Auckland International Campus

Graduate Diploma in Applied Management

CX770022 BUSINESS TRANSFORMATION AND CHANGE

Assignment 2: Individual Assignment

Name-AMANDEEP SINGH
Student id-1000060808
Submitted to-Dr. Dave Bibby
Course- CX770022

Stena line pg. 1 Business Transformation & Change

Contents
1. Introduction............................................................................................................................................... 3
2. Key factors driving change ........................................................................................................................ 3
2.1 External Factors ................................................................................................................................... 3
2.2 Internal factors .................................................................................................................................... 3
3. Strengths and weaknesses of Gunner Blomdahl’s leadership style ................................................... 4
4. Kotter criteria for effective leadership..................................................................................................... 5
5. Change management strategy.................................................................................................................. 6
6. Metrics to measure the progress ............................................................................................................. 6
Conclusion ..................................................................................................................................................... 7
References ..................................................................................................................................................... 7

Stena line pg. 2 Business Transformation & Change

1. Introduction
Stena Line is one of the world’s leading ferry operators and an international transport and
travel service company. Stena Line works within eight geographical regions which are Norway,
Germany, Baltic Sea South, Denmark, North Sea, Irish Sea North, Baltic Sea North and Irish Sea
South. The CEO of Stena Line, Gunnar Blomdahl went undercover into some of the fleets, under
the name of Per Hansen to investigate the standards of the service they provide. During the
investigation, he discovered some flaws in their service such as onboard customers who paid
for their services, had to sit near a building site. After coming back to the head office, the CEO
made some necessary changes.

2. Key factors driving change

Change in an organization involves the adjustments of external conditions in the operating
environment as well as maintaining the domestic stability (Alexandru Rizescu).

2.1 External Factors

Competitors- In Stena Line’s competitive set there are companies like DFDS, Tallink, Color Line,
and Scandlines. Although a company cannot control what their competitors do still, they need
to find the areas of their weaknesses and use that for the advantage of the company.

Customers- To maintain the customer’s loyalty, Stena Line needs to fulfill the customer
demands. When the onboard customers who were made to sit near a building site were not
given any alternatives, even though two cabinets were vacant. The crew members were also
not aware of the complimentary drinks they could give to their disappointed customers for
compensation. Customer in turn wasn’t satisfied while seating in dusty and noisy environment
even after they paid a lot of bucks.
Economy- Economy also plays a vital role in key factors driving organizational change. The
company needs to be well aware of the recession timings although due to economic changes
they hire employees on a temporary basis.

2.2 Internal factors

Leadership- The leaders who have a strong vision for the future and plan to achieve them are
more likely to attain success. Leaders make major decisions regarding budget, sales, human
resources, and marketing. Leaders of the Stena Line should examine the infrastructure and
strategies they made for the benefit of the company. The metal floor wasn’t good enough to
make the trolleys slip, so the staff had to use cardboard for that purpose. On the other hand,
the kitchen design needs some changes, the passage after opening the oven doors was too
narrow.

Stena line pg. 3 Business Transformation & Change

Employees- Happy and motivated employees are beneficial for the business growth of Stena
Line. The Filipino employees work enthusiastically but their wage is minimum as per UK wage
standards. So, the company should consider their rights as well. The company have some
untrained workers who needs to get a proper training as they weren’t using gloves while
handling food and lacked some communication skill while dealing with foreign staff. On the
other hand, the employees didn’t have good mess area.
Organizational cultures- The organization of Stena Line do have powerful success spirit. The
staff was very forward looking but some of the workers had to work in long night shifts with no
guarantee to their work statues. The enthusiastic workers must be given some job stability with
reasonable working hours. These organizational cultures need to grab the attention and must
come into the focus of higher authorities for the benefit of the company. The scheduling of the
restaurant times was not well-organized customers had to wait for the private party to end
before using the restaurant.

