Future Finance Analysis and Recommendations

Introduction

Business consultancy services provide a scope to the consultants to help the organisations in improving the performance and efficiency of the firm through in depth evaluation and critical consultancy, so that creative decision would be made for achieving the company’s success (Wilkinson, Armstrong and Lounsbury, 2017). The aim of the consultancy project is to analyse the business data and practices of the Future Finance, which is a famous organisation providing learning and developmental activities to the students. Through critical analysis, it is possible to develop consultancy project by reviewing the internal and external situation of the firm as well as propose some suitable recommendations in order to improve firm’s capabilities to handle their stakeholders. The leadership and communication strategy will also be evaluated for choosing the best way to strategize the business activities and manage its stakeholders in long run. If you require additional assistance with a business dissertation help, consider incorporating various methodologies and theories discussed in the field in place to strengthen your analysis and recommendations.

Future Finance company, established by group of entrepreneurs in Ireland, Dublin in 2014, mainly took the initiatives to support the post graduate students across the UK by providing the scope of taking educational loans for their higher studies (SearchITChannel, 2018). The main strategy is to provide future financial services for higher studies, where the students are eligible to take education loans. The company have grown their activities gradually and recently it provides over £150 million worth of loans to students for helping them to access the post graduate studies. The first loan was offered in 2014 to a trainee at the organisation of Surrey for £2500. After UK and Germany Future Learn declared for Techcrunch.com in 2016 that they rose $171M to grow the student loan platform In Europe (SearchITChannel, 2018). The company is advertising their loans by saying the students can get the freedom to focus on studies and get a private loan to cover tuition fees and the living cost (Future Finance, 2021).

Company’s strategic position

For analysing the strategic position of the company, it is essential to choose the strategic models and review the business environment of the organisation. Through SWOT analysis, it would be possible to analyse the internal business environment of the firm and on the other hand, PESTLE analysis will be chosen for critical evaluation of the external business environment.

Internal environment of the company

SWOT analysis is beneficial for evaluating the internal business environment, through identifying the strengths and weakness of the firm. It also provides a scope to analyse the future market opportunities and threats to adopt new strategic changes for running the business operations creatively. The strengths, weakness as well as opportunities and threats will be evaluated further.

Strengths

The major strengths of the Future Finance is that their strategy to run the operation is creative, where there are many students who try to access educational loans for their higher studies. In the recent era of remote education and working practices, taking loans for educational purpose is growing at a rapid rate and the Future Finance have chosen the innovative strategy to run their operations and expand their services across the UK. Secondly, the organisation is successful to have strong employee base and financial strength in order to invest in this business idea. The business is growing at a significant rate and the directors also focus on expanding their operations slowly across the UK (Consultancy.uk, n.d.). There is presence of the firm across the UK, Scotland, England and Wales. Hence, the company strategic planning is creative and the employees are also proficient to manage their services in order to meet the firm’s goals and objective as well as other strengths are Intellectual propriety over lending and propriety algorithms, Partnership with over 100 Universities, £150 million worth of loans and Constantly adapting our product portfolio (Consultancy.uk, n.d.).

Weaknesses

The major weaknesses of Future Finance is to have good leadership and managerial practices, lack of marketing planning and business expansion strategy as well as poor financial and capital investment in order to run their operations successfully (Institute of Consulting, n.d.).

Opportunities

The major opportunities for the business would be market expansion for the international students, technical innovation and creativity, business strategic changes, good marketing planning, retaining the students who are willing to study higher degrees as well as high demand of the students for accessing educational loans (Management Consultancies Association, 2012).

Threats

The major threats of running the business are such as high competitive environment in the financial industry of the UK, presence of financial institution providing loans and other capital investment planning as well as economic slowdown.

External environment of the company

Through PESTLE analysis, it is possible to analyse the external environment of the business which includes, political, economic, social, technological, legal and environmental.

Political

The political stability of the UK is helpful for the Future Finance to expand their business and efficient services across the UK, England and Wales. After Brexit, there is market slowdown, but the initial target market of the business is UK based students for which the organisation has the support of the UK government to run their operations sustainably.

Economic

Economic growth and high GDP of the country are considered to be important factors to run the business with sustainable growth. The economy of the UK is growing and there is high national income and purchasing power parity among the individuals to lead their lives. 1.96 trillion British pounds were the GDP of the UK in the previous year and there is 2.3% growth in April 2021.

Social

Social development with good literacy rate and social developmental project are beneficial for the business firms to run their operations sustainably. The government of the UK provide quality health and social care services to the individuals that improve the standard of living and the people are also educated with high literacy rate. Willingness to accept the debt by the student has been increased and social media has a massive impact on the credibility and the willingness of the client to choose the company.

Technological

The technological innovation and continuous growth in software development and business planning are helpful for the organisation to grow rapidly and arrange capital for their investment to support the students by providing them the opportunity of educational loans (Consultancy.uk, n.d.). Hence, the technological advancement further supports the business firm to enhance communication and ensure market expansion in near future.

