Strategic Plan for a New Start-Up Business Report

Introduction

KASHTA is a new business that aims to introduce a concept of outdoor traditional experiences in Saudi Arabia. The outdoor traditional experience will be providing tourism facilities to foreign and local tourists who visit the Saudi desert. The tourist services will include entertainment, food and camping for international tourists (Fahey and Narayman 127). The business is determined to become the best business in the entire Kingdom. It will be dedicated to bringing a different experience to tourists who visit Saudi Arabia. The strategic management and planning will promote setting up of priorities, focus on energy and resources, and strengthen the business operations (Fahey and Narayman 129). The plan also aims at ensuring the employees of the business and the other stakeholders are working towards common goals.

This strategic business plan is important to the business because it will generate a common outcome strategy that will reconcile the results of the venture. It will help access and adjust the company’s procedures and techniques of performance in accordance to the changing environment. The strategic plan will help in guiding the company in making sound decisions and taking appropriate actions (Fahey and Narayman 130). These decisions and actions are what the management will look to as stones for laying out a firm foundation for the success of the business. The same basis will define the results of what the business will be doing, what the business will be, whom the business will serve, and why the business decides to carry out the business.

An effective strategic plan articulates the direction of the business, that is why this plan indicates the actions the business should execute to make progress and the evaluation methods that a business making a success out of business operations.

This report helps to communicate to the business owners, shareholders, and management the goals of the business, the action that should be taken in order to realize these goals, and all other crucial elements that will make the business deliver its services as planned (Fahey and Narayman 131). The strategic management of the business generalizes a collection of ongoing activities and processes. These processes are what the business will put in place in order to coordinate and align resources to suit the goals of the business. The aims of the strategic management are to put into action the strategies to performance feedback. It will offer support to the plan as it evolves and grow with the growing requirements and other circumstances change.

Key words

Tourism, Saudi Arabia, marketing, SWOT analysis, vision, goals, mission, long-term objectives, strategies, strategic plan, strategic management

Kashta summary

The initiators of the business (KASHTA hotel) agreed upon coming up with the business and offering services to the tourists who visit Saudi Arabia. The initiators have agreed upon this strategic plan that will guide in the evaluation of the business opportunities. The plan critically evaluates all the necessary factors that the management should consider in order to positively create an impact in the tourism industry in Saudi Arabia (Fahey and Narayman 141). The owners came up with a vision, a mission and strategic plans that will enable the business to attain a level of being the best resort for tourists in the area. The business focuses in offering camping services for foreign tourists, offering the best food both local and international, and offering the best entertainment services to the tourist who visit and stay in the hotel.

The initiators sought to represent a diverse cross section of the community in developing a vision. The vision recognizes a critical role that KASHTA play in the Saudi desert tourism, the exceptional quality of services it will introduce, commitment to sustainability and most importantly, the provision of jobs both to local employees and expatriates (Fahey and Narayman 144). The business seeks to envision a new form of energy and excitement in a year-round maintenance. The biggest focus is to always provide world-class institutions and events in the tourism industry and create a dynamic and vibrant business that attracts tourists from all corners of the world. It aims to achieve these objectives through its engagement in cultural enrichment, civil commitment and community passion (Fahey and Narayman 150).

Mission statement

The mission of KASHTA as a tourist hotel is to provide outstanding tour facilities. The hotel is focused on both individual and group business and leisure travel in Saudi Arabia. The hotel emphasizes on quality and sensational camping experiences as well as quality services in terms of quality local and international food. The hotel also sensitizes on quality entertainment for all classes of tourists. The hotel aims at providing fair investment returns to the owners and shareholders. It implies that the hotel can meet all those objectives because of the continuing support of its well trained, motivated and enthusiastic employees.

The goals of the business

• To increase the hotel’s average holding capacity level by five percent in every year of its operation;
• To increase the volume of repeat guest business by 15 percent;
• Reduce the time used for check-in and check-out by two minutes to create a faster service delivery institution;
• To create a clean and pleasant environment that makes it comfortable for visitors;
• To ensure that there is high quality maintenance of facilities and equipment for efficient guests’ use;
• Ensuring quality services offered to the guests is of very high quality and in accordance to the standard procedure;
• Taking care of employees’ interests and motivating them trough proper remuneration.

