Strategic Management Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 3000 words - 35

Strategic Management - Essay Example Marketing, customer service and customer relationship management, human resource management, and operations are the largest competencies of the firm associated with the value chain that allows Apple to make such a positive impression with desired customer target segments across the world. This report conducts a critical evaluation of Apple using three distinct models: Porter’s Generic Strategies, the McKinsey 7-S Framework and Johnson’s Culture Web as a means of understanding what drives considerable market success from the perspective of strategic management competency and the achievement of competitive advantage. The Generic Strategies model is illustrative of how a firm is able to attain competitive advantages in its established markets. As shown by the model, there are three strategies available to firms, including cost leadership, differentiation, or a focus strategy. When a company is pursuing the most viable method to achieve competitive advantage, the firm selects which strategy is achievable and feasible based on tangible resources, internal human capital, market conditions, procurement capabilities and operational capacity (Allen, Helms, Takeda and White 2007; Miller 1992). A business can significantly improve its performance by selecting one of these generic strategies which will underpin the corporate level strategy development and its business-level strategies that will better serve the business for competitive advantage. If a firm is unable to decide on one of these three generic strategies, it poses a risk of being stuck in the middle, which succeeds in confusing important custo mer segments and creates an uncertain market-based identity for the company (Bordean, Borza, Nistor and Mitra 2010). Apple, in its pursuit of achieving competitive advantage, has adopted a differentiation strategy that emphasises product uniqueness when targeting a broader mass market internationally. Apple has worked diligently in positioning its business

Art Research paper Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2250 words

Art Research paper - Essay Example revolutionized the Western art scene, while Middle-Eastern cultures denounced it as blasphemy. With the advent of Christianity, the nude form was suppressed and it was not until the Renaissance, when artists looked to antiquity for inspiration, that the nude form came in vogue once again. The period between the 15th -17th century saw some of the most renowned works of nudes come into being. Kenneth Clark2 (1956) whose seminal work on the female nude gave way to much animated discussion on this forgotten topic, credits the Renaissance with giving an impetus to this form, saying â€Å"In the greatest age of painting, the nude inspired the greatest work†. The nude female form continues to inspire artists and art lovers to this day and many ground breaking studies reveal the various nuances of female depiction, its metamorphosis over the ages and the reaction it evokes, ranging from awe to a total denial of its worth as a subject. The words nude and naked are often interchanged for each other, but the difference in their meaning is so wide that the word nude invariably evokes the image of a person without clothes but it has an aesthetic ring to it. Naked on the other hand can mean intolerance and a subsequent discarding of clothes or even to a cult of nudists who exhort people to give up clothing. To put forth the idea more clearly, we can use Kenneth Clark’s definition of the terms, where he says â€Å"To be naked is to be deprived of our clothes, and†¦. the embarrassment†¦in that condition. The word nude carries †¦no uncomfortable overtone†¦it projects†¦a balanced, prosperous, and confident body: the body re-formed.† The author has delineated the female nude in conformity with religious, cultural and philosophic tenets of classical and modern Western society. Clark’s theories are the benchmark for any argument for or against the female nude, while John Bergerâ⠂¬â„¢s study of the relation between the work of art and the person