External environmental scan for organization

Lee’s Sandwiches

Research Proposal

External Environmental Scanning

STR 581

Professor: Kenneth Kobus

Vincent Nguyen

Lee’s Sandwiches

Lee's Sandwiches International, Inc. is an American fast food restaurant that specializes in Vietnamese cuisine. The company is privately run and operates along the Southwest in California, Texas, Nevada, Arizona, Oklahoma, Oregon and Utah. It was founded in the early 80s from humble beginnings ad has grown considerably since then. It initially only offered Vietnamese cuisine to its customers but later diversified by adding Euro-Asian sandwiches to entice a larger market. Majority of its clientele are Vietnamese Americans and other Asian Americans. However, their diversified menu has increasingly enticed a larger market share. For instance, 80% of the customers in California in 2006 were non-Asians. About 20% of customers in Houston were also non-Asian in the same year (Lee's Sandwiches, 2015).

The company has the possibilities of capturing a wider market within the country, but it is restricted by a number of reasons. A strategic plan that highlights these barriers and proposes tentative schemes can be beneficial to the company.

Vision, Mission, People Strategies and Values

The strategic plan will be aimed at the exploitation of a larger and available market. This will be performed through a number of ways that will be based on both external and internal environmental analysis. However, the vision and mission statements of the company will be upheld as well as the people strategies and values.

The strategic plan will be aligned with the vision and mission statements of the company by facilitating horizontal growth under the same principles. The products that the company offers its customers will not be altered but only offered to a larger market segment. The company began its operations in San Jose, CA and has expanded into seven states and over 55 locations (Lee's Sandwiches, 2015). This has been achieved while adhering to the company’s vision and mission statements.

The company is privately owned and operated. The strategy will keep this in mind by proposing approaches that can be performed under this basis. The strategic plan will not be aimed at making the company a national leading entity, but one that still operates on a small scale in new markets. This will mean that the strategies and values are maintained.

Sources of Internal Environmental Analysis

The internal analysis of the company will revolve around its strengths and weaknesses. The sources of information on the internal analysis are more restricted as compared to those of the external analysis (Bhavani, 2002). The first source that will be used will be the financial records of the company. These records are not published because the company is privately run, but show the performance of the company in a way to suggest its strengths and weaknesses.

Another source will be feedback from the employees and the customers. The employees will play the crucial role in this process. It is easier for the employees to participate in this plan, but the customers of a food restaurant may require specialized skills to provide relevant feedback. The employees will be required to provide their unbiased opinions, and use customer service skills to incite information from the customers. They will hence provide information from two sources.

Sources of External Environmental Analysis

The external evaluation will involve political, economic, social and technological analysis. The sources for this form of analysis are more prevalent. However, the sources have to be credible, and their varied nature means that they have to supplement each other (Bhavani, 2002). For instance, a peer-reviewed journal article on the state of the economy has to hold the same perspective as a news articles on the newspaper.

The key sources of information relevant to the external analysis will be articles published in journals and on key media platforms. For instance, Forbes and The Wall Street Journal are credible sources of this form of information. The basis for this is that the strategy will need up to date information to be considered viable. Dated sources such as books will only serve to back the information gathered from these sources.

Conclusion

The strategic plan will review the position of the company and base its provisions on it. The success of these provisions will be attained where the strategy will keep in touch with the values that the privately run company has nurtured through the years. A successful plan would identify how the company can improve its services within its domain.

References

Bhavani, T. A. (2002). Small-Scale Units in the Era of Globalization: Problems and

Prospects. Economic and Political Weekly, 37(29), 3041-3052.

Lee's Sandwiches. (2015, March). Retrieved from Lee's Sandwiches.com: