McKinsey’s 7S

Strategy

The formulated strategies that keep the company running efficiently and at a competitive
advantage are mainly formed by the head officer who is in charge of directing the entire
business, and whose marketing plans are further supported and/or supplemented by the
supervisors in the company. When asked about their existing strategies, J8 Travel Services’
main scheme is to market their offered services nationwide. Additionally, part of their marketing
strategy is by highlighting their offers in a way that would attract potential customers and clients
to avail of their services by including what travelers would necessarily want to be included in
their package, such as free food by partnering up with certain restaurants, free transportation
and accommodation at the point of destination, and leisure activities, all packed in a single and
reasonably priced package tour.

J8 Travel Services intends to achieve its objectives by providing high levels of service to its
prospective customers, may it be students, corporations, families, and even government
employees. The company targets specific destinations or regions in the Philippines where they
can supply customers with the best deals and unique products. They recognize who they are
targeting and how customers interact with their services in terms of age, ethnicity, income, and
qualification. For instance, there are big differences in the way several age groups travel and
spend during their trips. There may be different motivations. While ‘boomers’ are looking for
ways to relax and unwind, millennials on the other hand, seek more adventurous and
experiential travel. Furthermore, J8 Travel holds preliminary research on their customers’
behavioral patterns, such as, how do they look for tours, tickets, and how do they book, how
often do they travel, and also taking into consideration if their customers are “price-sensitive”.

The company likewise establishes partnerships with their suppliers or service providers to work
with each other on exclusive conditions. Through this, it can help J8 define their pricing
strategies by exploring standard profit margins of their suppliers and setting markups for their
services. 

Structure:

The company structure of J8 Travel Services do not include a multitude of divisions for their
workforce consists of the following few positions, ranked in an ascending manner: the rank-and-
file employees whose work duties are often routinary and clerical in nature - while there are a
select few that have been specifically designated to handle the company’s financial audits or are
placed to take care of the business processes with respect to On-The-Job (OJT) applicants, and
even designated liaison officers under whose administration and expertise falls the
technological know-hows that can be utilized by the company; followed by the supervisors, who
are in charge of handling the company’s events and promotions, local tours, as well as the
monitoring of their rank-and-file employees; and lastly, their head officer who acts as the
overseer of the entire company (both local and international) and the main formulator of plans
and strategies for the conduct of their travel agency business. 

Since the company’s managing workforce is relatively few that are managed by seven (7)
closely related people placed under managing positions in the office, the decision-making
processes in the company, as exercised mainly by their head officer, is centralized. The
company’s small organizational structure also entails them to work in tandem and catch each
other’s backs, where the work or duty of one position is not only supported, but may also be
voluntarily handled by the other when necessary. As such, it can be gleaned that the company’s
organization is truly geared at collective efforts and close communication where they have an
explicit, rather than an implicit, line of communication in conducting the business. 

Systems
While most companies tend to have a Human Resource (HR) Department, J8 Travel Services
does not have their own HR Department for the very reason that their organizational structure is
relatively small. Hence, the main system that runs their organization are left to the managing
officers, whose roles and responsibilities, notwithstanding the fact that there are specific tasks
and duties assigned to them, could be delegated or switched with another employee as
previously mentioned. However, there are certain people from the rank-and-file that are
designated to support the handling of the company’s overall financial system and
documentation. At times, the company’s head officer acts upon these matters as well and is
also the one who is mainly in charge of monitoring and evaluating them. 
 
With respect to their internal rules and processes, since the company has a small managing
workforce that are being run by people either of the same bloodline or are closely related, the
internal system of the company is surrounded by close ties and familiarity, where warm, family
treatment is accorded to each other. When it comes to the management of internal conduct, the
company also imposes a strict compliance with time and attendance policies, where the
attendance and punctuality of their employees are monitored by the use of their time cards. Part
of their internal system is also infused with providing their working staff with benefits such as the
availability of leaves with pay and sick leaves, and paying their employees based on city, and
not provincial rates, regardless of the place where the office is operating. More of these benefits
also include the annual provision of travel incentives for their employees that includes free travel
with their families, coupled with an additional travel allowance.

