嘉文博译留学文书/MBA Essay Writing CASE THIRTEEN

小　目　录
Essay 1

Essay 1

What is the most significant change or improvement you have made to any organization which you have recently been or are currently affiliated? Describe the process that you went through to identify the need for the change or improvement to the organization, how you managed the process of implementing the change, and describe the results. (500 words)

When I first joined my current company, I learned that it had been experiencing profit growth every year. However, growth was beginning to slow, and I needed to find a solution. The market for IC cards in China was nowhere near saturated with many opportunities for growth. To get to the root of the problem, I lead my marketing team in conducting a thorough market analysis. Our analysis showed that IC cards had a much broader range of possible applications in China, and that our company was too narrowly focused on the manufacturing of credit cards. Credit cards are still in low demand in China, so I knew that our company needed to change its strategy in order to continue to grow.

Our market analysis revealed that one area for potential growth was in the use of IC cards in the public transportation system. The old methods of payment are slow and inefficient. Public transportation providers are plagued by problems such as counterfeit tickets, unacceptable bills or change, and outright ticket evasion. Public transportation needs to operate as inexpensively as possible while still managing to make a profit. High technology payment methods can reduce costs and help with profitability. Although most public transportation companies and their passengers know that change is needed, most are resistant to change. I decided that a comprehensive promotional program was needed to change attitudes.

People are naturally resistant to change, and I was forced to deal with both internal and external problems in the promotion of our IC cards. Internally, our staff was used to dealing with credit card issues as we had focused on that market for a long time. Internal marketing was necessary to communicate to our employees that our new target market, the public transportation companies, were skeptical about using our IC cards and that this attitude would not easily be changed through one or two TV advertisements. To give my marketing team a better understanding of the challenges we were facing, we visited our main target companies onsite to give them a customized introduction and training. These personal visits were very successful in showing how the new payment systems worked and the confidence that we had in our products. The main problem for the transportation companies turned out to be the cost, because implementation of the new system required a huge capital investment. The payback period for this investment would be lengthy. To solve this problem, we focused on successful examples of the use of IC cards in the transportation systems of other countries. By using real examples, we were able to show them how our cards could reduce costs, eliminate losses, improve efficiency and help with their companies' images.

Our new marketing strategies were successful. By changing our market focus and our strategy, my company won contracts worth 5 million RMB with public transportation companies in several provinces in China. With our continuing promotion efforts, I know that we will continue to grow in this area in the future.