Operation Plans at Toivolas Construction Firm Business Essay

The owners of Toivola Construction LLC, believe that the most important element supporting the feasibility of this company is the strength and the proven ability of our managers and employees. Toivola Constructions' management team consists of Terry Toivola, Tiffany Toivola, and Kevin Toivola. Each one of us represents a strong blend of complementary skills and business experience. In addition to each one of us having a business degree, Tiffany will soon have completed her Masters degree in Accounting. Kevin also has a Masters degree in Marketing. Terry, the CEO and Vice President, started his first business at a very young age and has since worked in all areas of construction throughout the United States. Terry Toivola - As Chief Executive Officer, Terry's responsibilities include team building, building a positive culture among the team and setting our overall strategy in motion. As well as being responsible for these things Terry will be responsible for heading up each and every project making sure that they are completed within our budget and time constraints. As the supervisor of Cutting Edge construction, Terry was an integral part of a team that turned a one man construction company into a 3 million dollar a year organization. Terry has more than 10 years of construction industry experience with demonstrated accomplishments in cost effective negotiations, cost management and control, claim analysis, scheduling and purchasing. His diverse project experience includes extensive coordination with private developers, owners, real estate managers, cost consultant and contractors. Tiffany Toivola - As Chief Financial Officer Tiffany is responsible for the inflow and outflow of cash, balancing the books and payroll. Tiffany is also responsible for making financial reports for meetings, creating plans that will help up maximize our profits and determining ways for our employees to work more efficiently to reduce our costs. She is currently working in the construction industry as a corporate accountant and has built a group of dedicated vendors to assist the company with necessary supplies and lines of credit. Kevin Toivola - As COO Kevin will be responsible for all aspects of our operations. This includes our supply chain, quality, sales and marketing, safety and health and our environmental concerns. Through the use of performance measurements, flowcharts, best practice information and benchmarking he can predict potential problems in our operations and create the best methods to correct the issues. Kevin has an impressive combination of academic qualifications and business experience. He has a Masters degree in Marketing, and a Bachelors degree in Business management. This is supplemented by experience in his parent's very successful business. Kevin has been responsible for the development and oversight of the accounting department in this company throughout his years in college and has an ongoing role. As well as the three managers we have three other professionals that will be responsible for every aspect of physically completing the projects. Roger Wood has 16 years experience in the construction industry with a concentration in all aspects of masonry. Jay Smith has 9 years in the construction industry with a concentration in forming & finishing any renovation. Dennis Locke has 15 years experience in the construction industry with his concentration being roofing, siding & windows. With these three professionals on our side there are literally no projects that we can't do.

