Walmart Business Change Process

Published Date: 02 Nov 2017

Q#1 Provide the name of the organization (this must be a real organization and you may use the organization where you currently work; describe the organization’s size and summarize the primary mission of the organization. Don’t simply copy from the organization’s mission statement.

I choose Walmart for my Individual Project. Walmart is the world’s largest retailer and is one of the fortune 500 companies. WalMart’s primary mission is more for less; they strive to deliver quality products at a low discounted price. Walmart has evolved from Sam Walton’s goals for great value and great customer service. He was known, believed in leadership through service. (Walmart Corporate)Total number of employees hired by Walmart is 2,000,000 and has 4,253 stores. (Snope, 2012) Walmart has strived to maintain the green theme. Walmart’s sustainability initiative boils down to three goals:

1.  To be supplied entirely by renewable energy

2. To create zero waste

3. To sell products that sustains resources and the environment (Gerlsbeck, November 12, 2010)

Q#2 From your research of the organization, identify a single Business Process Change that the organization will need to contemplate and undertake in the coming year. These changes can result from new technologies, economic issues, or changes in the marketplace.

Becoming environmental friendly is one of Walmart’s sustainability goals.

The single Business Process Change that the organisation will need to contemplate and undertake in the coming year is to gradually phase out the dependence of electricity and switch to a natural and environmental friendly solar energy.

Q#3 Utilizing the Capability Maturity Model (CMM) outline briefly what changes need to be undertaken at each of the 5-stages (pages xxxiii-xxxiv).

The Capability Maturity Model (CMM) is a methodology used to develop and refine an organization's software development process. The model describes a five-level evolutionary path of increasingly organized and systematically more mature processes. Using the Capability Maturity Model, Walmart will have to make changes at all 5 stages. (Rouse, 2007), (Harmon, 2007)

Level 1 – INITIAL Level: At the initial level, processes are usually disorganized, even chaotic.

A meeting with the Leadership team should be set up to outline the details of the implementation plan. The success of the project solely depends on how each store manager implements at their stores.

Level 2 – REPEATABLE Level: Walmart could use the experiences gained from the project of refurbishment of the stores. The basic project management techniques which were established, successes could be repeated, because the requisite processes would have been made established, defined, and documented.

Level 3 – DEFINED Level: The management outlines a flow for each store to ensure minimum disruption of day to day activities as well as safety issues.

Level 4 – MANAGED Level: The work progress is reported by each store manager to the designated authority.

Level 5 – OPTIMISING Level: Constant feedback on the work progress from the store managers to the engineering and management team will help in the better implementation of the plan

Q#4 Evaluate Porter’s three-phase process (page 32, figure 2.1) for defining a company strategy and create a simple chart of the recommended change addressing issues in each phase.

What is the company doing now?

Strategy: Walmart is focused on reducing carbon emission and planning ahead to minimize usage of non-renewable energy.

The assumptions are government rebates on Carbon emissions, usage in the number of units of non-renewable energy and renewable energy, cost of solar panels in future and maintenance. (Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, January 2011)

What is happening in the environment?

The key factors for the success and failure solely depends on how the industry understands the current environment situation and plans ahead by investing resources for the future. It also keeps abreast of competitors activities by studying market trends. Also knowing the financial strength of each competitor.

Walmart strength lies in the technological changes in solar power and its financial ability to take major decisions keeping in mind the changes in government regulations to carbon emissions. (Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, January 2011)

What should the company do next?

Compare present strategy against inputs gathered from all the municipal or county entities involved with solar energy, including permitting, inspections, procurement, facilities management, and outreach departments. The best alternative is to select the all in one solar panels as compared to dedicated panels for each area of operation(such as water heating, lighting , Air-conditioning etc., ) (Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy,January 2011)

UNIT 2: Assignment

5a. Diagram the current process steps taken by the organization for the process.

5b. Diagram any adaptations to the process steps after the change process is approved.

6. Evaluate and address the importance of the existing and future diagrams and how they assist the organization in determining the validity of the suggested change (your response to this question should be 3-5 paragraphs in length).

A standard Business Process Modeling Notation (BPMN) will provide businesses with the capability of understanding their internal business procedures in a graphical notation and will give organizations the ability to communicate these procedures in a standard manner. Furthermore, the graphical notation will facilitate the understanding of the performance collaborations and business transactions between the organizations. (Business Process Model and Notation)

Diagram 5a, Is the current process that Walmart follows which gives them the strategy to evaluate their business needs . The existing business diagram will help the executive committee and Project Manager. The Executive Committee approves the proposal and the Project Manger requests Quotes. On the quotes being approved the Engineering Team is contacted and they liaise with the vendor on the implementation. The Store manager gives a daily update to the engineering team. Although the process in Diagram 5a is well laid out, in order for Walmart to be innovative and be in par with the new technology,

Diagram 5b is updated with an extra steps.

This diagram entails the process flow in the implementation on solar panels to all units of Walmart. It gives clear vision for each unit to understand how efficiently he process takes place and also how each unit can provide feedback o he respective department on progress issues an concerns. During the implementation of the project, the Engineering team came up with an advanced technology and has put the idea forward to the project manager and due to the extra adaptation the process goes back to the executive committee and then the normal process is followed.

Walmarts Engineering team has always strived to keep up with the growing technology. On researching on the new products available in terms of solar panel , It was researched and reports provided a better solar technology called Solar tracker.

A solar tracker is a device that orients various payloads toward the sun. Payloads can be photovoltaic panels, reflectors, lenses or other optical devices. Tracking the sun creates powerful renewable energy sources allowing as much as 40% of the solar light to be converted into green energy. Suntrack controls both photovoltaic and concentrated solar tracking mechanisms. (Solar Tracking Controllers).