Business Management And Entrepreneurship Case Study

Introduction of Business Management And Entrepreneurship Case Study

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Entrepreneurship is the capacity and willingness to build, manage, and operate a commercial venture, as well as any of its risks, in order to earn a profit (Doern, Williams and Vorley, 2019). Entrepreneurship is best demonstrated by the creation of new firms. Mary Kay Inc. is a privately held multi-level marketing corporation based in the United States of America. So according Direct Selling News, Mary Kay had a wholesale turnover of $3.25 billion in 2018 and was the world's sixth biggest network marketing organization. Located in Addison, Texas, is the headquarters of Mary Kay Cosmetics. Mary Kay Ash, the company's founder, started it in 1963. As a nation's potential to compete in an ever-changing and more dynamic global economy, entrepreneurship is essential.

A multi-level marketing strategy is used by Mary Kay to advertise its cosmetics. In addition to selling directly to customers, Mary Kay wholesalers, or "beauty consultants," may earn money by recruiting others to join their distribution network. A $100 beginning package is needed of all new Mary Kay distributors (Adkins-Green, 2019). Mary Kay withholds a great deal of information on the typical earnings of its representatives. As a result, this paper examines the characteristics of the entrepreneur. Along with the report, Mary Kay Ash shows how the entrepreneur saw the chance to provide the company's firm a competitive advantage so that it may succeed. Entrepreneurship's position as a leader as well as what it takes to become a great leader are also discussed in the research. The essay also discusses how entrepreneurs contribute to the economy and society. As a result of a worldwide epidemic, the paper also offers options for entrepreneurs.

Discussion

A. About the Entrepreneur

Personality and characteristics of Mary Kay Ash

Mary Kay Ash has made a significant contribution to the progress of female entrepreneurs by being innovative, energetic, and infectious in her optimism. The "glass ceiling" that prevents many women from rising to the top ranks of corporate America inspired Ash to create a company in which working mothers could defined their own goals for advancement and compensation, and also set their own schedules so that they could spend time with their children while still trying to balance work and home life (Balachandra, 2019). Mary Kay Cosmetics, a unique multilevel, direct-sales cosmetic firm, was the culmination of her idea. It would empower hundreds of thousands of women with the chances Ash had been denied. It was after Ash's husband returned from World War II and went off with another lady that her life changed forever. Ash was compelled to work full-time at Stanley Home Products and she had three children to support (Ivantsiv, 2018). Even though she swiftly rose to the position of top sales producer, she was disappointed to see guys with less aptitude and expertise promoted ahead of her.

In 1952, she worked at World Gifts before launching her own firm, which was founded the following year. Mary Kay Ash gave it her all while working for the corporation; she was committed and hardworking, but she was constantly hampered since she was a woman. She thought that all individuals, particularly those who took their work seriously, should be given the same possibilities. In the end, she was able to establish her own firm because of her belief that workers need to be treated decently (Adamson, 2020). Top performers were given holidays, jewels and even pink Cadillacs by Ash. Unlike many of her prior employers, Mary Kay Ash valued all employees equally and didn't tolerate gender discrimination in the workplace. As long as her sales reps were content, she thought, her company would be successful. A more positive work atmosphere and a more successful business are always the result of contented employees. Her constant concern for the well-being of others and her desire to ensure that everyone received the care they deserved were apparent in Mary Kay Ash. Ash has a wide perspective on life, which helps her seeing the big picture and avoid getting bogged down in the nitty-gritty (Ili?, 2021). So, Mary Kay Ash looks for persons who can fit into her wider goals and take over the sectors she thinks boring. Therefore, Mary Kay assesses individuals based on what they can contribute to the greater good. She is a real egalitarian who is seldom biased and would not tolerate the social prejudices of others.

Opportunities tuned into Success

When it came to Mary Kay Ash, everything was conceivable. As a result of her own personal experience with discrimination, she realized that she had to do something to help other women. After launching her firm in 1963, Mary Kay Ash rocked "business as usual" and changed the male-dominated workplace upside down. At the height of her career, Mary Kay Ash committed herself to helping women take charge of their own destiny (D'Antonio, 2019). Mary Kay Ash was a firm believer in the power of core beliefs to propel a person to the pinnacle of success. Using the Golden Rule as a compass, she stayed true to her values and remained steadfast in her commitment to showing leadership and pulling others up in the process. "Never, definitely never compromise your values," she would tell people. Many women have been inspired by her unshakeable morality and have become successful businesses and leaders because of it.

