Measures And Policies To Address Four Issues In Oman's Small Business Enterprises

Introduction to the four issues faced by small business enterprises in Oman

1.Measures and Policies you would put in place to address each of the above four Issues.            

2.Critically compare and contrast the structure and strategy adopted by any Multinational Corporation (MNC) and Corporate Parent organization based in your country and discuss strategic implications of both in your country’s economic growth and development.

1.This question tries to address the four issues that have developed after the introduction of multinational organizations on the small business enterprises in Oman. Each of the four issues have been given down in this paper and measures and policies to address the four issues are discussed.

One of the four issues that have an impact on the small business enterprises has been that small business enterprises have been closing down after the introduction of multinational organizations. This has been one of the major issues and it us seen that effective measures has to be taken in order to motivate the firms to survive in the economy. It has been observed that one of the fundamental factors for the survival of the small firms has been capital. Therefore, the small business enterprises of Oman need to manage sufficient capital so that they can compete with the multinational organizations that are entering the Oman market. The small business enterprise requires developing effective management skills so that they can understand the issues that are pertinent in the business and thereby staying afloat in the Oman economy. The improvement in the management skills leads to identification of the weaknesses and improving the core area of the business (Storey 2016). The small businesses do not have sufficient information about tracking the key performance indicators and thus requires implementing strategies that would gain them knowledge regard the market where they operate. It is essential for the organizations to construct an effective business plan that would be influential for the improving the procedure and the functional activities of the firm. The small business enterprises even needs to improve their focus on the strategies they have established so that by understanding the market they can construct alternative plans thereby improving the level of operations. Undertaking these strategies would lower the small business enterprises from closing their business in the Oman market.

The next point that is under consideration is that there have been figures that suggest that imports were raising with respect to the export figures in Oman. The level of export has been higher in Oman for a significant point of time as the country has been one of the largest exporters of oil and gypsum in the current decade (Keeble and Wever 2016). However, the level of import has overgrown the figures of export as export of other products has been relatively low. This has led to the rise in import as the consumers of the country require essential and necessary goods for their daily survival. Oman does not produce sufficient amount of daily commodities that would meet the desires of the population of the country and therefore in order to meet the deficiency export is essential. The advent of globalization has led to new and innovative products in the market and this has influenced the consumers to purchase such goods. Therefore, it is seen that the figures of import has increased over the level of export (Parahina et al. 2014). Therefore, in order to mitigate such issues various policies have been implemented so that the level of export increases over import. The government of the country has started investing in the manufacturing firms that focus on delivering the goods that are required by the consumers on a daily basis. This would reduce the level of import and thus would increase the export level. The government has even imposed higher taxes on import so that the country would lower imports thereby maintaining the balance of payment of the country.

Measures and policies to address issues related to funding and management

The next issue is in accordance to the rise in the level of unemployment in the locals of Oman. Unemployment is one of the major concerns for every country as it lowers the level of per capita income of the country (Leigh and Blakely 2016). It is seen that the multinational organizations hire competent employees in their business and in certain case outsource their employees from various other countries thereby maintaining their organizational objectives. This has led to the fall in the employment in the country (Blackburn, Hart and Wainwright 2013). Thus, it is important to implement various strategies like taking the initiative of educating the teenagers and the young ones so that they become competent enough to work in these multinational organizations. The government should even frame policies in order to limit the recruiting of the outsourced employees and motivating the organizations to appoint employees from the country itself. The level of unemployment in the country has increased because due to the introduction of the multinational firms, the small and medium business enterprises have started to shut down their operations and thus making many people lose their jobs (La Porta and Shleifer 2014). Therefore, the government should undertake various initiatives and policies so that small and medium business enterprises can continue their business in the economy and compete with large multinational corporations.

The last issue refers to the decreasing tenure of the MNCs in the country. The main factor has been due to the governmental policies due to which the MNCs get demotivated to function in the country (Mundial 2013). There have been various other factors like the environmental and cultural factors that have led to the downfall of these organizations. The decrease in the tenure of the MNCs has a significant impact on the economy of Oman and therefore, it is essential to take adequate measures and policies in order to retain the MNCs. It is essential that attractive tax reduction benefits and attractive schemes requires to be developed so that the MNCs feel like staying in the country. New and improved technologies if implemented in the firm would influence the MNCs to function in the country as they would understand that utilization of these technologies would improve the operations of the firm (Liedholm and Mead 2013). It is even essential to educate the citizens of the country so that they can be competent enough to work for these MNCs. The appointment of employees from the local residents would lower the cost of employment and thereby would motivate the companies to operate in the market. Implementing amiable strategies and policies for these MNCs would influence them to function effectively. 

