Competitors Analysis - "What are the competitors doing?"

I have been working as a sale coordinator for a retail company for the past six years. The brand we mainly focus selling/promoting is one of the most famous machine cut crystal companies from Austria - Swarovski. In the past ten years, Swarovski has shirted it focus from its crystal cut decorations to crystal jewelry. We do see the company is spending more resources on promoting it crystal jewelry lines more than the collectible crystal figurines and decorations in the 90s. I choose two companies to compare with Swarovski due to their fast growth in the industry as well as their brand names awareness to consumers. 

Competitors Analysis

Tiffany & Co. (Direct/Indirect competitor)

Tiffany & Co is a public trade company founded in 1837 in the United States. Tiffany sells jewelry in precious metals, china, stationery, personal accessories as well as leather goods.

Strength: Strong brand name and customer loyalty. Tiffany’s blue box has been a successful icon in luxurious jewelry marketplace. Tiffany offers several unique designers lines in affordable prices such as The Atlas Collection, Return to Tiffany & Co, and Tiffany 1837.

Weakness: Even though Tiffany has several famous designers’ lines of jewelry that many customers admire for, however the company’s revenue and brand name has been affected by high rate of counterfeit products in market. Tiffany’s deigns are simple and classic, yet very easy for others to copy, too.

Pandora Jewelry (Direct/Indirect competitor)

Public Trade Company, according to yahoo finance 2014, “PANDORA is manufacturer, marketer and distributor of hand finished and modern jewelry made from genuine materials – primarily sterling silver, gold, precious and semi-precious stones and Murano glass.” 

Strength: Offers different materials of charms, beads, pendants which allow customers to customize their own piece of jewelry upon individual’s taste and need. It was one of the fastest-growing jewelry accessories companies from 2006 to 2011.    

Weakness: Uniqueness of products offer. It is hard to differentiate the brand’s products from others. 

Calmat Fall 2014_BUS/CSIT 600 Grad Prosem

BUS 600 Grad Prosem should be the very first course for students who first join Calmat's MBA program. I think this course is designed to provide basic understanding and knowledge for students to get an idea of what Master of Management really is. However I take it the revise way (unintentionally). I have finished all major MBA courses in last two year in Calmat and this is the last required course I need to finish in order to complete my learning journey. Now it's time to review what I have learned!  

Work Breakdown Structure

1.0 Plan
-1.1 Planning Sheet
-1.2 Meeting
-1.3 Schedule
  -1.3.1 Event agenda
  -1.3.2 Confirm speakers

2.0 Finance
- 2.1 Expenses
- 2.2 Budget breakdown
- 2.3 Contact Sponsors
  -2.3.1 Follow up sponsors

3.0 Operation
- 3.1 Equipment
- 3.2 Logistic
- 3.3 Catering

4.0 Data
- 4.1 Flyer
- 4.2 Invitations
  -4.2.1 By e-mail
  -4.2.2 By letter
- 4.3 Event Survey
  - 4.3.1 Paper survey
  - 4.3.2 New registrations of Calmat Ulearn account

Project Management Assigment # 1 - Statement+of+Work

2012 Calmat Orientation Event

Project Manager: Ivy Rong Xuan Deng

Sponsor: Calmat

Revision History

Revision date	Revised by	Approved by	Description of change

Purpose

Introduce Calmat learning programs, registration process and other facilities to all new students.

Scope

Major project activities

1. Introduce Calmat learning programs 2. How to register classes 3. Introduce Calmat neighborhood, food, entertainment, learning resources.

Out of scope activities that are critical to the success of the project

Former students’ share previous school life experience in Calmat.

Deliverables

Cost Estimates

Cost Type	Amount
Labor hours	40 hours +(-)
External costs	$500+(-)
Labor (consultants, contract labor)
Equipment, hardware or software	-          Laptop -          Projector -           Partywares
List other costs such as travel & training	$500 - $1000

Schedule Overview

Estimated Project Completion Date: [08/25/2012]

Major Milestones

[Milestone]        mm/dd/yy

[Milestone]        mm/dd/yy

External Milestones Affecting the Project

[Milestone]        mm/dd/yy

[Milestone]        mm/dd/yy

Impact of Late Delivery Since all guests attend the event base on invitation, to deliver the event on time is very important to ensure that there will be significant attendants for the event to be success.

Measures of Success

Attendants are happy and feeling helpful about all the school learning information provided yet not overwhelmed.

Good result from quick survey at the end of the Orientation.

