Assignment Writing

Tips for
Microeconomics &
Macroeconomics
• This document is intended to give students an overview of only some of
the concepts/frameworks/theories that they could use while writing
their assignments for Microeconomics and Macroeconomics.

• Please be informed that you are not mandated to use all these concepts
or limit yourself to concepts/theories mentioned in this document. Please
feel free to use any other relevant concept/theories that you deem fit for
the purpose of writing your assignments.
 • The intention of SWOT, or strength, weakness,
opportunity, and threat, analysis, is to identify
those internal strengths and external opportunities
that an organization can leverage to accomplish its
SWOT Analysis objectives, while also seeking to mitigate internal
weaknesses and external threats (Lewis and Littler,
1997).
• As commonly defined, SWOT analysis is an approach to
considering the inhibitors and enhancers to performance that
an organization encounters in both its internal and external
environments. Strengths are enhancers to desired
performance while weaknesses are inhibitors to desired
performance, with both being within the control of an
organization. Opportunities are enhancers and threats are
inhibitors to desired performance, though these are
considered outside of an organization’s control.
Capon and Disbury (2003) offer the following
definitions:
• Strength: an internal competence, valuable
resource, or attribute that an organization can
use to exploit opportunities in the external
environment
• Weakness: an internal lack of a competence,
resource, or attribute that an organization
requires to perform in the external
environment
• Opportunity: an external possibility that an
organization can pursue or exploit to gain
benefit
• Threat: an external factor that has the
potential to reduce an organization’s
performance
 Internal Factors
Strengths Weaknesses

Core Skills Low Key Skills

Economies of Scale Old equipment & higher costs than the competition

Leadership & Management Weak finances & poor cash flow skills

Manufacturing ability or service deliverability Lacking management or leadership skills

Innovative processes & products Poor record of innovation

Architecture network Weak organisation with poor architecture

Reputation Low quality and poor reputation

Differentiated products Products not differentiated

 External Factors
Opportunities Threats

New markets & segments New market entrants

New products Increased competition

Diversification opportunities Increased pressure from customers and suppliers

Market Growth Substitutes

Demographic and social changes Low market growth

Change in political, economic & environment Economic cycle downturn & Technological Threat
factors
New takeover or partnership opportunities Change in political, economic or environmental
factors
Economic upturn Demographic change

International growth New international barriers to trade

 Some of the
metrics that you PROFITABILITY OF SOME CUSTOMER SATISFACTION CAGR – COMPOUNDED
COMPANIES IN THE (CSAT SCORES OR NPS ANNUAL GROWTH RATE
can focus on to INDUSTRY VALUES)

create your
industry analysis
report

MARKET SIZE (IN TERMS MARKET SHARE PRODUCTIVITY (HOW

OF REVENUE) (DISTRIBUTION OF EFFICIENTLY ARE
COMPANIES IN THIS COMPANIES OPERATING
SECTOR) IN THIS SECTOR)
 Revenue Volatility

Capital Intensiveness
Some of the
Consistency in Demand
industries
characteristics Differentiation of Product/Service
used in analysis
Competitive Advantage

Barriers to Entry & Exit

 Some Qualitative Aspects for
Industry/Company Analysis
Quality of management team

Reputation of the company

Good governance models

Regulations
 Micro Level Company Analysis
• The business model canvas, invented by Alex Osterwalder of Strategyzer, is made
up of nine building blocks showing the logic of how a company intends to deliver
value and make money.
• The nine blocks cover the three main areas of a business: desirability, viability and
feasibility. The business model is like a blueprint for a strategy to be implemented
through organizational structures, processes, and systems.
Micro-Level Analysis of a Business Model
Exercise: Apply this model to Infosys BPM & write down your points
 Porter's Five Forces is a strategic framework for
analysing the competitive forces within an
industry. It consists of five key factors:
1.) Threat of New Entrants: Examines how easy
or difficult it is for new companies to enter the
Porter’s industry.

Five Forces 2.) Bargaining Power of Suppliers: Considers the

influence that suppliers have over the industry
in terms of pricing and supply.
3.) Bargaining Power of Buyers: Assesses the
power that customers have to influence prices
and product quality.
4.) Threat of Substitutes: Examines the potential for alternative
products or services to replace those offered by industry players.

5.) Rivalry Among Existing Competitors: Analyses the level of

competition and its impact on industry profitability.

By evaluating these forces, businesses can make informed

decisions to enhance their competitive position and adapt to
industry dynamics.
Porter’s Five Forces
 Coopetition
• The principles and practices of coopetition are credited to New York
University and Yale business professors Adam M. Brandenburger and
Barry J. Nalebuff. They introduced the principles and practices of
coopetition in their book Co-opetition, first published in 1996.

• Coopetition -- also spelled co-opetition -- is a portmanteau, combining

the words cooperation and competition. Competitive businesses that
also cooperate when it is to their advantage are said to be in
coopetition.
• Coopetition is a business strategy that
uses insights gained from Porter’s Five
Forces and Business Strategy in
Economics to understand when it is
better for competitors to work
together.
• Coopetition games are mathematical
models used to examine in what ways
cooperation among competitors can
increase the benefits to all players and
grow the market. The models also
examine when it's best to allow
competition to divide the existing benefits
among players to provide the leading
competitors with more market share.

• Question: Is coopetition a feasible option

for all businesses?

Remember: Theorise
 Examples of coopetition
1.Pfizer and BioNTech. The March 2020 agreement between
Pfizer and BioNTech to jointly develop a COVID-19 vaccine is an
example of coopetition. The agreement enabled the two
pharmaceutical companies to combine development and
manufacturing capabilities. As a result, they were able to get the
vaccine to market by the end of 2020 and have produced
hundreds of millions of doses in 2021.

