Being in charge of a division of Mountain Products Corporation, I have noticed that our company has faced a number of problems connected to several failures with meeting the deadlines. Such failures have a considerable impact on the company’s profits as well as on the relations with vendors and popularity among the potential customers.
Our GPS products are already delayed by 6 months so that our competitors become able to present their own production, contact with our constant partners, and provide some of them with similar products within the shortest period of time.
In order to represent several good ideas on how to improve the situation and help the company to return expected profits and to take the same positions in the market, it is very important to evaluate the main causes of our current failure such as inventory shortages of the key parts, to develop a new program that helps to attract the attention of potential vendors and customers, and to introduce future innovations in the most attractive way and prove that our GPS production is still worthy of customers’ and vendors’ recognition and use even after this terrible failure is taken into consideration and analyzed from several perspectives.
The current situation of the company is not very pleasant: because of the inventory shortage of the major parts which are extremely important for our production, Mountain Products cannot introduce its goods on time. Several vendors have already rejected our services due to such serious delay of 6 months. It is also necessary to admit that our competitors have already reached the market 2 months ago, this is why their product is in demand right now.
In fact, the main causes of the problem under consideration are connected to poorly developed relations with our partners, lack of attention to the deadlines and strategic management of the activities, and inabilities to evaluate competitors’ possibilities under the same conditions which are still characterized by the better arrangement of relations at different levels. Fortunately, this situation is not as desperate as it would seem.
There are a number of steps that have to be taken in order to improve the situation, correct the mistakes and problems appeared, and prove the fact that all GPS products and other goods offered by the Mountain Products Corporation may be in demand within a short period of time.
Schilling (2008) suggests paying certain attention to innovation theory in action according to which any company is able to represent a line of innovative ideas and attract people’s attention. Of course, it is also necessary to remember about usual steps such as discounts for vendors and possible actions for consumers: the vast majority of people prefer to rely on sales and events where it is possible to buy a good cheaper in comparison to other companies.
Though such discounts may considerably influence the profits of the company, the idea to return our customers exists and can work. To succeed in this step, it is extremely important to evaluate the prices offered by our competitors and the ways of how their production is implemented by customers.
Another powerful step is connected to the guarantee limitations: the extension of the guarantee for consumers will hardly influence the profits, attract more people, and prove once again that time delays are connected to the improvement of the quality. Right now, our company is ready to present the products and provide customers with long-time guarantees without anxiety about the poor quality of the products.
Finally, it is necessary to admit that our company is working at adopting new GPS location logic that is developed for DOD applications. Unfortunately, our organization has already faced some problems connected to the resources which are important for these products: some of them are still unavailable. Consumers and vendors have to be warned about the possible improvements and innovations, and it seems to be a good opportunity to make use of some media advertisement.
This step should show that Mountain Products Corporations still wants to take care about its customers and partners who are eager to use our services: we remember about each one, share our ideas and prepositions, and inform everyone about changes and improvements which will be available for people.
Our competitors represent their goods on time; of course, it has a negative impact on our company. However, we have powerful grounds to explain our delays and instead, we offer good quality and constant communication with customers and vendors to consider their points and wishes for our future innovations.
In general, the case study under analysis is not an easy one. When a company delays production, many problems appear at different levels. To represent a good solution to the problem, it becomes necessary to consider the opportunities of the competitors, customers’ and vendors’ expectations, and the company’s own possibilities.
It is wrong to give empty promises to people, and this delay of production has to be indemnified by means of quality, guarantees, and communications by means of which customers and vendors comprehend that such delay is justified.
Reference List
Schilling, M. (2008). Strategic Management of Technological Innovation. New York :McGraw-Hill/Irwin.