3

Environmental Analysis

“Businesses and managers are now faced with highly dynamic and ever more
complex operating environments.” - Robert Paton.

3.1 The Concept of Organizational Environment

Organizational environment is always dynamic. It is ever changing.
Changes today are so frequent and every change brings so many
challenges that it is highly essential for managers and leaders of Environment of an
the organization to be vigilant about the environmental changes. organization consists
Every organization, whether business or non-business, has its own of its surroundings –
environment. Environment of an organization consists of its anything that affects
its operations,
surroundings – anything that affects its operations, favorably or favorably or
unfavorably. Environment embraces such abstract thing as unfavorably.
organization’s image and such remote visible issues as economic
conditions of the country and political situations. The environmental
forces –abstracts and visibles – need a careful analysis. Systematic
and adequate analysis produces information necessary for making
judgments about what strategy to pursue. Managers cannot make
appropriate and sound strategy simply on the basis of their guesses
and instincts. They must use relevant information that directly flows
from the analysis of their organization’s environment.

3.2: Understanding Environmental Influences

Business managers must understand the various facets of the Managers are
impacts of external environment. They need to recognize that benefited in several
external environment has many aspects that can have significant ways when they have
impact on the operations of a firm. They need to undertake analysis a deep understanding
of environment on a regular basis. This is particularly important for and appreciation of
the impact of
the reason that developments/changes in the remote environment1 environmental factors
influence the business organizations. They also need to understand on business.
the influences of changes in the industry environment. Managers
are benefited in several ways when they have a deep
understanding and appreciation of the impact of environmental
factors on business:
1
Remote environment refers to general external environment, as apposed to ‘specific
environment’ or industry environment.
 42 Strategic Management / Dr. M A Mannan

• Knowledge of environment helps mangers identify the

direction to which they should proceed. They will travel along
with a distinct way of changing direction, whenever necessary.
Managers can Without an understanding of environment, managers are like a
develop crisis plans bicycle without a handlebar – no way of maneuvering while
for overcoming crises
that affect riding on a street.
organization.
• Managers can isolate those factors, especially in the
external environment, which are of specific interest to the
organization.
• Managers can take preparation to deal with predicted crisis
in any of the factors in the environment. They can develop crisis
plans for overcoming crises that affect organization.
• The key to achieving organizational effectiveness is
understanding of the environment in which the firm operates its
businesses. No knowledge or inadequate knowledge is very
likely to lead managers to ineffectiveness because of ‘running
on the wrong road for reaching the goals.’

3.3 Types of Organizational Environment

We can classify the organizational environment into two broad
categories. These are:
1. External environment, and
2. Internal environment
An organization’s operations are affected by both the types of
An organization’s environment. Therefore, it is essential for the managers to make in-
operations are depth analysis of the elements of the environments so that they can
affected by both the develop in themselves an understanding of the internal and
types of environmentexternal situations. Based on their understanding, they will be
–internal and better able to set required objectives for their organizations and
external.
formulate appropriate strategies to achieve those objectives.

This chapter has two major sections: Section A deals with the
analysis of the external environment and Section B discusses the
analysis of internal environment.

Section A:
Analysis of External Environment

3.4 External Environment: Meaning and Nature

External environment consists of an organization’s external factors
that affect its businesses indirectly. The organization has no or little
control over these factors. The external environmental factors
C H A P T E R 3 Environmental Analysis 43
reside outside the organization, which can lead to opportunities or
threats. For convenience of analysis, we can divide external
environmental factors into two groups: (a) general environment (or
remote environment), and (b) industry environment (or immediate The strategy-makers
operating environment). The strategy-makers must understand the must understand the
challenges and complexities of both the remote environmental challenges and
factors and the immediate operating environmental factors. They complexities of both
the remote
need to appreciate that the remote environmental factors are environmental factors
largely uncontrollable because of their distantly located external and the immediate
nature. However, they can undertake appropriate strategies to deal operating
with these factors, usually collectively with other actors in the environmental
industry, to reduce the intensity of their impact on the businesses. factors.
On the other hand, the operating environmental factors are those in
the immediate competitive situations of a company. These are often
regarded as ‘task environment’ or ‘specific environment.’ These
factors basically constitute the competitive environment of a
company. When strategists take into cognizance of both the remote
and operating environments, they can become more proactive in
strategic planning and more dynamic in grabbing opportunities. In
the following discussions, you will find a broad description of
general environment. The industry environment (operating
environment) will be discussed in chapter 4.

