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Table of Contents
CHAPTER 1: ORIENTATION......................................................................................................................... 1
1.1 INTRODUCTION..........................................................................................................................................2
REFERENCES.................................................................................................................................................. 8
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Chapter 1: Orientation
1.1 Introduction
This case study involves Robin Ash the newly appointed COO at Printzhof Press which is a
Philadelphia-based company (Kinzie et.al, 2004). Printzhoff Press was established in 1848 by
Eric Nygren and since then promotion of educational excellence became the core goal of the
company. Printzhoff started off very well and was able to give quite good competition to its
other counterparts in the marketplace considering its USP of focusing on narrow disciplines
(Smith, 2009). However, as competition increased over the years Printzhoff started struggling
with various issue which required change in order to ensure continuous growth and sustain in the
market. Throughout this analysis the problems faced by Printzhoff will be identified and possible
solutions will be highlighted to overcome the problems faced by the company (Kinzie et.al,
2004).
In this case Robin Ash, the newly appointed COO at Printzhoff needs to figure out the possible
way to effectively implement change along the organization (Hutcheson, 2007). The challenges
for Printzhoff has been affecting its market share, profitability, sales & revenue. While
technology has improved drastically in the textbook market, Printzhoff has not made any
advances which has led to lowering sales (Kinzie et.al, 2004). The core problem at Printzhoff is
the managements reluctance towards change and shifts in organizational culture which is non-
2
1.3 Research Questions
Q1. How can an effective change management strategy lead to the success of Printzhoff
press?
Q2. What impact will an Adaptive Culture strategy have on the progress of
Printzhoff in the market?
Q3. How can Printzhoff use product development strategy in line with organizational
change to ensure overall organizational effectiveness?
The core aim of this report is to identify key issues faced by Printzoff, understand the reasons
which caused the issue and come up with possible solution to deal with the issues faced.
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4
1.6 Structure of the Report
Chapter 1: Introduction
1.1 Introduction
1.2 Statement of the Problem
1.3 Research Questions
1.4 Research Aim
1.5 Research Objectives
1.6 Structure of the Report
Chapter 5: Conclusion
Propose Solution to Problem
Recommendations
Limitation of the Study
5.4 Conclusion
5.5 Scope for further Research
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Chapter 2: Case Brief
Printzhoff is a publisher of college level textbooks and was one of the most important wings of
EEH as 35% of the company’s overall revenues in 2010 was generated from Printzhoff
(Hutcheson, 2007). However, Printzhoff has been reacting very slowly to changing market
demands in the textbook industry which led to lower growth of the company. In recent times the
textbook industry become very competitive as new market leaders emerged and the rise of digital
era completely transformed the overall market. Ash was appointed in such circumstances to
ensure sustainability and growth of Printzhoff in the competitive industry (Smith, 2009).
Ageing Employee
Resistance to Increased
Base & Lack of
Change Competition
Innovation
The most crucial challenge for Ash was to change the non-adaptive corporate culture at
Printzhoff which slowed down the growth of the company (Abu-Jarad et.al, 2010). During the
meeting with the Product Development head, marketing head and HR head Ash got to know that
these people where resistive towards change and thought previous procedure will still be
effective, overall, it can be said that the company lacked innovation. Furthermore, the increasing
competition and emerging market leaders such as Pearson poised critical threat to the existence
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2.3 Strengths & Weaknesses of the Case
Strengths Weakness
1. Printzhoff is one of the most 1. Ageing Workforce Population
prestigious textbook publisher in resulted in greater resistance to
the country. change.
Strengths
Printzhoff is known to be one of the most prestigious publishers in the country which provides
the company to gain more traction from customers and also authors (Smith, 2009). Furthermore,
the company’s focus on limited disciplines such as liberal arts & social sciences also enables it to
get a better understanding of their product and specialize on that segment (Costanza et.al, 2015).
Weakness
The most vital weakness of the case is that most of employees at Printzhoff are retained since a
long time and have become old which causes them to be resistive towards change (Kinzie et.al,
2004). There has been no product development strategy applied by Printzhoff to deal with
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competitors and changing market demand which is very unhealthy for the company (Smith,
2009).
The main competitors for Printzhoff are Pearson, Cengage and McGraw-Hill as they had better
revenues compared to Printzhoff in FYI 2009-2010 (Smith, 2009). Pearson can be considered as
the most powerful competitors in the industry considering its growing sales from 2009-2010 as
shown in Figure 4. Whereas Cengage and McGraw-Hill also followed as 2 nd and 3rd ranked with
$668 and $477 worth revenues compared to Printzhoff’s $327 revenue. Other competitors
included Wiley and Macmillan who were behind Printzhoff but if not acted properly they can
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References
Abu-Jarad. I, Yusof. N & Nikbin. D (2010), ‘A Review Paper on Organizational Culture and
Organizational Performance’, International Journal of Business & Social Science, Vol 1, No 3.
Available at: http://ijbssnet.com/journals/Vol._1_No._3_December_2010/4.pdf , [Accessed on 19th February
2021].
Hutcheson. A (2007), ‘The Truman Commission’s Vision of the Future’, Thought & Action,
Page 107-115. Available at: http://www.nea.org/assets/img/PubThoughtAndAction/TAA_07_11.pdf , [Accessed
on 19th February 2021].
Kinzie. J, Palmer. M, Hayek. J, Hossler. D, Jacob. S & Cummings. H (2004), ‘Fifty Years of
College Choice: Social, Political and Institutional Influences on the Decision-making Process,
Vol 5, No 3. Available at: http://www.marketplace.org/topics/economy/how-gi-bill-changed- economy, [Accessed
on 20th February 2021].
Smith. S (2009), ‘How the GI Bill Changed the economy’, American Public Media Market Place
Economy. Available at: http://www.marketplace.org/topics/economy/how-gi-bill-changed- economy, [Accessed on
19th February 2021].