On Sept. 13 1963, Mary Kay Ash launches her company and opens her firm: "Beauty by Mary Kay". The Basic Treatment Set from Beauty by Mary Kay introduced a fresh approach to skin care along with the new potential (Mullane, 2020). A foundation and four other skin care items were supplied. Cosmetics for the eyes and lips have been around since the early days of the glamour industry. Mary Kay Ash establishes an annual practice of honouring and educating women entrepreneurs for the upcoming year by recognizing their achievements in business. She calls it a Seminar. Bathrooms in the United States were mostly white in the 1960s. As a result, the colour pink was selected for the packaging of the company's cosmetic goods in order to make them more appealing to women. When it came to foreseeing business potential and efficiently managing the firm, Mary Kay Ash was unmatched (Ili?, 2021). More and more women have been able to achieve on their own terms thanks to her efforts. It's not only that she's a great recruiter of beauty consultants, and she also has the ability to connect with her workers, educate them customer service skills, and sell the company's goods.

Significance of innovation and innovative products

To maintain long-term economic development and prosperity, one must focus on innovation. New goods, services, and procedures are the result of implementing innovative concepts. Organizational executives often use development branding. As a result of this process, managers might get insight into new avenues for creativity (Zakievaet al., 2019). As a key contributor to success, it's critical to understand. It ensures the long-term viability of a company, including its brand. Innovation is generally seen by customers as anything that enhances the value of a product or a business. When employed correctly, this may provide one a commercial edge, particularly in a saturated or fast changing industry.

Product introductions at Mary Kay typically took three years until the business started digitizing innovation four years ago. Mary Kay now has better insight into how product, adapted to regional requirementsdo in each nation, and product portfolio selections are based on facts rather than anecdotal knowledge, which has resulted in a 30 percent reduction in product launch time during 2012(Jegadeeswari, Sudarvel, and Velmurugan, 2020). Mary Kay deployed “Oracle's Agile PLM tools” and followed the Kalypso best practices in order to better its innovation process and results.

When it comes to technology-aided projects, start with the plan. It is a "playbook to accomplish the company plan," according to Young, to formulate an innovation strategy. In their business strategy, companies often make bold claims about their ambitions, such as becoming the industry leader, yet their innovation initiatives are only incremental (Mundo, 2019). Their innovation pipeline can never provide double-digit growth." Mary Kay's top executives decided in 2011 to stop releasing the same goods all over the world. Deanna Fell, vice president of engineering and PMO at Mary Kay, says, "We discovered that our clients in Asia, for example, had quite different expectations for their skin care." That approach has allowed us to address market expectations as part of the innovation strategy." For a corporation have between 400 and 450 items in its pipeline, Fell says Agile PLM has enabled Mary Kay select which innovation ideas to reject.

B. About the Entrepreneurial Organisation

Mary Kay Ash’s Team building

Cosmetics giant Mary Kay Inc. is based in the United States. Situated in Dallas, Texas, the U.S.A, the company's worldwide headquarters Dermatological care and personal care goods such as skin creams are among its main areas of expertise at this company. In Dallas and China, the bulk of their items are made by a team of manufacturing professionals (Garcia, Pamplona and da Silveira, 2022). The professional women direct sales team is responsible for selling all of the goods. There were 35 nations where the company's goods were offered as of 2009.

Mary Kay's aim of opening doors for women launched Mary Kay Inc. in 1963. There were only nine beauty consultants working at Mary Kay Inc. at the time. After 47 years, Mary Kay does have its own product development and testing departments, as well as a worldwide network of beauty consultants. Drawing on her 25 years of professional expertise, Mary Kay Ash shaped the company's culture(Crittenden, Crittenden, and Crittenden, 2019). It is imperative that those who work for Mary Kay Inc have pride in the firm and are prepared to take chances, seek continual development, and adhere to the Golden Rule faith in God first, family second, and work third. In addition, Mary Kay recognizes and celebrates individuals on a regular basis, both privately and in public. Listening to others is a high value in her society. Constructive criticism and reinforcement go hand in hand when it comes to helping workers feel valued inside the company. She rented a modest shop in Dallas and set up a production unit with her $5,000 in life savings, her big idea, and the original skin cream recipe. Initially, the firm employed a pharmacist, her second husband, and a group of saleswomen who could pay for their goods in advance as independent agents (Mullane, 2020). Mary Kay's mission was to enhance the beauty of women's lives. She establishes the importance of religion, family, and work as the top three priorities in her life, with the Golden Rule as the fourth. As a firm, Mary Kay Ash often described it as a business with a heart. It's not just about selling stuff; it's about educating women how to improve their self-esteem.