Vision statement

To provide quality and memorable experience to all the esteemed company’s customers.

Objective

KASHTA hotel plays an important role in ensuring that the environment is protected in all aspects for future generations. The company has set its goal to help achieve this by minimizing the waste from the hotel, energy and waste usage, and practicing safe disposal whenever possible. The business opens its door to joining efforts with other organizations where possible to increase the environmental goals. The company joins all its customers, suppliers, and contractors by inviting them to participate in maintaining a safe environment. The hotel ensures maintenance of the hotel standards and development of its human resource by training and making use of its customers’ feedbacks and opinions as a source of data for implementing improvement strategies. The business is committed to being always open in the ability to further development and monitoring and recording the progress in maintaining the environment.

An internal audit

An internal audit reveals that all the information systems conform to the business requirements and ethical issues. The hotel information system is up-to-date and matches the requirements of the business. The software property management is large enough to support all sizes of rooms within the business. The inbound business procedures are in place for the standard guidance of operations in a day-to-day basis.

The internal controls for franchising activities are extensive such that the business enjoys enough amount of control. An internal audit of the internal governing structures indicates that all structures are in place and bound to be effective in all ways. The organization has adhered to the internal rules and regulation and the external guidelines stipulated by the tourism act and the federal law. The business also is in conformation with the community policy and adheres to the community needs. It respects the societal rules and beliefs of Saudi people at large.

The audit indicates that the adequacy of management control framework is in accordance to the stipulated guidelines. The audit ensures that the business is within its scope of operation, and its revenues are channeled to the stipulated destinations. The audit ensures that all the systems placed to assist the company on ethical issues and CSRs are in place and functioning towards their purpose.

Strategic plan and external audit

KASHTA acknowledges the importance of the community participation in the Saudi desert. It aims to involve all groups of the community in order to develop a balanced representation in its effort to be named the best tourist hotel in the entire area (Lorenzen 236). The KASHTA is intended to create an impact on the services offered to tourists in the desert, so that they get satisfaction from camping, food and entertainment offered by the hotel. The plan is intended for the owners and the Saudi Tourism Association for desert explorations. The plan incorporates a number of strategic result areas. All the strategic areas are established by their own mini-vision, priorities, strategies, action steps and measures of success.

Art and cultural

Inculcation of the culture and art of the Saudi community forms a basic part of KASHTA. The hotel will take into account for Saudi art and culture. If the art of the Saudi community is made a part of the business agenda, the business will benefit, so does the community (Lorenzen 237). Community members will have the opportunity to demonstrate its art. KASHTA hotel will engage in educating tourists on different arts and cultures of the Saudi community. The business will engage its management team in assessing the local cultural landscape and the value it stores for the community. After that, the company shall device mechanisms that will help in recognition and identification of the importance of culture. The company shall develop strategies and ways to develop more sustainable funding sources for art and culture (Lorenzen 238).

The art and culture mini-vision

The soul of a community or society is vested in its art and culture. KASHTA is the cultural core of the Saudi Arabia. Cultural tourism is responsible for the economic growth in Saudi Arabia. The community is attributed for its internationally recognized social events. These events bring significant benefits to the tourism industry (Lorenzen 246). KASHTA is determined to work round the clock in ensuring that it is the leading in art education. It will ensure that the population is all rounded and facilitated with high creativity levels and critical thinking capacities.

Art and social priorities

The priority is to assimilate the business into the modern art and cultural landscape.