3.5 The General Environment

The general environment includes the distant factors in the external
environment that are general or common in nature. Its impact on We can use
the operations of the firm, its competitors and customers make its PESTLED model for
the identification and
analysis imperative. We can use PESTLED model for the analysis of the factors
identification and analysis of the factors in the general environment. in the general
PESTLED Model covers political, economic, sociocultural, environment.
technological, legal, environmental (natural), and demographic
aspects. Some authors prefer to use each factor as ‘environment’
such as political environment, economic environment etc. In this
book, we will use both the term interchangeably.
A list of the general environmental factors is given below:
Factor-wise PESTLED Environment-wise PESTLED
Political factors Political environment
Economic factors Economic environment
Sociocultural factors Sociocultural environment
Technological factors Technological environment
Legal factors Legal environment
Environmental (natural) Environment (natural)
factors Demographic environment
Demographic factors
The government of a
country intervenes in
Political environment: The government of a country intervenes in the national economy
through setting
the national economy through setting policies/rules for business. In policies/rules for
business.
 44 Strategic Management / Dr. M A Mannan

our country, we see many such policies – import policy, export

policy, taxation policy, investment policy, drug policy, competition
policy, consumer protection policy etc. Sometimes, the government
pursues nationalization policy for state ownership of business.
Some countries, such as India, pursue state-driven mercantilism to
reduce imports and increase exports. Some countries have
liberalized their own economy and shifted from centrally managed
economy to capitalist economy or welfare economy. In Bangladesh,
the successive governments are emphasizing more on privatization
rather than on state ownership. As global competition has
increased, the government has also liberalized its trade policies to
Government agencies be in line with the WTO agreements.2 Another important issue is
and pressure groups
are also exercising political stability that affects operations of business firms
influences on substantially. Even decision about investment is highly affected by
business operations political stability. We have seen in Bangladesh how political
of firms that have instability has in the past affected investment and trading in the
political character. country. In many other countries also, political instability or political
disturbances substantially affected businesses, such as Sri Lanka
(civil war with LTTE), Nepal (mass upsurge by the Maoist activists),
Pakistan and Afghanistan (terrorist activities) and Argentina (default
in international debt).
In addition, government agencies and pressure groups are also
exercising influences on business operations of firms that have
political character. Managers must be able to understand the
implications of the activities of these agencies and groups.
Government agencies include different ministries, the office of the
Controller of Imports and Exports, Board of Investment, National
Board of Revenue, etc. Pressure groups include Consumers
Association of Bangladesh, various Chambers of Commerce and
Industry, Employers’ Associations, and the like. Since the pressure
groups put restraints on the business managers, managers should
have clear ideas about the actions of these groups.
Economic environment: A country’s economic well-being affects
market attractiveness. Several economic variables are relevant in
determining business opportunities. There is thus a need to analyze
economic environment prudently by the business firms. Economic
The economy of a
environment comprises a distinct variable with which management
country can be in a must be concerned. The economy of a country can be in a situation
situation of boom or of boom or recession or depression or recovery or it may be in a
recession or state of fluctuation. Managers/strategy-makers must have the ability
depression or to predict the state of the economy. The performance of business
recovery or it may be
in a state of
organizations is affected by the health of a nation’s economy. This
fluctuation. warrants the necessity of studying the economic environment to
identify changes, trends and their strategic implications.