3. Strengths and weaknesses of Gunner Blomdahl’s leadership style

Leadership is a trait which is maybe inherited in a person since birth or this skill can be
developed through practice. Every leader has some strengths and weaknesses in their
leadership styles, Gunner Blomdahl’s strengths and weaknesses are discussed below;
3.1 Strengths – Gunner Blomdahl is a bold and courageous person, he himself went to
investigate his fleets as an imposter even though there was a risk being getting caught. He can
emphasize relationships with his employees, he wanted to know his employees both on a
professional and personal level.
He truly wants to serve his customers. Despite the fact that he was CEO of the company, but he
didn’t mind working with his crew members this shows that he is not pretentious. He can
understand and relate to his customers from other cultures, as he was the only person in the
restaurant who could understand the German language and able to communicate with them.
3.2 Weaknesses – Over-optimism for the strategies is one of the weaknesses of a leader. A
leader should not hang upon the idea of how the situation ‘should' look versus how accurate
the thing is when realistically seen (Peck, 2014). The mistake Gunnar made that he didn’t go or
sent anybody to examine the functioning of the kitchen layout of Britannica, on the design of
which he played a big part in. In this way, he lacked the vision of his strategy. He needs to be
more creative in his solutions. In terms of his ethics or considering the ease of his employees he
wasn't good enough. He didn't do anything about the wages that Filipino crew members got
and furthermore, he didn't change the status of the employee who worked very hard on night
shifts.

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4. Kotter criteria for effective leadership
Leadership focuses on the ability to motivate, guiding or influencing others for achieving the
desired goal. It focuses on the managerial system and consistency in the organization which
involves staffing, setting directions, funding, setting goals and oversight (Noureddine, 2015).
Management involves controlling of processes, identifying problems and in general managers
try to achieve the desired goal through key functions of planning and budgeting (George
A.Bohoris).

According to Kotter criteria, some of the organization are overmanaged and Under led.
Leadership and management go hand in hand. Good leaders must possess qualities of strong
leadership as well as strong management (P.Kotter, 1990).
Motivating people versus controlling and problem solving

In this case study of Stena line CEO of the company as a leader motivates his employees to
excel, as he provided a workshop to one of his employees who works very hard on her night
shifts. As a manager, he can control whether he can change her work status or not this is
because he knows the fact that ferry business is seasonal and in recession times it will be very
difficult for the company to pay salary to the permanent employees.
This criterion suggests that leaders can help natural managers to become great managers.
Gunnar understood that that manager at Stena Mersey had the right attitude towards his work
but lacks some of the qualities like quick decision making or making customers happy. So, he
invited him to the headquarters where he will learn how to deal with the customers efficiently
at another level.
Aligning people versus Organizing and staffing
Stena Line’s staff is organized and staff in such a way that subordinates works under their
respective heads which is quite normal in any other business environment. But the alignment is
different this process provides clear sense of direction where lower level employees can work
without same level of vulnerability. All employees are aligned in such a way that they have one
common goal which in the case of Stena Line is making good time. Gunnar went to the ships to
see if the customer standards are good enough. His main motive to check his employees and
see if they need some training and remove their vulnerability.
Directing versus planning and budgeting
Function of the leadership is to produce change which cannot be done without setting a
direction or vision whereas planning and budgeting is a management term. Planning and
budgeting are done for stability but setting direction involves some risks whether the change is
logical or not. Stena Line must have directed the layout of the kitchen design. Nevertheless,
they didn’t plan it properly this is the reason why the kitchen design had some flaws now these
flaws need to be vanished.

Stena line pg. 5 Business Transformation & Change

5. Change management strategy
Balance scorecard method is developed by Robert Kaplan and David Norton. This is a
management system that identifies the factors that develop long-term economic values in an
organization through four perspectives: financial, learning and growth, customer and internal
business processes (S.Kaplan, 2010). The vision of the Stena line is to provide convenient,
efficient and relaxing travel to their customers. The key performance indicators for the Stena
line are discussed below:

5.1 Financial Perspective – Stena line is one of the biggest ferry company in the world. There
are near about 5,600 employees working here. In this case, study Stena Line had invested one
billion pounds for the look and size of the operation. In 2010 Stena Line was accused of paying
less wage to their Filipino staff as per UK wage standards. They pay 4$ per hour to Filipino staff.
Stena Line responds that national wage standards didn’t apply to the Filipino staff. The Filipino
staff works straight 6 months away from their home, so Stena Line should consider something
about their wages.
5.2 Customer perspective - Customers travel with Stena Line for experiencing a relaxing
journey. Some of them even travel with kids for their convenience. In Stena Mersey customers
were disappointed due to a building site near them. The environment was dusty and noisy,
even customers complaints were pulled off by the manager. No member apologized to
customers for this inconvenience staff and they weren’t given anything complimentary. Stena
line needs to aware their crew members about dealing with the customers efficiently.