Mary Kay Ash’s role as a leader in supporting organizational growth

Since the chances she provided women at the time were life-altering, Mary Kay Ash was a transformative leader. She handled her staff with respect, gave them an objective to strive for, and inspired them to go above and beyond. It was Mary Kay's illustration of how achievable success might be that made her a hero and transformational leader for American women (Crittenden and Bliton, 2019). For a while, Ash's business culture seemed out of place to those outside of the firm, but looking back, her leadership instincts were really remarkably forward-looking.

Ash's company has a strong focus on gender equality as a core principle. Her vision was to build a corporation where every woman could receive the support and understanding she needed, as well as a slew of new possibilities. It was an important turning point in her career when she decided to advocate for a healthy work-life balance. God, family, and profession were the three most important standards she followed as a leader (Carradus, Zozimo and Discua Cruz, 2020). Managers who were able to see the value in working to build a strong family were promoted by her. She wanted to create a new company with her spouse in order to show her real intentions. Despite the fact that her son passed away before the first shop could open, Ash did not abandon on her dream of creating a cosmetics firm with him. The Mary Kay Company's behavior was out of the ordinary. Ash didn't want to entice customers with bargains on his products.Her leadership style was characterized by a combination of support and change. Ash, on the other hand, advocated for the philosophy of treating others the way you would want to be treated (Balachandra, 2019). This woman didn't push her leadership style on the team. Experts were not invited by her. All she wanted to do was assist those in need and give them the chance to succeed. When it came to helping and training others, she was more than willing.

Ash's firm is organized in a tall structure. Most individuals may work as independent entrepreneurs, make as much as they desire, and establish their own pricing to compensate the losses incurred by the business. In other words, the Mary Kay Company's goods may be resold under various circumstances. The sole requirement is that the funds used to create the items be returned. Many would-be Mary Kay beauty consultants see this chance as a stepping stone to a secure future.Ash's art is notable for its ability to alter audiences. A transformational leader encourages change and procedures that have the capacity to affect others, and this sort of leadership results in workers who are more committed and empowered (Mullane, 2020). Following this model, Ash became the face of the movement. Women all around the globe have benefited greatly from the possibilities she has created for them, allowing them to pursue their goals, acquire respect, and spend more time with their families.

She understood the differences between male and female employees in her position of authority. No one can ignore the truth that women are more sensitive and require more preparation when faced with a brand-new task or situation. Even so, she may be able to come up with further evidence to support her case that women deserve the same opportunities as males. While men and women received the same amount of motivation in the form of an incentive, women were able to reply more swiftly and with more responsiveness than males (Adkins-Green, 2019).However, she didn't make her selections only on the basis of feeling. In light of her company's success, it is clear that all of her actions were financially beneficial. She justified her actions by saying that they offered the potential to make a difference in the lives of others and to introduce ladies in need to the wonders of the world. Work should not be split based on sex or ethnicity. It doesn't matter who can get a job done faster or better in a certain length of time. In the end, it's all about who stands to gain the most. Ash felt this method to be essential in reaching a choice.

C. About Contribution to the Economy and Society

The business of Mary Kay does a lot of contributions to enhancing the society such as the company has provided sponsored an education program in “The star’s Newspaper”. The main agenda of the program is to enhance the literacy of the children in the English language through innovative methods. An innovative and interactive major has been introduced by The STAR NiE in order to make the learning procedure much easier through the medium of language exercises and various kinds of activities. A number of schools have been benefited through this program such as, “SK Sek 6, Kota Damansara, SK Sek 9, Kota Damansara, SK Sek 7, Kota Damansara, SK Sek 11, and Kota Damansara.” The company has even sponsored the “Inspiring Star” program it is mainly a charity program. The initiative for the program was to boost the capital fund in order to utilize it for meeting the expenses done on the operations at the NASOM center. The program also supports the social growth of the autism children by the medium of participation and highlighting their talent in order to uplift their social skills. The program also assisted to expand awareness and acceptance of Autistic children within the society (Kay and Gonzalez, 2020). The awareness spread through this program will assist the autistic children to involve and mix with other social activities of which they are generally deprived off.