2
The World Trade Organization (WTO) was created on 01 January 1995 through
abolition of GATT. Bangladesh is one of the first signatories to the WTO Agreements.
For details about WTO, its functions, agreements and other relevant issues, readers may
visit its web site: www.wto.org
C H A P T E R 3 Environmental Analysis 45
Business organizations operate their businesses in markets
consisting of people. These people are likely to become customers
when they have purchasing power. And purchasing power depends
on income, prices, savings, debt and availability of credit.
Therefore, business organizations must pay attention to the income
and consumption patterns of the customers. However, all the
economic variables in the economy must be treated holistically for
clear envisioning of the entire economy and the market.
Socio-cultural environment: Socio-cultural forces include culture,
lifestyle changes, social mobility, attitudes towards technology, and Socio-cultural forces
people’s values, opinion, beliefs etc. These forces dictate a include culture,
particular set of values and attitudes with resultant lifestyles. A lifestyle changes,
society’s values and attitudes form the cornerstone of a society. social mobility,
attitudes towards
They often drive the other conditions and changes. The demand for technology, and
many products changes with the changes in social attitudes. people’s values,
Socio-cultural factors differ across countries. In many countries, opinion, beliefs etc.
worker diversity is now a common phenomenon. We find in some
countries the increasing life span of population, trend toward fewer
children, movement of population from rural areas to urban areas,
increasing rate of female education, entry of more and more
women into the mainstream workforce, etc. All these have a
primary effect on a country’s social character and health. Therefore,
it is very important for managers of business organizations to study
and predict the impact of social and cultural changes on the future
of business operations in terms of meeting consumer needs and
interests. Business firms must offer products in the society that
correspond to its values and attitudes.
Technological environment: Technological dimensions include
information technology, the Internet, biotechnology, global transfer
of technology and so forth. None can deny the fact that the pace of Technological
change in these technological dimensions is extremely fast. dimensions include
Technological changes substantially affect firm’s operations in information
many ways. Advancement of industrialization in any country technology, the
depends mostly on technological environment. Technology has Internet,
biotechnology, global
major impacts on product development, manufacturing efficiencies, transfer of technology
and potential competition. The business organizations that face and so forth
problems with changing or unstable technology are always in
difficulties in terms of predictability than those organizations that
have stable technologies. The effects of technological changes
occur primarily through new products, processes and materials. An
entire industry may be transformed or revitalized due to use of new
technology.
Strategy formulation is linked to technological changes. An
intelligent response to the ever-increasing technological advances
should be entrepreneurial rather than reactive.3 Strategic managers
need to monitor developments in technology for their particular
industry when formulating strategy. Quick and thorough study of
3
S. C. Bhattacharya, Strategic Management: Concepts and Cases, op. cit., p. 21.
 46 Strategic Management / Dr. M A Mannan

technological changes helps managers achieve higher market

share because of early adoption of new technology. A firm must be
aware of technological changes to avoid obsolescence and
promote innovation. It means that strategy managers of an
organization must be adept in technological forecasting.
Technological forecasting can protect and improve the profitability
of firms in growing industries.
Legal environment: The legal environment consists of laws and
regulatory framework in a country. There are many laws that
regulate the business operations of enterprises such as the Labor
Code, Factories Act, Industrial Relations Ordinance, the Contract
Act, and the Company law, just to name a few. Business laws
The legal
environment consistsprimarily protect companies from unfair competition, and also
protect the consumers from unfair business practices. Business
of laws and regulatory
framework in a laws also protect the society at large. The laws regarding merger,
country. acquisitions, industry regulation, employment conditions,
unionization, workmen’s compensation and the like affect a firm’s
strategy. Even globalization has caused significant repercussions
on the legal environment. Thus, the business mangers must have
thorough knowledge about the major laws that protect the business
enterprises, consumers and the society.
Natural environment: Strategy-makers need to analyze the trends
in the natural environment of the country where it is operating its
business. The most pertinent issues in the natural environment that
strategy-makers should consider include the availability of raw
materials and other inputs, changes in the cost of energy, levels of
environmental pollution, and the changing role of government in
environmental protection. Changes in physical/natural environment,
such as global warming, will heavily affect our daily lives and the
functioning of our organizations with a variety of consequences.
Demographic environment: The demographic environment is
concerned with a country’s population. Specifically, it is related to
population’s size, age structure, geographic distribution, ethnic mix
and income distribution. With over six billion population,4 the
demographic changes are evident all over the world. In some
countries there is negative population growth and in some countries
The demographic couples are averaging fewer than two children. In general, average
environment is age is increasing. In many countries, rural-urban migration is
concerned with a rampant. These trends suggest numerous opportunities for firms to
country’s population.
develop products and services to meet the needs of diversified
groups of people in the society. Strategy-makers must make an
analysis of the demographic issues, especially, size and growth
rate of population, age distribution, ethnic mix, educational level,
household patterns, and inter-regional movements.
In fine, we can say that all of the above external environmental
factors are interrelated. Therefore, strategy-makers need to analyze

4
The world’s population reached six billion in October 1999.
C H A P T E R 3 Environmental Analysis 47
all of them in an interrelated fashion to understand and visualize the
‘whole of the environment.’