5.3 Internal Business perspective – Not only Stena Line invested their money, but also, they
want to examine the quality of the service they provide. Stena line invested a huge amount of
money for the design and size of the ferry. Still, there was a flaw in the design of a brand-new
super ferry. The passage near to the ovens was too narrow and the to slip the trolleys from the
metal floor, the crew had to use cardboard. Maybe be officials didn't investigate the design
they installed in the kitchen. This shows that proper checking of the system is crucial for a
business environment.
5.4 Learning and Growth perspective – The learning and growth perspective aims to introduce
new organizational concepts. These feedback structures of balance scorecard provide the
validity of the assumptions that somehow supports the execution of the strategy (Jose Candela,
2009). Due to this seasonal ferry business Stena Line hires employees on a temporary basis.
They cannot upgrade the status of the night shift employee, so Stena Line provided her the
opportunity for a workshop. In that workshop, she had a chance to work with top chefs. In this
way Stena Line wants their employees to excel and progress on their respective fields.

6. Metrics to measure the progress

• It is essential for a company to make their customers satisfied. Customers feedback and
complaints are one of the most important things to which giving attention is necessary. The

Stena line pg. 6 Business Transformation & Change

 Stena Line has a policy according to which they can give something complementary to their
customers in case they have any inconvenience. If the company is not able to resolve some
issue immediately by giving their customers an apology or something complementary, they
can maintain their customer loyalty and the reputation.
• The wages of the employees must be according to the national wage standard rates. The
Filipino staff works very hard which is beneficial for the company, so they should have equal
rights as any other employee working in Stena Line.
• The CEO of Stena Line focused on the infrastructure of the seating area of the crew
members which is a very good step. Due to this staff after working tirelessly can feel some
ease.
• Proper training of the employees is essential. They should know policies of the company so
that they can provide their best service to the customers.
• Some of the temporary basis employees who work very hard should be given contracts on
permanent basis after certain period of time by doing this Stena line will have good and the
best staff who will represent their company.
• Infrastructure designs and strategies must be examined by the authorities after
implementation. This will help the company to find out the flaws and inadequacies at
correct time.

Conclusion
In order to fulfill their motive “Making Good Time" Stena Line needs to focus on customer
satisfaction. They should listen to customer demands, complaints and feedbacks. It is crucial to
know what their customer wants before their competitors know it. Stena Line needs to focus
on their employees. They should focus on their progress through workshops and also about
their wage plan. Their employees should be aware of the policies which are made for their
customers. The higher officials must do occasional checks on ships to examine the work
environment and the strategies they implemented. In spite of these situations, the Stena Line
does have some loyal customers and the staff works enthusiastically and productively. In this
way, they come out to be one of the best ferry service providers.

References
Alexandru Rizescu, C. T. (n.d.). Factors influencing continuous organisational change.
George A.Bohoris, E. P. (n.d.). Leadership vs mangement. Lund University.
Jose Candela, M. C. (2009). A review of the learning and growth perspective: a new approach to
labour climate. International journal of management science and engineering
management.

Stena line pg. 7 Business Transformation & Change

Noureddine, D. (2015). The problem of effective leadership from the prespective of corporate
management developement. Procedia Social and behavioural sciences.
P.Kotter, J. (1990). What leaders really do. Harvard Business School.

Peck, D. (2014, january 23). Huffpost. Retrieved from 10 big leadership weaknesses:
http://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/4276011/amp
S.Kaplan, R. (2010). The balanced score card. Harvard business school.

Stena line pg. 8 Business Transformation & Change