Stakeholder Analysis

Name & Role	Major Responsibility or Contribution
[Name] Customer
[Name] Sponsor
[Name] Management
[Name] Team

Chain of Command

Project Team

Customer Approval Chain

Assumptions

Assumption: The actual party of attendance is larger than we were expected.

Impact if assumption is incorrect: Over prepared, might over budget on labor and other expenses.

Project Management Assigment #1 - Stakeholder+Analysis

Fall 2012 Calmat New Students Orientation Stakeholder Analysis

Project Manager

Ivy Rong Xuan Deng

Stakeholder Role Profile These questions will encourage the project team to consider a wide variety of stakeholders.  Use these questions to identify as many stakeholders as possible. After generating the list, you may decide some of the stakeholders are represented by other stakeholders or will have so little involvement in the project that you don’t need to consider them and you may remove them from your list. This list is a starting point Add questions to this list that fit your project environment.  If you miss an important stakeholder on one project, add a question to this list that will cause the next project team to identify that stakeholder.

For each of the questions below answer the question: “Who…?”

	Question	All stakeholders that apply. Use people’s names whenever possible.
1.	Approves funding for this project?	President
2.	Approves functional requirements?	President
3.	Approves technical requirements?	Chief Technology Officer
4.	Approves design decisions?	Director of Marketing and Strategic Communication
5.	Approves changes to requirements?	President
6.	Approves changes affecting schedule?	President
7.	Approves changes affecting cost?	President
8.	Will use the product or service produced by the project?	New Students
9.	Set the organizational goals that drive the necessity of this project?	Project Manager
10.	Will assign people to the project team and determine the hours per day they work on the project?	Project Manager
11.	Approves contracts for suppliers?	President
12.	Is the manager or executive sponsoring this project (will use their authority on behalf of the project team to overcome organizational obstacles)?	Yes
13.	Will manage the project (provide leadership to assure tasks are assigned and completed on time, cost and schedule are monitored, issues are identified and resolved)?	Project Manager
14.	Represents organization policies governing this project?	San Jose Police Department
15.	Represents regulations or laws affecting this project?	Recruitment and Admission
16.	Will have their work disrupted by this project?	All parties
17.	Will have to change their systems or processes because of this project?	- Student Service and Records - Regional Students Recruitment - International Students Program
18.	Will benefit from this project? (If this is a large group, who will represent this group?)	New Students and Calmat
19.	Will perform the work on this project? (This includes all vendors and subcontractors as well as employees)	Team members
20.	Will participate in phase gate decisions to approve moving the project to the next phase?	President

Stakeholder Alignment Questions These questions will ask for a minimum amount of understanding about each stakeholder.  Use these for each stakeholder that has a high interest in the project or can have a high impact on the project.  The better you understand each stakeholder, the better prepared you’ll be to win cooperation. Not for publication These questions are meant to stimulate thinking about stakeholders.  Your assumptions and insights into the motivations of each stakeholder or stakeholder group are a private assessment and should not be published.

For each significant stakeholder, answer the following questions:

	Name:	Title:
1.	What is their contribution to the project? Set purposes and goal, participate and deliver project on time.	Project Manager
2.	To whom do they report? All stakeholders should report to the Project Manager.	Project stakeholders
3.	What authority do they have over the project? Stakeholders will be issued different responsibilities according to area he/she participated.	Project stakeholders
4.	What is their goal for the project (what is their stake in the project) and how does it relate to their organization’s goal or other personal goals? (What makes this a ‘win’ for them?) - Attendants provide good feedbacks by filling out a simple quick survey at end of the section. - Increase of new register members on school’s website.	The customers = New students
5.	Do they present a specific threat or opportunity? Some team members might be students from Calmat; we could choose couple of them to share their personal school experiences with the new students and families.
6.	What perception do you want them to have about the project? Introduce the school to new students, attract potentials, and engage with formal Alumni.

Plan Communication

Use the Communication Plan and Responsibility Matrix templates to document roles and responsibilities and how you’ll keep your stakeholders engaged and informed.

Project Management Assigment #1 - Project Chater

Calmat 2012 Student Orientation Project Charter

Project Manager: Ivy Rong Xuan Deng

Sponsor: Calmat

Date: 06/30/2012

This charter serves to announce the initiation of the Calmat Fall 2012 New Students Orientation project.  We are undertaking this project to ensure all new students and families who attend this event have the opportunity to know about Calmat’s study programs, school environment, neighborhood, and the social life.

Ivy Rong Xuan Deng has been selected to lead this project.

Please provide your complete cooperation to the project and to Ivy Rong Xuan Deng.

Thank you.