3.6 How Do Organizations Respond to External

Environment?
Environmental factors influence the businesses in many ways. The
influences may be positive or negative. There are some forces in
the environment that may retard the growth of a business It is essential for the
organization. Similarly, there are some forces that may give a strategy managers to
sudden boost to the growth of an organization. It is, therefore, understand the
essential for the strategy managers to understand the importance importance of
environmental
of environmental influences on the operations of their businesses. influences on the
Based on such understanding, they can devise ways to respond to operations of their
the environmental forces. businesses.
A business organization can employ several ways to respond to its
environment. We discuss here some common measures.
1. Lobbying: Companies can hire strong lobbyists to bargain
with regulators to change any law or to refrain them from
enacting new law that may adversely affect business activities.
Federation of Bangladesh Chambers and Commerce and
Industry (FBCCI) is a very influential lobbyist. FBCCI
representatives often undertake efforts to influence government
agencies/ ministries /committees.
2. Influencing customers: Organizations can influence their
customers in different ways. Managers may devise new uses of
a product. They may create new set of a product. They may
create new set of customers for products or they may direct
their efforts toward taking customers away from competitors.
3. Influencing suppliers: One of the ways to directly influence
environment is to establish a long-lasting relationship with
suppliers. Organizations can do it by signing long-term contracts
with fixed prices. This would serve as a hedge against inflation.
Organizations can also protect itself from supply-related crisis
by establishing backward linkage (that is, producing their own
materials). For example, a mineral water firm may start
producing bottles by itself or a soft-drink/fruit-processing firm
might become its own supplier of cans. A person is called a
boundary spanner
4. Boundary spanning: A firm may engage itself in boundary who collects
spanning for learning about what other organizations are doing. information from
A person is called a boundary spanner who collects information outside the
organization while
from outside the organization while he/she is working in the he/she is working in
field. Salespeople, purchasing agents, relationship manages are the field.
most suitable as boundary spanners.
5. Environmental scanning: Organizations can influence
external environment based on information collected through
 48 Strategic Management / Dr. M A Mannan

regular observation and analysis. This is known as

environmental scanning. When followed, environmental
scanning can actively monitor the environment. Using both
boundary spanner and environmental scanning organizations
can gather and organize relevant information for assisting
managers in making decisions.
6. Strategic response: A firm may alter its strategy to deal
with the environmental changes. The strategy-alteration may
take any of the forms: slight change in the strategy; adopting an
entirely new strategy; or maintain status quo. Which one would
In order to enter into
better meet the demands of its competitive environment
new markets or depends on situations that prevail.
uphold prominence in
the current market or 7. Organizational combinations: In order to enter into new
for some other markets or uphold prominence in the current market or for some
strategic reasons, a other strategic reasons, a firm may resort to merger, acquisition,
firm may resort to takeover or alliance. Two or more firms may combine together
merger, acquisition,
(merge) to create a new firm. A firm may buy another firm to
takeover or alliance.
acquire its assets. In the case of acquisition (or takeover), the
acquired firm may continue to operate as a subsidiary of the
acquiring firm, or the acquired (taken-over) firm may cease to
exist and become part of the acquiring company. When two or
more firms undertake a new venture, it becomes a joint venture
or strategic alliance (if the venture is of cooperative in nature).