Shared Values
 

The cornerstone where J8 Travel Services stands are: competence in handling travel packages;
orderly climate for travel and work; responsive attitude towards clients’ welfare; and an
enthusiastic spirit in providing quality services.

The J8 Travel team works in an environment where each of them is seen as a contributing
member of the company. Each member of the company organizes and sorts out who will do
what, according to their expertise, interest and availability. They are passionate about their work
and put their customers at the heart of everything they do. For them, customers come first,
hence, they work together to the highest possible standards when customers book their
services aligned with their guarantee to provide customers value for their money. Furthermore,
every member of J8 Travel dedicates themselves to each individual customer and each
individual itinerary, making sure every experience with their customers is seamless and stress-
free all throughout. 

Style
Generally, the leadership style observed by J8 Travel is a top-down approach where an
executive decision maker or other top person makes the decisions of how something should be
done. The reason for this is that decisions in the firm, and all the tasks and goals, are assessed
and determined by the managing director together with the sales and events manager.
However, employees can also give a say or suggestion on how to accomplish the overall goals
and objectives of the company. The company also supports discussions, reviews and
modifications of their competencies to ensure that they meet the needs of the organization and
to reflect new advances. 

Because of the company’s organizational structure being composed by people with close ties
and familiarity, they are naturally inclined towards interfirm cooperation that is based on trust,
altruism, collective thinking, and stewardship. Hence, it is these innate qualities often found and
shared among family members that causes the emergence, as well as the maintenance, of
having cooperative relations in the family-owned business.

Staff

The employees of J8 Travel Services are well-trained and have invested in travelling both
locally and abroad to ensure that they personally have the expertise, knowledge and experience
of their offered programs. The agency’s workforce comprises two major divisions when it comes
to supervising and decision-making. One for office matters and the other for field matters. The
managing director together with the finance officer, liaison officer, and OJT Head (Philippine
Office) are in-charge of clerical duties, managing file system, updating paper works, maintaining
statistical and financial records, and the likes. On the other hand, the events and promotions
manager, marketing manager together with the marketing assistant are responsible for
promoting and marketing the business, recruiting, training and supervising staff mainly when on
tours, preparing promotional materials and displays, and meeting profit or sales targets. 

Currently, J8 travel has seven (7) regular employees. During tours, internships, on-the-job
training in the Philippines or abroad, business travel, family trips or solo trips, the company hires
freelance travel agents, tour guides, and drivers to accommodate their clients instead of hiring
their own employees.  

 
Skills

Their employees are known to be diligent and motivated in executing their tasks that
consequently produces high productivity levels in the business. At the outset, the company’s
process of hiring new employees and staff do not demand high qualifications, nor are they
required to be equipped with tons of skills upon their application. In effect, new recruits that are
hired may or may not be lacking in certain skills required of the business. Despite these initial
shortcomings, however, predilections by the company’s managing officers are given towards
those employees whose characteristics evidently show their eagerness and willingness to learn
their tasks, to be instructed and taught by their officers. Ultimately, their employees eventually
learn to be proficient with their respective jobs. When it comes to determining employee
effectiveness, they are monitored by the managers and assessed through the use of client
feedback, and personal observations as to whether they are timely and able to complete their
tasks in a given day. On the other hand, with respect to the skills of those in the managing
positions, it can be said that their skills are proficient for they are often required to execute their
tasks in an “all-around” manner. As previously mentioned, each of their specific roles attached
to their job titles could be switched and manned by the other, and no restriction towards their
specialization, as given by their job title, is being followed. 

Moving on to the company’s strong points, J8 Travel Services is known for being accredited by
the government and its agencies, such as the Department of Transportation, and is associated
with many organizations in the tourism and travel sector that are all listed under the company’s
online website. The company has also been a multiple international awardee from various
international travel awards, such as the Malaysia Airlines’ Top Producer of Via Philippines in
2019, multiple Asia Tourism Excellence Awards in 2015, and many more, which information can
also be gathered from their online website. Lastly, the company is not only focused with
providing leisurely travel from within and out of the country, but they also cater their services to
other industries such as in schools, where they can offer internships and OJTs to students,
including field trips, and even to local government units (LGU) when it comes to accommodating
government conferences.