Memo

 
To: RGV Inc.
From: Paul Shives
CC:
Date: 02/28/2022
Re: Data driven Decision Making Strategies

First, thank you for the opportunity to make an assessment and recommendation regarding your
company’s plan to cut costs and become profitable through a data driven decision. The analysis
and recommendations are based on the company’s review and data obtained from your staff. Based
on the realities of the market and company’s capabilities, these data-oriented decisions and
recommendations are aimed at improving efficiency and abilities of the company to increase its
productivity and performance.

Company Stakeholder Data Analysis

When we have an international company, there are several key stakeholders that the
company should take into consideration. Firstly, the management and owners of the company are
critical as they are the vision bearers. It is important to understand what the vision of the company
is apart from profitability to know how well to align the company’s strategy to fulfill the objective,
while maintaining profitability. The second one is the employees of the company. This is
extremely critical in the day-to-day operations of the company. Top management should ensure
that the employees' needs, and objectives of the organization are aligned. Besides, the staff should
be competitively compensated, and practice of equality including through rewards not only to
motivate them and improve their productivity but also to enhance retention/attraction of high
skilled and committed employees that can help drive the productivity of the company. Another key
stakeholder includes customers who are a big part of the company’s profitability objective.

One of the problems in the company is too much cost. However, with effective marketing
strategies and the use of business data analytics from the marketing platforms, the company can be
able to make cost-effective decisions that are data driven and gain most out of the market.
Considering this is an international company, the company has also to mind the cultural diversity
of its customer segments. Constructing personalized marketing communications and product
information in a way that conforms to the values and traditions of the people can significantly
improve the profitability of the company and loyalty from most of its customers which is essential
for the long-term sustainability. Investors and business partners are critical towards improving the
agenda of the company forward. In this case, the company should partner with investors who help
the company achieve its international market growth goal as well as having interests that are
aligned with that of the company. This includes partnering with local partners in the international
regions in a way to overcome the penetration challenges as well as reduce legal limitations
working on some of the regions. As a result, the observing of government policies and regulation
of the markets and taking care of the stakeholders can help the company to be effective in its
strategy implementation across the global market.

Data Collection and Timeframe Recommendations

RGV Inc. operates within an international market with operations on other continents
outside America. The product range is also quite diverse including supply of beverages, meat,
produce, condiments, confections, dairy products, grains, and seafood, among others. However,
this data is not enough to determine where the problem in the company is or how best to improve
its productivity while cutting costs. Therefore, it is recommended that the company focuses on four
main types of data to enhance its performance. First, the company should have a thorough analysis
of how each product is performing in each market segment. This includes creating a list of all
products and the markets that each of them is available to give insight on the demand of such a
product and consumer behavior in every market. In addition to the data of the products of the
company, the company should also get information about the strongest competitors in various
markets and examine differences with the company’s efforts. Not only does this provide critical
information on what strategies to use best in various markets but the comparison also helps in
motivating creativity and innovation to overcome competition and provide unique and highly
competitive products based on consumer choices.

The second type of data includes the productivity of salespersons and management. It is
important to know the most effective employees and needs in each department based on their
performance compared to potential forecasts. While this data is not aimed at downsizing the
company, it can help get to understand the challenges in each area or department that limit growth
of sales and help put measures such as training and change of tasks in a way that can help improve
the productivity of an individual. The third type of data includes the company's past financial
records. This is to determine the most profitable areas, most essential operational costs, available
resources, trends of profitability over the years among others. This is more of quantitative data
analysis which can help plan better for the financial health of the company. Lastly, the fourth set of
data should be based on business analytics of consumer behavior in making online purchases.
Monitoring what customers order most from what region can help in ensuring the inventory
management is well scheduled to avoid losses from perishable goods and efficiency in the
production which not only reduces the overhead costs of production but minimizes losses in the
production and storage phases before the product reaches the final consumer.

Time frames are important in this case. The focus is to get data analyzed from the past
three consecutive years to make out trends. Further, business analytics should be performed in
every three months to ensure the company is flexible to changing consumer patterns and remain
more responsive to increase profitability and adapt new marketing strategies to widen the market
and increase sales.

Data Collection and Analysis Recommendations

Data will be collected in three main ways. First, the past company records regarding
financial performance, sales in every region, volume of sales, market segments and performance in
each of the last three years will be collected through the HR and marketing departments. A team
composed of members from each department will be composed which will then compile organized
data to represent where the company stands and the trend in the last three years. With technology
and business analytic software available, the data can be stored in a database such as excel to make
it easy or analysis. However, in future, it is recommended that the company invests in an online
database that is linked to business analytic software where employees can upload specific data each
day or week and the software from a glance help show current trends and the best available
decisions that are cost effective and most profitable in the current market. The second way would
be to conduct an interview with employees and some of the key stakeholders to get qualitative data
on their experiences and the best ways to improve performance. This feedback can be very helpful
when incorporated into the decision making. Lastly, performance appraisals will be conducted
throughout the entire company using a 360-degree feedback approach. The appraisals will help
know areas to improve on everyone, where training is needed and how best to align employees'
needs with that of the organization to be where they are most productive and committed. Using a
process flow diagram can help as an effective tool of monitoring efficiency of operations.

Data Distribution and Visualization

The data collected and results from the analysis should be shared with the top management
which is responsible for implementing the recommendations and making the final decisions. Based
on the results, the communication of the data should be done in an appropriate way based on
relevance. For instance, the management should only see results and directives from the data that
concerns sales, salespersons, and marketing information to the marketing department only. If a
message is directed at investors and partners not all information should be shared but only relevant
data that can make the investors see return on their investment and ways of helping the company
tap into potential growth areas. To help visualize the data, using charts and graphs to show trends
will be critical and an effortless way to compress the information in an easily understandable way
for many of the key stakeholders.

Self-Assessment

From this exercise, I have a lot regarding the best ways to collect data and use it in making
effective decisions. First in the data collection, I learned how to collect various data from various
parts of an organization and using it to compile recommendations that can be actionable. In this
case, data can either be qualitative such as those sharing experiences and emotions, and some can
be quantitative including those of market analysis. Comparing this data and analyzing to show
relationships can help a company grow efficiently.

Secondly, data-oriented decisions can increase efficiency and cut costs in most businesses.
I this case, I realized that if decisions are made without considering relevant data and trying to see
trends, business can incur large costs either on irrelevant practices or wrong places and get low
returns. Therefore, it is important always to know where the company stands, current trends of
consumers, competition, and the best available practices to improve performance and
responsiveness to market changes.