Section B
Analysis of Internal Environment

3.7 Internal Environment: Meaning and Elements

The internal environment of an organization consists of the
conditions and forces that exist within the organization. Internal
environment portrays an organization’s ‘in-house’ situations. An
The internal
organization has full control over these situations. Unlike the
environment of an
organization consistsexternal environment, internal environment is much more directly
of the conditions andcontrollable. It includes various internal factors of the organization
forces that exist such as resources, owners/shareholders, board of directors,
within the employees and trade union, goodwill, and corporate culture. These
organization.
factors are detailed out below.
1. Resources of the organization: An organization’s
resources can be discussed under five broad heads: physical
resources, human resources, financial resources, informational
resources and technological resources. Physical resources
include land and buildings, warehouses, all kinds of materials,
equipments and machinery. Examples are office buildings,
computers, furniture, fans and airconditioners. Human
resources include all employees of the organization from the top
C H A P T E R 3 Environmental Analysis 49
level to the lowest level of the organization. Examples are
teachers in a university, marketing executives in a
manufacturing company, and manual workers in a factory.
Financial resources include capital used for financing the
operations of the organization including working capital.
Examples are investment by owners, profits, reserve funds, and
revenues received. Informational resources encompass ‘usable
data needed to make effective decisions.’ Examples are sales
forecasts, price lists from suppliers, market-related data,
employee profile and production reports.
2. Owners/stockholders: Owners of an organization may be Owners of an
organization may be
an individual in the case of a sole proprietorship business, an individual in the
partners in a partnership firm, shareholders or stockholders in a case of a sole
limited company or members in a cooperative society. In public proprietorship
enterprises, the government of the country is the owner. business, partners in
Whoever the owners, they are an integral part of the a partnership firm,
shareholders or
organization’s internal environment. Owners play an important stockholders in a
role in influencing the affairs of the business. This is the reason limited company or
why managers should take more care of the owners. members in a
cooperative society.
3. Board of Directors: In our country every registered
company (private or public limited company) must have a board
of directors as per the Companies Act, 1994. What would be the
number of directors in the board is stipulated in the company’s
Articles of Association. They are responsible for top-level
strategy making and providing directions to the company. They
are strategic decision-makers and planners. They oversee and
monitor the overall functioning of the company. Some
organizations have no board of directors, rather they have
‘board of trustees’ (such as in a university or charitable
organization or a hospital) or ‘Managing Committee’ (such as in
an NGO or non-government school) or a Governing Body (such
as in a college).
4. Organization’s culture: An organization’s culture is viewed
as the foundation of its internal environment. Organizational (or
corporate) culture significantly influences employee behavior.
Strong culture helps a
Culture is important to every employee including managers who
firm achieve its goals
work in the organization. Strong culture helps a firm achieve its better than a firm
goals better than a firm having a weak culture. Culture in an having a weak
organization develops and ‘blossoms’ over many years, starting culture.
from the practices of the founder(s). Since culture is an
important internal environmental concern for an organization,
managers need to understand its influence on organizational
activities.
5. Organization’s image/goodwill: Reputation of an
organization is a very valuable intangible asset. High reputation
or goodwill develops a favorable image of the organization in
the minds of the public (so to say, in the minds of the
customers). ‘No-reputation’ cannot create any positive image.
 50 Strategic Management / Dr. M A Mannan

Negative image destroys the organization’s efforts to attract

customers in a competitive world.

Analysis of the internal environment (or microenvironment) of an

organization is an essential part of situation analysis. The situation
of an organization, whether business or any other type of
When an analysis is
organization, is expressed in terms of its internal and external
made of both the environmental factors. When an analysis is made of both the types
types of internal andof internal and external environments, managers can have a clear
external environment, idea of the overall situation of the organization. External
managers can have environmental
a factors reside outside of the organization and,
clear idea of the
therefore, depict the external situation. The internal environmental
overall situation of the
organization. factors reside inside the organization and, therefore, portray the
internal situation. Internal environmental analysis (some prefer to
call it simply ‘internal analysis’) helps managers identify the internal
strengths and weaknesses in respect of various internal
environmental factors. Analysis is made of each factor in different
areas of the organization.

3.8 Areas Usually Covered by Internal Analysis

Internal analysis is made of various internal issues of a company.
Depending on the nature of the company, the following major
specific issues need to be covered in the analysis:5
• Financial position
• Product and service positions
• Product and service quality
• Marketing capability
• Research and development capability
• Organization structure
• Human resources
• Conditions of facilities and equipment
Every area of a • Past and present objectives and strategies
company that has • And many more
substantial impact on
In fact, every area of a company that has substantial impact on the
the long-term survival
of the company long-term survival of the company should be analyzed to determine
the strengths and weaknesses of each area. A framework for
should be analyzed to
determine the internal environmental analysis is shown in Figure 3.1. This
strengths and
framework indicates several sample questions that need to be
weaknesses of each
area. addressed while making an internal analysis. These are actually
important considerations for identification of strengths and
weaknesses of an organization.

Framework for Internal Analysis

Strengths Weaknesses
A distinctive competence? No clear vision?
Adequate financial resources? Poor strategic direction?
5
L. L. Byars, L. W. Rue and S. A. Zahra, Strategic Management (Chicago: IRWIN,
1996, p. 89).
C H A P T E R 3 Environmental Analysis
Excellent competitive skills?
Positive image of the
company?
Access to economies of
scale?
Proprietary technology?
Cost advantages?
Competitive advantages?
Product innovation abilities?
Good leadership and
management?
Achieved market leadership?
Well-crafted functional
strategies?
51
Obsolete machinery?
Lack of managerial talent?
Lack of competencies?
Poor track record in strategy
implementation?
Falling behind in research and
development?
Narrow product line?
Weak market image?
Competitive disadvantages?
Poor marketing skills?
Inadequate working capital?