2.Amazon Prime and Netflix. These two companies have

competing content-streaming platforms. But Netflix is also one of
Amazon Web Services' main customers. Service providers like
AWS offer complete solutions that include the integration of a
range of services. As a result, one part of AWS can find it's
working with a competitor of another part of the company.
 Advantages of Coopetition:
Share strengths. Companies can combine their unique advantages and
complementary strengths so that each can benefit while remaining in
competition with each other. This allows them to create a more complete
product together.

Distribute the workload. Coopetitors can grow their business network and
merge their workforces to take on projects that are too big for one company.

Team up against larger competitors. Smaller companies, especially

technology startups, may be in competition with each other and a larger,
well-established company. Cooperating can allow the smaller companies to
rival the larger one.
Improve market performance. Competitors can work
together to penetrate new markets or develop existing ones.
Developing existing markets means providing a better
product or service to customers a company already has.
Market penetration means tapping into new markets
through collaboration with competitors in target markets.

Foster technological innovation. Competitors working

together drive innovation. Each company involved in the
relationship can add what they learn from the collaboration
to their own products or services.

Establish industry standards. Competitors in the same

industry can share data and drive adoption of a given
technology. Doing this can help develop standards and
requirements that help the industry without jeopardizing a
company's intellectual property or core competency.
 Disadvantages of Coopetition:
Power imbalances. One member of the relationship may gain a disproportionate amount of
power over the other participants, which could overshadow the cooperative nature of the
relationship. Amazon's relationship with sellers on its marketplace is a potential example of
this. The advantages Amazon is getting from all the partnerships with smaller sellers is
making it a stronger, more dominant competitor.

Lack of trust. Companies in this type of relationship may not trust each other with trade
secrets, leading to a situation where nobody is willing to take risks or share information of
value.

Workload distribution. Companies may have different ways of working. Trying to merge
those approaches can lead to inefficiencies and logistical problems
 Disadvantages of Coopetition:

Lack of competitive Antitrust issues. Businesses

advantage. If companies must take care not to cross the
cooperate too much, line between coopetition and
collusion, such as price fixing.
duplicate efforts and share
Coopetition can face legal
their "secret sauce" -- what
questions if it isn't in some
makes them special -- they
way benefiting consumers.
will erase what differentiates Such benefits can include
them in a competitive lower prices, better access to
market. products, more product or
improved products.
 • What is PESTLE Analysis? PESTLE
analysis, is a concept in marketing
principles. Moreover, this concept is used
as a tool by companies to track the
PESTLE economic environment they’re operating
Analysis in or are planning to launch a new
project/product/service, etc.
• PESTLE is an acronym which
in its expanded form denotes
P for Political, E for
Economic, S for Social, T for
Technological, L for Legal,
and E for Environmental. It
gives a bird’s eye view of the
whole environment from
many different angles that
one wants to check and keep
a track of while
contemplating a certain
idea/plan.
 Political factors in PESTLE Analysis

• These factors determine the extent to which a government

may influence the economy or a certain industry.

For example, a government may impose a new tax or duty

due to which entire revenue generating structures of
organizations might change. Political factors include tax
policies, Fiscal policy, trade tariffs, etc. that a government
may levy around the fiscal year and it may affect the
business environment (economic environment) to a great
extent.
 Economic factors in PESTLE Analysis

• These factors are determinants of an economy’s performance

that directly impacts a company and have resonating long term
effects. For example, a rise in the inflation rate of any economy
would affect the way companies price their products and
services. Adding to that, it would affect the purchasing power of
a consumer and change demand/supply models for that
economy.
• Economic factors include inflation rate, interest rates, foreign
exchange rates, economic growth patterns, etc. It also accounts
for the FDI (foreign direct investment) depending on certain
specific industries who’re undergoing this analysis.
Social factors in
PESTLE Analysis
• These factors scrutinize the social environment of the
market, and gauge determinants like cultural trends,
demographics, population analytics, etc.

An example of this can be buying trends for Western

countries like the US where there is high demand during the
Holiday season (around Christmas).
Technological factors in PESTLE
Analysis

• These factors pertain

to innovations in
technology that may affect
the operations of the
industry and the market
favorably or unfavorably.
This refers to automation,
research and development,
and the amount of
technological awareness
that a market possesses.
Legal factors in PESTLE Analysis

• These factors have both external and internal sides. There

are certain laws that affect the business environment in a
certain country while there are certain policies that
companies maintain for themselves.

Legal analysis takes into account both of these angles and

then charts out the strategies in light of these legislations. For
example, consumer laws, safety standards, labor laws, etc.
Environmental factors in PESTLE
Analysis

• These factors include all those that

influence or are determined by the
surrounding environment. This
aspect of the PESTLE is crucial for
certain industries particularly for
example tourism, farming,
agriculture, etc. Factors of a business
environmental analysis include but
are not limited to climate, weather,
geographical location, global
changes in climate, environmental
offsets, etc.
 Macroeconomic Analysis

• For macroeconomic analysis, it

would be suggested that students
gets data (for a period of 10-15
years) from credible sources such as
IMF, World Bank etc. then create
simple MS Excel charts to
investigate the trends when it
comes to metrics such as inflation,
GDP, unemployment rates etc.
• Apart from the above-mentioned business theories there are hundreds
of other business theories that you could consider in your assignment
to join the puzzle, some of them are:
Boston Consulting Group (BCG) Matrix, Market Segmentation, Change
Management Framework, Scenario Planning, Product Life Cycle (PLC),
Ansoff Matrix, Blue Ocean Strategy etc.

So please explore and feel free to use theories that you prefer.

All the best for your assignments!

End of Presentation