: An Integrated Business Plan.
Gruber, M., De Leon, N., George, G. and Thompson, P., 2015. Managing by design.
Kampas, S.R., Tarkowski, A.R., Portell, C.M. and Bhatti, N., Accenture Global Services Ltd, 2018. System and method for cloud enterprise services. U.S. Patent 9,985,905.
Schaper, M.T., Volery, T., Weber, P.C. and Gibson, B., 2014. Entrepreneurship and small business.
Simón-Moya, V. and Revuelto-Taboada, L., 2016. Revising the predictive capability of business plan quality for new firm survival using qualitative comparative analysis. Journal of Business Research, 69(4), pp.1351-1356.
Watson, K., McGowan, P. and Cunningham, J.A., 2018. An exploration of the Business Plan Competition as a methodology for effective nascent entrepreneurial learning. International Journal of Entrepreneurial Behavior & Research, 24(1), pp.121-146.
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