Legal

Legal compliance must be maintained efficiently and the organisation is able to follow the FCA regulations in order to provide financing options to the students. Additionally, there are student welfare committee regulations and Data Protection Act 1998 for maintaining confidentiality of the students and guide them for accessing the educational loans. There are other ethical practices such as maintaining accountability and transparency, documentations, respect and integrity management which reshape the business activities efficiently to run the operations legally.

Environmental

The environmental sustainability as well as environmental protection laws supports the business to run their operations sustainably by creating green environmental footprint. Renewable energy resource utilisation, protecting natural resources, reducing greenhouse gas emission and ensuring green environmental footprint are the major practices to run the business sustainably.

Leadership and communication

Leadership and management are mandatory for the organisations to run the business operations efficiently and lead the stakeholders towards achieving the future success (Van Dam and Marcus, 2019). The leadership style that the Future Finance has adopted is top to bottom strategy, where the directors took the decision to run the firm. There is power of the directors to make the ultimate decision, and the organisation is efficient to manage their directors through developing good teamwork. Hence, there is owner and team work among the directors, to make the ultimate decision. The directors of the organisation discuss the business activities and tool collaborative decision for the firm. However, there is no empowerment of the management team and others stakeholders in the business which lacks to develop good leadership style. As per the autocratic leadership style, there is top to bottom approach and the leader tool ultimate decision for the organisation. As per the autocratic leadership style, the leaders are also trying to manage power in the organisation by maintaining seniority and job designation as well as there is lack of team working activities among all the staff members and stakeholders. On the other hand, communication is another major practice to run the business activities strategically. The organisation is able to develop good communication strategy by adopting latest technology so that they can enhance interactions among the stakeholders (Miedtank, 2017). The main Human Resource management system is conducted through the innovative IT solutions SLACK and BAMBOO. Additionally, Google Suit is utilised for enhancing group discussion and communication in the organisation. The technical team is efficient to handle the IT infrastructure and the collaborative culture further improves the internal communication system.

Company culture including its ethical and value base

Internal corporate culture is mandatory to be followed by the organisational leader and managers in order to protect the employees and also manage other stakeholders to run the business activities strategically. The ethical practices such as workplace safety, managing integrity and data protection are maintained well to run the business sustainably. Additionally, the leader and management team at Future Finance are able to handle the employees through respect, managing transparency and accountability as well as team working activities. The directors focus on team collaboration to share the information among the staff and improve their knowledge and expertise to handle the clients in long run. Hence, team collaboration as well as respect for others; transparency and integrity management are the major practices to develop good corporate culture in the business (Sturdy, 2018). There is also flexibility to work for helping the employees to manage work life balance. On the other hand, the internal system is effective and supported by the IT infrastructure where the employees can utilise the organisational resources to serve the clients efficiently. Value based system is hereby developed by the organisational directors, where the directors try to create values for the stakeholders by providing them high return on their investment and manage them through developing good corporate bonding and trust.

Major issues in the company

There are certain issues related to business strategic planning, communication and leadership for which the organisation cannot expand their services across the UK, England, Scotland and Wales. Lack of capital funding is one of the major issue, for which the organisation tries to expand their business activities gradually rather than rapid business growth. It is difficult or the firm to arrange huge amount of capital for the investment to support the students with educational loans. Hence, the organisation faces the issue of lack of capital budgeting system. On the other hand, there is lack of marketing strategic planning for which it becomes difficult for the organisation to expand their operations across the UK. Initially, the organisation targets the UK students rather than international student due to shortage in fund. The marketing strategic planning is not effective for promoting the ideas of educational loans across the England (Helmold et al., 2020). Additionally, the strict compliance of the FCA regulations is another major issue, where the firm faces difficulties to follow the guidelines and maintain the business ethics. In the context of leadership and management, the major issues is lack of leadership practices, poor empowerment of the managers and staff members, lack of engagement in the organisational decision making practice, internal conflicts, top to bottom strict leadership structure in the workplace, for which the workers cannot feel free and valued to work with others under suitable working circumstances. There is also lack of training and developmental programs for the workers at the business to improve their personal and professional skill to handle the clients.

Recommendations

The organisation is capable to hiring the employees for running their business by providing the access of educational loans among the students across the England, UK, Scotland and Wales. There are several issues for which the company cannot handle their stakeholders and expand their business rapidly across the international market place. It is hereby essential to manage the business activities to ensure service efficacy and good market communication in order to handle all the stakeholders, who are engaged with the business. The suggested recommendations are such as,

The organisational leadership style must be transformational leadership in order to run the business functions strategically by developing strong team work. There is team collaboration only among the directors, where the leader took decisions after group cooperation with other directors of the company. There is not such involvement of the managers and staff members of the firm in making the best solutions. Hence, it is essential of the firm to adopt the transformational leadership style in order to manage their services and lead the employees towards achieving the future company goal.