Figure 3.1: A sample framework for internal analysis of a company

3.9 Conducting Internal Analysis: Who to Do It?

The task of assigning the responsibility for performing internal
environmental analysis may not be similar in all organizations.
The task of assigning
Evidence shows that practices differ from organization to the responsibility for
organization. Usually the following practices are prevalent in performing internal
different organizations: environmental
analysis may not be
 Involvement of Planning Department: Some similar in all
organizations involve the Planning Department for conducting organizations.
the analysis of internal environment. The staffs in the planning
department are expected to be proficient in such analysis.
They gather information and then make analysis of the internal
situations.
 Use of Outside Consultants: Some
organizations use independent consultants for conducting
internal analysis. The expert consultants have experience in
performing such activities. They can also give impartial view of
the situations, which the internal staffs of the planning Some organizations
department or other persons may not give. form a team of line
managers with
 Forming of Team: Some organizations form a relevant experience.
team of line managers with relevant experience. Usually such
a team performs the analysis in collaboration with the planning
staffs who provide technical assistance. The underlying
philosophy behind using team approach is that the line
mangers will be better able to understand the implications of
the analysis and they will be in a better position to guide their
strategic planning decisions.

3.10 Concluding Remarks

An analysis of external environment provides the managers with
information about external opportunities and threats (OT). On the
52 Strategic Management / Dr. M A Mannan

other hand, an analysis of internal environment generates

information about the organization’s internal strengths and
weaknesses (SW). It means that the managers can identify their
organization’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats
(SWOT) from the overall strategic analysis of the organization.

TERMS USED
Environment
Environmental analysis
Industry analysis
SWOT
Value chain
General environment
Remote environment
PESTLED Model
External analysis
Internal analysis

SAMPLE MULTIPLE CHOICE QUESTIONS

1. For strategy-making we need to undertake
a. external environmental analysis
b. internal environmental analysis
c. industry analysis
d. all of the above
2. External situation analysis of a single-business company is
also known as
a. industry analysis
b. company analysis
c. organizational analysis
d. none of the above
3. Which of the following is not covered in the internal analysis?
a. strategic moves of the competitors
b. strategies adopted and applied by the company itself
c. research and development capability
d. human resources
4. While responding to changing conditions in the context of an
organization, management needs to look at
a. how to take advantage of new opportunities
b. how to lessen the impact of externally imposed threats
c. how to strengthen the mix of the firm’s activities by doing more of
some things and less of others
d. all of the above
5. The external factors shaping may be
a. business philosophies
b. ethical principles of key executives
c. shared values and culture
d. none of above
C H A P T E R 3 Environmental Analysis 53

SAMPLE TRUE-FALSE STATEMENTS

Write down T if a statement is True, or F if a statement is False. Use
the boxes in the second column.
Statements
# T/F
Every organization has the same environment whether it is a
1
business organization or non-business organization.
Regular analysis of environment is particularly important for
2
the reasons that developments in the remote environment
influence the business organizations.
An organization’s operations are affected by external
3
environment, not by internal environment.
A boundary spanner is a person who collects information from
4
outside the organization while he or she is working in the field.
Team is not useful for conducting internal environmental
5
analysis.

SAMPLE SHORT-ANSWER QUESTIONS

1. Why should managers of business organizations clearly
understand the influences of environment on business?
2. Explain the PESTLED Model for analysis of external environment.
3. How do business organizations respond to external environmental
influences?
4. What are the areas usually covered by internal environmental
analysis? Explain them briefly.
5. Prepare a framework for internal analysis of an organization.
6. Who are responsible for conducting internal analysis of
organizations? Which one do you prefer and why?

PRACTICE QUESTIONS

1. Suppose you are responsible in your company for dealing with the
environmental influences. Make a list of the approaches that you
would adopt for dealing with the external influences on your business
enterprise.
2. Talk to the manager of a bank, ask him/her to give you information
regarding various resources of the bank and then prepare a list of the
financial, human, and physical resources of the bank.
3. From the knowledge that you have gained from the study of
internal environmental analysis, you could understand that company
image is a very important internal environmental factor. Explain your
view about the importance of company image on the basis of your
study of a company like the producer of MUM or paper tissue of
Bashundhara.