• Rationale: to understand the current scope of art and culture practiced in Saudi Arabia and its impact socially and economically. The company should know where it is headed through knowing where it stands.
• Strategy: KASHTA will hire or engage an organization such as the Saudi social development centre to carry out community economic impact study.
• Action measures: assessing the current cultural landscape of KASHTA. The priorities involved are to follow the guidance of the Saudi educational group in developing a consumer art for the business. The time involved is supposed to be one year, and the resource option is owner’s funding, private philanthropy and public funding among others.
• Measures of success: full understanding of the art and culture of the Saudi community with information of particular demographic, economic impact and qualification of the area. Carrying out a complete evaluation and sending copies to all business stakeholders.
• Priority 2: explore the feasibility of the business to create and designate a KASHTA cultural district.
• Rationale: an economic impact study indicates that an art and cultural district form a powerful tool for advancing the business upwards economically.
• Strategy: to gain support for the district from community members, government, local organizations, and the art and social stakeholders.
• Action steps: the first action will be to demonstrate how culture and art affect tourism in the desert. This action is placed within the time frame of one year, and the resources will match the resources used in the priority. The second action will be to create an art and culture map. The third action will be to announce an evaluation exercise for the art and cultural district.
• Success measures: the local social authorities will be in agreement with the business creation of art and cultural district. The business community and the stakeholders will show a high understanding of the art and culture of Saudi within the developed district. The business should encounter 80% support from the local communities and social organizations and the Kingdom.

Economic development

The business aims at maintaining financial stability and maintaining a high level of economic development. KASHTA aims at maximizing opportunities in the tourism sector and developing a sustainable tourism culture within the economic factors that maintain the relevance of the hospitality industry (Lorenzen 247). The key services offered by the business are quality camping activities, quality entertainment and quality food. The business, through this strategic plan, aims at always improving these services to ensure continued economic success. One way the company plans to develop on its economic success is through healthy collaborations with other stakeholders such that it will always have a trained workforce that will help in meeting the future expectations. The hotel will prioritize the development of social amenities in the desert such that tourists will be attracted to those facilities (Lorenzen 248). The amenities will create a climate of social interactions, therefore, fulfilling the need for visiting the hotel for camping and recreational activities. KASHTA engages in maintaining and strengthening the desert’s business-friendly environment. The local leadership is an important part of ensuring business success; therefore, the business embarks on forming good relations with the authorities of Saudi Arabia and creating central resources for the business.

Economic growth mini-vision

KASHTA is a diverse business that seeks to utilize its readily accessible resources, such as high quality education, art and culture and tourism industries to generate an inviting environment for foreign tourists to explore the desert experiences.

Economic development priorities

KASHTA expands the capacity of jobs and business creation opportunities.

• Rationale: if the company does not offer job opportunities, there will not be any developments in terms of business. The expansion of opportunities will give a business a chance to attract visitors into the desert and hence create job opportunities. Offering job opportunities will ensure that the community is involved in the business, therefore, there will be an increased revenue turnover.
• Strategy: KASHTA will create a panel that will look into how to create jobs and methods of filling those positions.
• Action steps: the panel will categorize the existing positions and decide on what gaps to fill and what jobs to categorize as high-paying. The company will focus on how to develop a plan that will invite other businesses to the desert, so that it can drive other services to them.
• Measures of success: the chosen panel should create and maintain a spreadsheet of the categorized jobs and monitor their performance and growth.
• Priority 2 stipulates that KASHTA will embark on strategies to improve quality of education in a bid to create a generation that will be efficient in the future.
• Rationale: to ensure that the workforce is educated, so that it attracts business.
• Strategy: KASHTA will focus on expanding educational opportunities by assessing the need of the business community and balancing the growth opportunities in the economic environment.
• Action steps: create incentives that will encourage people to attend schools and acquire relevant information; partner with schools to facilitate relevant workforce development.
• Measures of success: the expansion of university campuses into education services that touch upon improving services in the tourism industry. An increment in school enrolment will indicate success in attaining the priorities.

Education

KASHTA will engage its operation in the creation of better education centers and more enrolment in these centers. Maintaining elementary schools and inculcating traditional education will ensure that the educational goal is met adequately (Lorenzen 250). The business looks forward to supporting students to achieve higher education results by collaborating with the local systems to ensure that funds are available for such programs.

