business environment (Case Study Sample)

The Transformation of Valio Case Study Name Instructor Course Code Date The Transformation of Valio Case Study Valio is a dairy company based in Finland. This case study focuses on Valio as the leading food business in Finland. Finland is geographically located in northern Europe hence a member of the European Union. Valio processes about 80 percent of the total milk produced in Finland (Karjalainen, 2020). During the collapse of the Soviet Union at the beginning of the 1990s Finland exports were hit drastically. As a result of the collapse of the Soviet Union Russia retaliated against the EU, which in turn hit Finland as Russia banned EU imports which included dairy products which were Finland’s food products (Pramusinto & Purwanto, 2018). Valio responded by reducing the casual laborers and the payrolls to respond to this crisis. The cut back affected about 3000 employees under the production and logistics unit, the retrenchment also affected the head office. Valio employs approximately 3500 workers in Finland (Lebaka et al. 2018). Due to the crisis, Valio was utilized milk in processing other products, such as fermented milk. This helped the continued success of the company. The major problem in this case stud environmental change. Environmental change is an external problem (Huisman-Dellago, 2020). The two vital sources of environmental change that were significant during the study period were changes during the collapse of the Soviet Union. Due to the collapse of the Soviet Union, the new competition law that was enacted in Finland led to the decline of Finland exports to Russia. The other source of change was after the EU association. As a result of the association, European countries opened borders which lead to uncontrolled competition and the enactment of new legislation. Dairy products from Finland are expensive compared to the product of other EU members, as a result, the market is flooded with dairy products from the competitors hence organizational profitless compared to other companies (Karjalainen, 2020). The unfolding of the challenges not only spotlight vulnerability but also chances. Companies engage in institutional changes when they face challenges in their organization and market (Lebaka et al. 2018). As a result of a change in environment, Valio underwent an organizational change to curb the heightening challenges which emerged as a result of the EU association. The restructuring involved Valio institutional innovation of the firm workforce, structure, and processes where fire come up with a new business idea. As a result of institutional rearrangement, internal processes, production, and management practices have to change (Huisman-Dellago, 2020). In a restructuring program that took over a decade the company finished vital projects in reducing the number of plants to a manageable figure and streamlining, this also included laying-off half of its workforce. The production unit focused on value-added products, which is focused more on quality rather than quantity. In case of challenges in a firm whether internal or external a companies find alternatives to navigate and prevail, this alternative is determined by firm strength (Karjalainen, 2020). Valio dairy should have been ready in case of political and economic challenges by putting in place a well firmly established procedures in the western countries, to help it compete in the global market instead of expanding itself locally. Valio should have come up with new technology to help in terms of product distribution and marketing. Modernized technology is efficient and economical in terms of controlling the quality, efficient supply of the products (Huisman-Dellago, 2020). Valio should have reorganized the head office to be able to solve and respond to global and local challenges. By doing so the company should have simplified and enhanced the rate of operation and the speed of operation but also maintained the quality of their products. The case study to the study of business because of the small emerging businesses that are growing and want to establish a market in foreign countries this pap...