Mary Kay has also sponsored the Play and Learn center by donating RM 20,000. The center mainly provides a safe place for the poor children as their parents and caretakers do hold more than two jobs and, therefore, they lack time to keep the children under supervision. The center does provide innovative methods to help the children learn how to communicate among peers and other people, developing a bond between them that creates a sense of belongingness. Mainly the children in the center are in a safe and healthy environment enhancing their skills through the medium of interactive activities, which help them to grow. Mary Kay has aligned with the National Cancer Society of Malaysia they have bought a portable device for breast examination in order to examine at least more than 1,000 underprivileged women. It is a wireless operated device that helps to diagnose or detect the tumor tissue that too in a painless procedure. The main aim of the activity is to reach out to numerous numbers of women belonging to the remote area and cultures in order to provide appropriate health facilities and treatment access for them (Pfeiffer et al., 2021). The National Cancer Society was able to raise the fund of RM 35,000 to purchase the device due to help provided by the Mary Kay Beauty Consultants and their customers. The company does put a focus on spreading awareness related to the malignancy by the medium of early detection, to not only the employees of the company but on a global platform. The company raises funds and distributes a great amount of capital in order to invest in the research done on cancer and find solutions and cures for cancer related to women's bodies.

The company puts a lot of focus on the enhancement and empowerment of women setting aside the discomfort that occurred due to lack of gender equality the company does align with those companies only those who share the same mission. The company does provide a safe and healthy environment for the employees working under their organization. the company does make sure to implement such strategies which will ensure women can re-enter the workplace with full confidence and they must feel safe and must be treated equally (Crittenden and Bliton, 2019). As the owner of the company Mary Kay is a great supporter of gender equality, therefore, the management system of the company also makes sure to uplift that agenda to create a better environment for the working ladies and empower them within the social and economic strata of the society. The company is dedicated to investing an ample amount of capital in the science behind beauty (Villagómez Morales, 2019). The company has collaborated with such organizations that promote empowering women and their families, protecting survivors of the domestic abuse, and encouraging children to chase their dreams. According to the Dallas Convention and Visitors Bureau, “Mary Kay Seminar will pump more than $30 million into the local economy and contribute to 2,200 jobs in the Dallas area this year. Mary Kay has hosted its Seminar at the Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center Dallas since 1974, making it the longest-running annual event at the facility.”

Due to the emergence of a pandemic the cosmetic industry has faced challenges such as, there has been seen a decline in the growth of the industry due to the emergence of lockdown the manufacturing companies had shut down their production units due to lack of labor. Due to the cut down of the workforce, even the production level has been adversely affected. Even due to the emergence of a pandemic the fashion shows have been canceled which is also the main concern for the company and reasons to bear great losses. But even in this scenario, the Mary Kay Foundation has emerged with helping hands for the survivors of the domestic abuse that has been raised during the period of lockdown. The brick and mortar stores were affected as due to protocols imposed to create a healthy environment have put limitations on the customers to visit the stores. Even lack of jobs and eradication has led to a lack of money to invest in the purchase of cosmetics. The company has provided support to prevent and reduce domestic violence that emerged due to the pandemic by providing $25,000 grants to “North Texas shelters.” The main agenda of the organization dealing with the scenario is to work on rescuing the women and children facing violence. The company has done a lot in order to extend its helping hands to the shelters regardless of location and follow the protocol in order to promote a better environment even in that crisis.

Conclusion and Recommendations

With her leadership style as well as the changes she made to the firm she worked for, Mary Kay Ash showed that a single company can have a significant impact on the national economic climate. Ash's views were a great inspiration for a number of Americans. As a result, managers and employees alike are inspired by her example, and they realize that there is always room for improvement. The greatest testament to Ash's accomplishments and sound judgment is the esteem with which she was held around the globe. She had no intention of making a lot of money or being the greatest boss. To assist others was at the centre of her motivations, which led to the creation of one of the biggest and most successful businesses. She might also use a situational leadership style to execute changes for better organizational management and to increase staff morale because of the present pandemic condition.

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