Education mini-vision

KASHTA involves itself in the production of lifelong, world-class educational opportunities for all residents regardless of education stage. The company engages in maintaining a community that is informed on its social and educational opportunities.

Education priorities

The organization is involved in creating and supporting community that is focused on educational values. It engages in efforts to improve measures of student success.

• Rationale: ensuring coordination of existing resources through all levels of education in the community.
• Strategy: the business will create a leeway for other businesses and the local leadership to support its bid for quality education.
• Action steps: ensure that the relevant stakeholders support the educational values of the community and initiate programs to support the initiative.
• Success measures: within the first two years, stakeholders’ meetings should take place to evaluate different strategies. Members of the group which supports the education agenda will increase by number.

Energy and sustainability

The main success of the business will depend on cost saving measures that the business takes, especially on energy and water. The two recourses are fundamental for the success of the business, therefore, necessitating cost saving services (Lorenzen 250). Energy sources should be affordable and not harmful for the environment. Since the business is established in the desert, solar energy will be the most efficient means of energy provision.

Energy and sustainability mini-vision

KASHTA has a purpose to achieve a successful solar energy program that will help reduce alternative costs of energy.

• Priorities: to ensure that per capita energy consumption is low.
• Rationale: the business minds the future generations, hence, it engages in consumption of environmentally friendly energy. The future generations depend on the availability of clean energy and water.
• Strategy: business engages in the development of a strategy for quality education and funding for the installation of alternative sources of energy.
• Success measures: to see that there is a reduction in the per capita energy and water consumption by 30% , which would indicate that there is increase in the program.

Park and recreation

KASHTA develops parks and recreational facilities for foreign tourists and locals. The recreational services will include camping sites, extensive sports facilities, an aquatic centre, public art, community garden, and an entertainment centre.

Parks and recreation mini-vision

The business develops recreational opportunities for visitors in order to maximize their satisfaction by the services.

• Priorities: the business prioritizes findings that will be used in maintenance of the current existing recreational facilities and production of new ones.
• Rationale: parks and recreational facilities are an important and integral part of KASHTA, therefore, quality of services should be very high.
• Strategy: the company enters into an initiative to re-modernize the camping grounds and the recreational facilities.
• Action steps: make inclusions into the annual budget for funds to maintain, improve, and produce new recreational facilities; KASHTA assimilates new partners in the business such as private corporations; carry out an event exploration in the vicinities of the company such as food festivals.
• Measure of success: one way to measure success is by assessing if the parks are being maintained to the levels of services; another way is to record the new sources of revenue from the recreational activities.

KASHTA SWOT analysis

Strengths:

• KASHTA has an attractive package of tourism products (camping, recreational, entertainment and food);
• It also maintains a good accommodation status with spacious and comfortable services;
• It offers good transport services to its facilities and other major connecting centers;
• It offers a variety of tourist services.

Weaknesses:

• Safety and security measures implementation is slow;
• Poor local population in the desert, hence the lack of sufficient manpower.

Opportunities:

• The company has an opportunity to develop new tourism products and services to supplement the ones already in progress;
• Added advantages to promotion and marketing strategies;
• Eco- and literacy tourism;
• The company has degenerated enough or sufficient government support;
• Degeneration of sufficient support from the surrounding communities.

Threats:

• Political instability in some parts of Saudi Arabia;
• Religion boundaries that affect the tourism business operations;
• Undeveloped infrastructure in the desert;
• Lack of public-private partnership to support total growth of the business.

Ethical and environmental issues

The resort will be built with the involvement of sustainability development techniques and a high emphasis on the environmental protection (Bradford, Duncan and Tarcy 368). In the recent years, tourism in Saudi Arabia has earned great revenues. Many companies, including KASHTA, have laid down strategies that help in realizing and paying attention to critical issues of how the tourism industry sustains environmental factors at a safe mode. One way that KASHTA has employed to make sure that the issues of environment are protected is planting trees. The company has a strategy to implement the planting of trees in order to facilitate a clean and safe environment. The company distributes seedlings to the local community in order to encourage them to plant the trees and take care of them. It does not engage in building of golf courses, because they consume a large quantities of water, and hence may pose a future challenge of water shortage.