Measures and policies to address issues related to import and export

2.This question would try to critically compare and contrast the strategies and structures that have been implemented by Multinational Corporations and the Corporate Parent Organization. It is observed that MNCs have unique corporate strategy like decentralizing and nationally and self-sufficient operations. The companies has the ability to sense the opportunities that are available locally in Oman and then tries to exploit such opportunities in an effective manner so that MNCs can improve their level of operations and increase their profits (Eid and El-Gohary 2013). The MNCs look to enhance their knowledge by analyzing the market and retains these knowledge in every unit of the firm so that every department of the organization can have effective level of knowledge with respect to their operations thereby maintaining an effective competitive edge.

The MNCs maintain strategies to operate in the international market and adapts to the cultures and the political environment of the country where they operate. This makes them one step ahead of the other firms. The international strategy of the MNCs primarily concentrate on the process of worldwide learning, which leads to sharing of innovation.  The structure of the MNCs comprises of international divisions where focus is given to the international countries where they operate (Luo and Shenkar 2017).  With respect to this, MNCs in Oman try to function according to the work culture that is prevalent in the economy itself. The MNCs maintain an alternative path of development with the help of which the companies can move ahead of their local and international competitors. Most of the MNCs maintain a global matrix, which aids the organizations to balance products and requirement of the region and accomplish both efficiency and responsiveness. The global matrix leads to transfer of knowledge and learning (Chung et al. 2015).

Corporate Parent Organization is another type of organization who have their unique typology of strategies. It is seen that these companies maintain hands-off ownership, which has very lean corporate centers. The companies tend to be careful to avoid the negative influence and therefore try to restrict shared services to the corporate level. These organizations provide financial sponsorship, which occasionally have value destructive conflicts of goals among the corporate parent and local businesses. The financial sponsorship follows a parental strategy. As opportunities establish values with the help of leverage, the companies are increasingly are transforming to a more interventionist approach thereby creating value in their portfolio organizations.

Measures and policies to address issues related to unemployment

These organizations have a strategic guidance strategy that leads to the development of the organization in an effective manner. The company analyses the market from time to time and then understands the changes that are available in the market and thereafter undertakes changes that would lead to the improvement in the operations of the companies. The other strategy exploited by these organizations involve creation of synergy (Chen, Chen and Zhou 2014). This is undertaken by the organizations by concentrating on bringing out the crucial benefits from the synergies of marketing and sales and the operations among the business units. The organizations that employ synergy assemble a portfolio of businesses that naturally fits together and can attain maximum advantage through the intrinsic collaboration. The organizations maintain functional leadership where the organizations focus on adding values to the businesses in the portfolio with the help of functional excellence, central services and shared corporate resources. This leads to the strong corporate functions that unites expertise in the areas that have a long-term inspiration on the business units. Thus these are the strategies that are exploited by the MNCs and the corporate parent organizations leading to the economic development of Oman.

Reference List

Blackburn, R.A., Hart, M. and Wainwright, T., 2013. Small business performance: business, strategy and owner-manager characteristics. Journal of small business and enterprise development, 20(1), pp.8-27.

Chen, X., Chen, A.X. and Zhou, K.Z., 2014. Strategic orientation, foreign parent control, and differentiation capability building of international joint ventures in an emerging market. Journal of International Marketing, 22(3), pp.30-49.

Chung, C.C., Park, H.Y., Lee, J.Y. and Kim, K., 2015. Human capital in multinational enterprises: Does strategic alignment matter?. Journal of International Business Studies, 46(7), pp.806-829.

Eid, R. and El-Gohary, H., 2013. The impact of E-marketing use on small business enterprises' marketing success. The Service Industries Journal, 33(1), pp.31-50.

Keeble, D. and Wever, E. eds., 2016. New firms and regional development in Europe (Vol. 9). Routledge.

La Porta, R. and Shleifer, A., 2014. Informality and development. The Journal of Economic Perspectives, 28(3), pp.109-126.

Leigh, N.G. and Blakely, E.J., 2016. Planning local economic development: Theory and practice. Sage Publications.

Liedholm, C.E. and Mead, D.C., 2013. Small enterprises and economic development: the dynamics of micro and small enterprises. Routledge.

Luo, Y. and Shenkar, O., 2017. The Multinational Corporation as a Multilingual Community: Language and Organization in a Global Context. In Language in International Business (pp. 59-92). Springer International Publishing.

Mundial, B., 2013. Doing business 2013: smarter regulations for small and medium-size enterprises. The World Bank.

Parahina, V.N., Boris, O.A., Bezrukova, T.L. and Shanin, I.I., 2014. State support for creation and development of socially-oriented innovative enterprises. Asian Social Science, 10(23), p.215.

Storey, D.J., 2016. Understanding the small business sector. Routledge.