VIRGIN GROUP

Running Head : Virgin Group

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Date Many factors have come into play in the evolution of the Virgin Group from the small business idea designed to generate capital for a magazine that was not doing well financially (de Vries and Dick , 2007 . A company 's microenvironment is defined as the internal forces that are within the company or the forces close to the company over which it is possible to have control . The microenvironment is composed of internal environment and external environment ( HYPERLINK "http /www

.londonexternal .ac .uk " www .londonexternal .ac .uk

Internal environment includes the firm 's management structure organization 's strategies and objectives and departments within the company . Functions such as manufacturing , purchasing , finance which may include suppliers , marketing intermediaries , competitors and the public who include shareholders and local interest groups form the external environment of a company

Macro-environment refers to the large forces that impact society usually there is little a company can do about them . In effect it is necessary that a company adapts to the opportunities and threats presented by the macro-environment . These forces include demographic forces , economic , legal or political , cultural and natural forces HYPERLINK "http /www .loxternal .ac .uk " www .londonexternal .ac .uk

Both the microenvironment and the macro-environment factors have affected Virgin 's strategic direction . As part of the top management and thus a factor of microenvironment , Richard Branson the Chairman of the Virgin Group has been instrumental in charting the way forward for the group of companies . His risk taking personality has led to opening up of opportunities for Virgin leading to major profits through expansion into fields that are different from what Virgin started out with initially

Branson 's top management team has also influenced greatly the strategy of the company . Nick Powell has been useful in checking Branson 's erratic ways through his methodical and cautious personality . While at Virgin Records , Nick Powell provided the necessary counterbalance that helped the company to maintain its competitive edge when the company was started . In the 1980s when Virgin incurred heavy loses Powell was looked upon to come up with solutions to decrease the mounting financial pressure . The presence of Simon Draper also contributed to the success of Virgin . It was claimed he had `golden ears . His uncanny ability to single out good artistes led to the signing up of various artistes who proved beneficial to the success of the company . After listening to Mike Oldfield of the Tubular Bells and signing him up Virgin was thrown into the big time of the music industry (de Vries and Dick , 2007

In the context of virgin records singing up of bands can be equated to purchasing their talent . Following the recession of the 1980s the idea to sign up new bands led to increase in profits and Virgin was able to successfully move itself out of the financial uncertainty it had gotten into

Finance issues led to the start of Virgin Retail this was because the student magazine had failed...