The company has formalized strategies that will help it in support of Saudi’s environmental conferences. It has set out a local fund that helps in the development of environmental measures to curb unethical environmental issues (Bradford, Duncan and Tarcy 369). KASHTA has laid down strategies that will help to preserve a clean environment and clean air within the society it carries out its business and the Saudi Arabia on the whole. It recognizes the efforts of other stakeholders who try to help in the creation of a better environment. KASHTA has an implementation strategy that will allow it to adhere to international and national regulations that are set in order to control firms and make them responsible for caring for the environment. It has resorted to using renewable energy sources.

Global issues

People do not often think of the desert areas that are found in Saudi Arabia as tourist attraction centers. Saudi Arabia is a famous country for its wealth in oil. It is also famous for the discrimination of the female generation (Bradford, Duncan and Tarcy 371). There are several global issues that may affect the nature of business for KASHTA as a tourist centre. The first issue is the intricacies of the Saudi visas. There are no visas meant for tourists in Saudi Arabia, which means the sponsorship of visas by tour licensed companies is not a part of Saudi culture. However, the existing five companies that have such mandates also discriminate the tourists on the grounds of nationality (Bradford, Duncan and Tarcy 371). The harsh conditions do not encourage global tourism in Saudi Arabia. Such harsh conditions include restrictions imposed on women who visit the Kingdom, for example, they should be 30 years and above or married and accompanied by their husbands. Visitors to Saudi Arabia are also discriminated on the basis of their religion.

Despite the global issues, there is a high likelihood that the policies will change, and tourists will have better conditions to visit any destination in Saudi Arabia. The Saudi tourism commission is working hard in order to come up with relevant policies that will guide individual tourists and group tourists on their visit to Saudi. There is also an initiative to invest in various projects that are seen as tourist attraction centers, which are aimed at improving tourism projects in Saudi Arabia. For example, the construction of the five international museums will open leeway for many tourists in the Kingdom. The Saudi leadership has discovered the immense economic benefits of tourism. This sector will help to reduce the rates of unemployment in Saudi Arabia.

Conclusion

KASHTA is a new business that aims to introduce the concept of traditional outdoor experiences in Saudi Arabia. It will be providing tourism facilities to foreign and local tourists who visit the desert in Saudi Arabia. The tourist services will include entertainment, food and camping for international tourists. The business is devoted to an aim of becoming the best one in the entire Saudi Arabia. It has a purpose of brining a different experience to tourists who visit the Kingdom. This strategic business plan is important to the business, because it produces a common outcome approach that reconciles the outcomes of the venture. The objective, which KASHTA has set to help to achieve its goals, is to reach a high level of the community participation in the Saudi desert. It involves all parts of the community in order to enhance a balanced representation in its effort to be named the best tourist hotel in the entire region. The plan incorporates a number of strategic result areas. All the strategic areas are created by their own mini-vision, priorities, strategies, action steps and measures of success. The resort will be built with the involvement of sustainability development methods and much importance will be attributed to the environmental protection. As regards visa conditions, there are no visas meant for tourists in Saudi Arabia, which means the sponsorship of visas by licensed tour companies is not a part of Saudi culture. Despite this, it is highly likely that the policies will change, and tourists will have better opportunities to visit any Saudi destination. The Saudi tourism commission is working hard in order to come up with relevant policies that will guide individual tourists and group tourists on their visit to Saudi Arabia.

Works Cited

Bradford, Robert, Peter Duncan and Brian Tarcy. Simplified Strategic Planning: A No-Nonsense guide for Busy People Who Want Results Fast. Worcester, MA: Chandler House, 2000. Print.

Fahey, Liam, and V. K. Narayman. Macroenvironmental Analysis for Strategic Management (The West Series in Strategic Management). St. Paul, MN: West Publishing. 1986. Print.

Lorenzen, Michael. “Strategic Planning for Academic Library Instructional Programming”. Illinois Libraries 86. 2 (2006): 22-29. Print.