Operating Plan

Toivola Construction LLC will be operated out of Terry and Tiffany's home in Sartell, Minnesota. We currently own all of our equipment outright as it is necessary to own your own equipment and tools in the construction industry. All three of us managers are responsible for meeting with customers, negotiating prices for the projects and bidding on new projects. Terry will be implementing strategic plans to insure the work is completed in the planned amount of time and the customers are 100% satisfied. Tiffany will make follow up calls with each customer approximately two weeks after completion to make sure their experience working with Toivola Construction was gratifying and ask for their recommendation. According to a journal that I recently read by Abdelsamad, M.H "95% of the total number of business organizations in the U.S. are made up of small businesses". After reading this journal which talks about why some businesses fail, I realized that starting a business can be a dream come true for us, but is also full of risks. As a new company we have to strive for 100% customer satisfaction. A large number of new businesses fail each year due owner's lack of management skills, excessive optimism, failure to monitor results, financial pitfalls and excessive withdrawals. As a manager of Toivola Construction Kevin will be able to predict these potential issues before they become an issue.Starting and running a business is not all profit and great salary as I once thought, it takes sacrifices that a business owner has to make such as long working hours, and time away from their families. It takes great discipline to accomplish a day's work. Understanding and studying the above mentioned issues can assist us in making this company a huge success. To start we will charge by the hour for any remodeling projects done inside or outside of the home. Since our focus is on residential homes we will require a deposit of A½ down upon acceptance of our contract with the rest due upon completion. In certain circumstances we will need to rely on T&M (Time and Materials) such as creating a prototype or something we have never done before. If we do have to rely on T&M we will not require a down payment just a signed contract not to exceed a certain dollar amount. Once the project is bid the work begins immediately. Our three main employees will work under our leadership to get the job done in the shortest time possible with 100% accuracy. We will implement an Autocratic style of leadership in the beginning until we know their capabilities and can fully trust them to represent our company. When dealing with new employees we would use the autocratic style because we want the projects done right, our way. Therefore we will tell them how to do the job and stay in constant communication throughout the project. Once they can be trusted we will implement the democratic style of leadership. Terry, Kevin and I will be using our own money for the initial startup of Toivola Construction. We each have equal amounts invested into the company. Tiffany has the ability thru her current vendor relationships to set up accounts at Mills Fleet Farm, Menards and a private builder supply company, provided a need arises and payments don't arrive on time. Terry has a very close friend in the loan department of Security State Bank where he has banked his entire life that would be more then willing to offer us a loan also. Through our direct marketing letters and flyers, web-sites, links and local newspapers, we will position our services as an inexpensive and hassle-free way to update and maintain our customers' homes. By utilizing our services, residential customers will not hear that the job is too small to take on and we will never purposely over bid the project so we don't have to take it. We will cater to the needs of the plain Jane or the outrageous. Toivola Construction LLC can and will succeed in this economy! For part two of this assignment I will be doing this a little different. Toivola Construction LLC is a small six man operation and most likely will not ever have a need to outsource work outside of Minnesota let alone on a global scale. So here is my part two, which focuses on the global economy. Several emerging trends are impacting organizational life. Of these emerging trends, two will be examined here; globalization and diversity. These two emerging trends create tensions for organizational leaders and employees as they go through waves of changes within their organizations. These tensions present opportunities as well as threats, and if these tensions are not managed well, they will result in dysfunctional and dire organizational outcomes at the end of any change process. To stay competitive, more organizations are embracing offshore outsourcing. Many functions are being shifted to India, the Philippines, Malaysia, and other countries for their low labor costs, high levels of workforce education, and technological advantages. According to the 2002-2003 Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) Workplace Forecast, companies such as Ford, General Motors, and Nestle employ more people outside of their headquarters countries than within those countries. Almost any company, whether in manufacturing or services, can find some part of its work that can be done off site. Forrester Research projects that 3.3 million U.S. service- and knowledge-based jobs will be shipped overseas by the year 2015, 70 percent of which will move to India. Communication and information sharing are occurring across the globe in multiple languages and multiple cultures. Global competition and global cooperation coexist in the new world economy. One major consequence of globalization is greater mobility in international capital and labor markets. This creates a global marketplace where there is more opportunity, because there are more potential customers. However, there is also more competition, as local companies have to compete with foreign companies for customers. According to Dani Rodrik, professor of international political economy at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, the processes associated with the global integration of markets for goods, services, and capital have created two sources of tensions. First, reduced barriers to trade and investment accentuate the asymmetries between groups that can cross international borders, and those that cannot. In the first category are owners of capital, highly skilled workers, and many professionals. Unskilled and semiskilled workers and most middle managers belong in the second category. Second, globalization engenders conflicts within and between nations over domestic norms and the social institutions that embody them. As the technology for manufactured goods becomes standardized and diffused internationally, nations with very different sets of values, norms, institutions, and collective preferences begin to compete head on in markets for similar goods. Trade becomes contentious when it unleashes forces that undermine the norms implicit in local or domestic workplace practices. According to Thomas (1992), dimensions of workplace diversity include, but are not limited to: age, ethnicity, ancestry, gender, physical abilities/qualities, race, sexual orientation, educational background, geographic location, income, marital status, military experience, religious beliefs, parental status, and work experience. The future success of any organizations relies on the ability to manage a diverse body of talent that can bring innovative ideas, perspectives and views to their work. The challenge and problems faced of workplace diversity can be turned into a strategic organizational asset if an organization is able to capitalize on this melting pot of diverse talents. With the mixture of talents of diverse cultural backgrounds, genders, ages and lifestyles, an organization can respond to business opportunities more rapidly and creatively, especially in the global arena (Cox, 1993), which must be one of the important organizational goals to be attained. More importantly, if the organizational environment does not support diversity broadly, one risks losing talent to competitors.

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