This assignment is designed for you to identify and analyse the elements that define the challenge faced by the partner organisation. You are to present your analysis in a business report format. This involves undertaking an external and internal SWOT analysis of the organisation and making predictions about its potential role engaging with the case study organisation.  You will build out the SWOT analysis by nesting other theories into the SWOT as discussed in the Topic 3 lecture.

How to think about the big picture:

Overall management challenge: The FFCRC, as an R&D organisation, helps energy businesses design solutions to technical & management problems.  This semester, we will advise the FFCRC on the best way to approach the business development challenges of the REIDS-SPORE Demonstration Project. 

A1 is designed as a SWOT analysis that you build out using other strategic management theories to analyse how the FFCRC (as an R&D organisation) functions as a knowledge generation resource for businesses in the energy sector (in Australia and also Singapore)

A2 is an analysis of management strategies that might be needed to promote the adoption of one of four energy products created by the REIDS SPORE Project (listed in A2 instructions) by businesses in Singapore. 

A3, is a synthesis of what you have learned in A1 and A2 together to design a business model / roadmap for FFCRC to present to the REIDS-SPORE executives about how the two organisations could work together to deliver an energy solution to a range of business sectors in a socially & environmentally appropriate way.

CLICK HERE FOR A1 – SUGGESTED STRUCTURE

Suggestions below are to help you think about the assignment. These ideas are not an assignment structure – just prompts to help you with critical thinking.  If you find any of them confusing, please feel free to disregard the ones that are not helping you:  

• Make sure you state the management challenge in this report as a problem that can be solved through the combination of management theory and practice. In other words – what question are you answering with this report?  State it clearly in the introduction.
• This business report is meant as an opportunity for you to learn how to diagnose & analyse the role of the FFCRC in the energy sector using  management theory
• As this is a fairly short report – there is no need for an Executive Summary – just a robust introduction with a 'roadmap' for the report – tell us what you will be covering
• Examine the data pack information provided by the partner organisation. You may wish to undertake your own research to find more relevant data such as about climate change and how it will affect businesses. (e.g., irena.org (Links to an external site.), iea.org (Links to an external site.))
• Analyse the data / information you have collected using appropriate management tools and theories within a SWOT framework.
  • External organisational analysis – this includes analysing the CONTEXT which can include Australia, Singapore, and the broader aspirations of the global energy sector. While noting the external factors, your goal is to analyse how these factors affect the FFCRC.  You are not analysing Australia or Singapore – you are investigating factors the FFCRC needs to be aware of in those locations in order to fulfill its purpose as an R&D organisation.
  • Internal organisational analysis – include a discussion of the governance structure (e.g., what kind of an organisation is it?  It's not a bureaucracy, for example) & purpose of the PO.  Again, you are not describing the FFCRC.  Prof Coffey already did that.  You are meant to ANALYSE what Prof Coffey shared with you using management theory. 
• Explain how the FFCRC's potential approach to the overall management challenge (above) results from a combination of external and internal factors within the SWOT analysis 

Other useful information:

• You have to include in-text citations and compose a reference list
• Please follow RMIT Harvard referencing style conventions: https://www.rmit.edu.au/library/study/referencing (Links to an external site.)
• Please refer to RMIT guide  (reports/learning lab) for a report format https://emedia.rmit.edu.au/learninglab/content/reports-0
• You may submit your assignment multiple times on Canvas up until the due date / time. 

Further discussion about the 1st assignment: 

• Your job is to offer meaningful insights about the PO operating environment by making balanced use of a variety of analytical frameworks to interpret the data / information you have collected. 
• By analysing internal / external environments, you are redefining the management challenge(s) as a business problem(s) that can be solved.
• Remember that you are functioning as a management consultant.  Part of the intellectual work you need to do is provide a unique perspective or prism through which you interpret the PO and its role in the energy sector.  Each student will have a slightly different interpretation – and that is okay.  You will be marked on how well you support your point of view with robust use of theoretical frameworks.
• You should not offer solutions/practices to how the PO should engage with the Case Study organisation at this point.  You will do so with the 2nd & 3rd assignments.