David Jones Management Case Study

Report writing on the case of David Jones management

Prepared by Nisarg Patel

David Jones is one of largest departmental store in Australia. It was established in 1838. Since 176 years the Australian retail market has undergone drastic changes. According to my suggestion the best model of planned change that suits David Jones case study is the positive model of planned change. The positive model, as it appears from its name is based on the positive mentality. It pays emphasis on that things will better in the future and that present going things are not bad. Thus to lead the company using this model there is no need of faults in the present conditions. The use of positive model can be done at any point of time with expectation of making conditions better in future and perfection can always be achieved. This model focuses on the betterment of things that working properly then on things that are not working. In order to initiate the enquiry occurrence of problem is not required. The initiation of enquiry can be done any time for better future of the company. David Jones departmental stores should indentify its strengths. They should magnify their strength and prepare itself for an ideal future. They should achieve their future expectations by designing different ways to accomplish their target. In order to meet the required future expectation, implementation of their plan is carried out properly. It is easy to focus on strength and improve it than trying to decrease errors or weakness because people of the organization are highly motivated to deliver superior products or results due to its positive vibe. The positive model of planned change is based on concept of appreciative enquiry and expectation theory. It involves primary development of their strength to the highest level. To increase the efficiency of positive model of planned change in case of David Jones, they should make use of wide range of diagnostic tools to deal with the current scenario along with improving their strength to maximum (Ashton 2010).

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David Jones brought many changes in itself to achieve their desired future of being one of the largest store chains across Australia. The implementation of new strategy is not easy because there is always resistance to change. The change is always accompanied with low output, frequent quarrels, slowdown of overall process. In order to overcome the resistance to change, organization should follow certain solutions. The management should always encourage staff to come up with new ideas and should listen to their feedback on it. The solution of problem lies in its root cause. The management should focus on finding out what are the actual problem and its source. In many cases the problem is the social change of employees and their relationships. (Lawrence 1969)

The management sometimes only pays emphasis the technical aspects of the change and neglects the social change. The social change being the root leads to magnification of the technical issue. Thus the amount of effects required to overcome the resistance of change increase. The best solution for overcoming social change is use of emotional intelligence. The basic definition of emotional intelligence can be the skill to monitor others and your own emotions and feelings, to differentiate between them and use all this information to guide action and thoughts. The change in an organization is very emotionally demanding. Thus use of emotional intelligence is necessary. The emotional intelligence is acquired by age and years of experience. The use of emotional intelligence during decision making is helpful to successfully execute the change and the emotions can be regulated. Whenever there is a change, the management should have knowledge about the employee’s behavior, feelings, thoughts, etc (YBARRA and KROSS 2014)

I agree with the decisions made by the management and the changes they brought in the organization were needed urgently. The introduction of the bridal boutique at the seventh floor of building of David Jones departmental store located in central business district of Sydney. That is an example of innovation. The David Jones store is delivering a totally new perspective of bridal wear. They are the pioneers of this new trend in the retail market. This strategic move will boost their sales and help them to build their image in market. Innovation is necessary for company to survive in the modern retail market at global level. The overall changes made at David Jones are perfect and I totally agree with it. My suggestion in this case is that they should open theme bridal boutique at other major cities like Melbourne, Brisbane, etc. The other thing I would like to suggest is that david jones should set two different cloth line for different segment of people. The one such be economical and the other one should be exclusive superior range. They should take inspiration from Toyota. Toyota has owns two brands of itself, one is Lexus and other is Toyota. ( adam 2010)

This concept might boost the sales and market position of david jones in Australia. The celebrity events that david jones organize are great. These events are successful in attracting customers. These events project david jones at a gobal level. The store keeps on updating according to customer needs. David jones introduced many international brands to Australian grounds. The management’s decision in the past to take it online has now bloomed. The company is having 190% growth in 3Q14. This result proves the effectiveness of decision. The customers should be always satisfied with the company. (ASX AND MEDIA RELEASE 2011)