The organisation must focus on strategic marketing planning by arranging capital funding for the educational loan and also for investing in business promotional activities. Marketing planning must be developed well in order to run their operations efficiently across the UK and also promote their services among the students, so that they can access the information about the availability of the educational loans. For this, the business firm must develop effective marketing planning by utilising the organisational website, to target the students across the country where adequate information and content development are crucial to share the important data with the students. Moreover, the social media promotion is essential for the firm to promote the educational loan activities and support the students with funding for higher studies and EMI management for the loans.

The organisation must develop the communication plan for enhancing their business activities. It is essential for the organisation to arrange conference and business meeting with all the managers and employees in Future Finance, in order to enhance interactions with them. Group meeting and general discussion must be there for enhancing internal communication. Though the HR team utilises the latest technology for communication and interacting with the staff, it is mandatory for the business to develop Information and Communication Technology (ICT) in order to enhance group collaboration. ICT is an integrated software system for communication where email services, telephonic conversation, employee portal management are there to support internal communication system. On the other hand, market communication must be developed through handling student portal on the organisational website, where the managers must handle the feedback of the students and resolve their queries to support them for accessing the educational loans for their higher studies.

Implementation strategy

It is important for the organisation to implement the above mentioned suggestions in order to run the operations ethically and manage all the stakeholders, engaged with Future Finance. The major stakeholders related to the business activities are such as the employees, managers, directors, financial executives, technicians, government, FCA and the students. It is important for the corporate leader of the firm to create values for all the stakeholders by providing them high return on investment (Booysen, Bendl and Pringle, 2018). Improving the leadership and management style at the organisation is one of the important strategy through which it would be possible to create good circumstances of working efficiently. In this regard, transformational leadership style provides a scope to the leader to continuous encourage employees creativity in the workplace; ensure individualised skill development, collaborative working practice and continuous motivation (Patterson and Rowley, 2019). The leader of the firm hereby needs to create friendly atmosphere with cooperation and harmony to work with others. The leader also needs to support and guide each employee with adequate organisational resources and important information, so that they can improve their knowledge and expertise to help the students for accessing educational loans (Sebastião, Zulato and Trindade, 2017). On the other and, the leader should motivate the employees through providing them rewards and incentives, maintaining transparency and accountability, respect all the staff and encourage their creativity to perform better. In this regard, the leader should empower all the employees and managers in the business in order to review their perception and knowledge about the business activities and it further provides a scope to the leader to choose the best solution through collaborative decision making practice.

In addition to this, for implementing the recommendation of enhancing communication, the leader should develop ICT in the business so that the managers and employees can interact with each other through email and telephonic conversation. Group discussion must be arranged as well as there should be training and developmental programs for the employees, so that they can improve their skill set to handle the business operations (Harzing and van Ruysseveldt, 2017). General meeting is also important in this context to enhance internal communication among the directors, employees and managers, where they can interact with each other and develop creative business solutions. The leader also needs to arrange conference and develop external bodies to manage the market communication for retaining the students for the good opportunity of accessing educational loans (Webb, 2017). Moreover, for marketing strategic planning, the leader should promote the service through organisational website and social media advertisement, for implementing the marketing plan, the directors should arrange adequate capital and manage the ICT framework for interacting with the stakeholders. In this regard, promotional activities through social media advertisement and promoting organisational website to increasing the access of information related to educational loans across the UK for supporting the students would be the best strategy to implement the marketing planning and run the business activities strategically (Brewster and Hegewisch, 2017). Hence, technological innovation and creativity as well as the leadership style must be improved at Future Finance to expand the business innovatively and meet the corporate goal by increasing the access of educational loans to support the students for their post graduate studies.

Reflective analysis

Through this study, it is possible to review the leadership style and managerial practices in the organisation to handle the stakeholders, including the workers, managers, directors, shareholders and investors, where it is the responsibility of the corporate leader to create values for them. I come to know that the transformational leadership style is effective for continuous support and guidance where the leader would be able to develop strong bonding and trust among the employees. Moreover, I also review the organisational decision making practice through developing suitable organisational culture, where I focus on collaborative decision making practice by empowering the staff members and managers, it is beneficial to enhance business creativity and technical innovation, where all the stakeholders are able to share their perception with the directors of the company and through cooperative decision making practice, it is possible to choose the best solution to the business. Hereby, I can improve my personal knowledge on business strategic planning and leadership through this study, it also helps to improve my communication skill and problem solving skill, as the consultancy business project provides me an opportunity to review the existing issues in the business and purpose some creative solutions to the business. It is helpful for me to utilise my knowledge and skill set to analyse the existing issues and develop further decision to make the business successful. Through this study, I am able to improve my critical analytical skill set for evaluating the business activities and choose the best solution to achieve the business goal.

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