The company has a corporate transformation and that will bring a change corporation wide across the whole company. The company needs to boost its corporate revenue in order to survive in the modern retail market. The company should focus building a stronger corporate reputation in the Australian retail market. Overall the company should maintain their position as the leading fashion retail store across whole Australia. Thus the company needs to bring a change corporation wide rather than focusing on change in a particular department. The company should implement new management technique that ensures the optimum use of the area of strength of the company. The top level executives should make sure that the corporate principals are followed by the staff. The decision making should be effective and done by futuristic ideas. The management should think for long-term investment. It will help them to build a better future for the company. The management should cover the all perspective of present and future business. The management should understand the importance of the strength of the company. The better future can only be achieved by continuous innovation. The company has to incorporate higher values of work. They should continuously bring new concept and replace the older ineffective concepts. The company brings a customer-driven innovation and achieves maximum excellence. There should be overall development in the emerging markets. The company has to keep on analyzing the current market and continuously focus on improvement. The goal of the management should be increasing the strength business foundation. The change made should provide a drastic progress in the market. The financial growth is essential for the company. The stakeholder of company should be satisfied by the progress of the company and increase corporate value of the company. By doing this the company will be able to gain trust of the stakeholder and will have a better market value. (Harner 2011)

The success of the corporate transformation depends on the long term solution it provides. The corporate transformation is based on the understanding of the processes and the principles. The transformation should not be made just quick fix the problems. There should be no use negative solutions such laying off employees, selling off under pressure, etc. This thing creates a false impression of the company in the market and adversely affects the market price and value. The corporate transformation is all about thinking, planning and acting in new ways. The effective transformation us the one which gives ability to grow and sustain the company under market crisis. The change has to be deep rooted not just the superficial. The transformation is only successful when it is based on perspective of the total company. The top level management should a vision of better future and should focus on implementation of the changes throughout the company. The corporate transformation is a coordinated process. It may involve short term loses. The new formed business strategy should boost the sales. The top level management should analyze problems; evaluate strengths, weakness and resources available to the company. (Krishnan 2008)

According to my view coercive style of management is used by Paul Zahra, the CEO of David Jones. The use of incremental and collaborative method of change causes conflicting views and ideology in many cases. Thus leads to chaos and is often time consuming. The use of dictatorial transformation and forced evolution is a better option. In case of David Jones there was scope of time so forced evolution was used. If the change in made within the time limit than more successful. Paul Zahra took decision on the perfect time to take the store online. The results today show 190% growth in their online segment. The other changes made were for betterment of the company. The company has progressed a lot over the time period.

REFERENCE LIST

Aston, 2010, viewed on 16 august 2014, http://ashtonfourie.com/blog1/2010/04/29/comparison-of-three-major-change-models/

Paul R. Lawrence, 1969, viewed on 16 august 2014, http://hbr.org/1969/01/how-to-deal-with-resistance-to-change

OSCAR YBARRA, ETHAN KROSS, JEFFREY SANCHEZ-BURKS, the Academy of Management Perspectives 2014, Vol. 28, No. 2, 93–107, THE “BIG IDEA” THAT IS YET TO BE: TOWARD A MORE MOTIVATED, CONTEXTUAL, AND DYNAMIC MODEL OF EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE, viewed on 16 august 2014, http://dx.doi.org/10.5465/amp.2012.0106

ADAM FISHER, 2010, Toyota and Lexus: a tale of twin brand, viewed on 17 august 2014, http://www.cbsnews.com/news/toyota-and-lexus-a-tale-of-twin-brands/

ASX AND MEDIA RELEASE, 2011,viewed on 17 august 2014, http://www.davidjones.com.au/~/media/David-Jones/Corporate/ASX-and-Media/2011/Jan_11_JAN.ashx

Stephen harner, 2011, Key to Corporate Transformation: Ten Decisions Actions, viewed on 18 august 2014, http://www.forbes.com/sites/stephenharner/2011/05/16/key-to-corporate-transformation-ten-decisions-an-actions/

Priti Krishnan, 2008, Corporate Transformation, Icfai Books, viewed on 18 august 2014, http://www.ibscdc.org/businesscasebooks-pdfs/Corporate%20Transformation.pdf