Rebranding a Small-Scale Tourism Business in Abu Dhabi

Table of Contents:

1. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

2. INTERNSHIP OVERVIEW AND BACKGROUND

3. DURATION AND LIMITATION OF MY INTERNSHIP PROJECT

4. SUPERVISION/ REPORTING

5. PROFILE OF GOLDEN EYES TOURISM

6. IDENTIFIED PROBLEMS

7. EXISTING MARKET AND CUSTOMERS’ BEHAVIOR

8. SPECIFIC TASKS AND MAJOR RESPONSIBILITIES

9. ACTION PLANS AND MY CONTRIBUTION

10. SWOT ANALYSIS OF GOLDEN EYES

11. PROPSOSED REFORMS AND BEST PRACTICES IN LIGHT OF LITERATURE

12. EFFECTS OF MY CONTRIBUTION TO GOLDEN EYES (BEFORE & AFTER)

13. INTERNSHIP SELF-EVALUATION AND THOUGHTS ON PERSONAL IMPROVEMENTS

14. FACED CHALLENGES AND LESSONS LEARNED

15. CONCLUSIONS AND FUTURE BEYOND THE CURRENT INTERNSHIP

16. RECOMMENDATIONS FOR GOLDEN EYES TOURISM

Preface and Acknowledgement

For almost one (1) month from 11th December 2017 till 14th January 2018, I did my first business internship at Golden Eyes Tourism, a traditional Abu Dhabi based local tourism company in UAE. The entire internship activities were part of my remotely work, taken place at University of Canberra-ACT, Australia. Figure-1 shows the actual location of my Employer’s offices in Abu Dhabi City.

Editorial Note: Figure removed due to copyright issues

Fig-1: Location Map of Golden Eyes Office

During my internship, I worked in multiple areas of business development and rebranding of Golden Eyes including evaluation of its existing human resources and review of the current organisational structure. The main objectives of my internship project were to investigate the major reasons of Golden Eyes’ declined business and consecutive losses; and to propose suitable business reforms and marketing strategies catering the faced challenges. Further, I was also asked to help company’s management in implementing the proposed changes required to fill the administrative gaps. These tasks of my internship best suit my major units’ studies and outcomes. My responsibilities also brought me to a very new and interesting area of using active elements of entrepreneurship, leadership, public management, business transformations, managing change, communication, networking, and rebranding of a small business in real life. Though my tasks were mostly related to my Employer’s business improvement and remained commercial oriented, however, while performing my assigned duties; I also gained a significant practical knowledge and the most importantly; great opportunity to sharpen my hard and soft skills in a professional working environment.

I am extremely grateful to Mr. Rashid, an Emirati entrepreneur and UAE Diplomat working in Canberra-ACT; for giving me this valuable opportunity, trusting my abilities, providing me a freedom to share ideas and cooperating with me during my entire internship period. Mr. Rashid is currently the Chairman and CEO of Golden Eyes Tourism. I consider him as my first business client as well as my direct supervisor due to the nature of my internship. During my placement, he remained a vital source of my inspiration and direct communication to Golden Eyes’ top management. I would also like to express my gratitude to Mr. Gregory Boland (my Academic Supervisor and Internship Unit Convener) for the approval of my internship report’s topic; and more importantly for his cooperative personality and precious instructions during the workshops/ sessions. He provided me his timely feedback on my research topic and responded to my academic queries which helped me to prepare an interesting presentation with my voice narration and a creative reflective diary those were submitted earlier.

Appendices :

Appendix-A: My Internship Placement and InPlace Approval

Appendix-B: Unit Convener’s Approval Report Topic

Appendix-C: Golden Eyes’ History, Moto, Mission, Vision, Objectives and Core Values

Appendix-D: Proposed Organisational Changes and Updated Roles

Appendix-E: Screenshots of Golden Eyes Old and New Website

Appendix-F: Financial Statement and Report Format

Appendix-G: Copies of Correspondences/ Communications

1. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

There is abundant evidence that in last few decades, the Abu Dhabi Government and private businessmen are exploiting their complete resources either in shape of Emirati hospitality or leisure attractions to emerge as a major tourist spot in the Middle East. The role of SMEs (small and medium-sized enterprises) particularly, tourism companies is very vital to provide locals and foreign visitors the necessary insights into UAE traditions, history and customs while creating a sustainable hub of tourists’ entertainments. To maintain existing customers, to attract more overseas visitors form diversified backgrounds and to cope with the current market trends, traditional businesses are transforming rapidly in Abu Dhabi. Most of the business owners are adopting latest technologies, new infrastructure, contemporary marketing mix strategies and vibrant business practices to upgrade their brands and to differentiate their products in the competitive atmosphere. Such practices have also developed additional financial burden and unavoidable organisational pressure on the existing tourism businesses like Golden Eyes Tourism to adapt innovative trends for business sustainability and their future growths.

Official portal of UAE Government recently shared that “In year-2016, the direct contribution of the travel and tourism sector to the UAE’s GDP was AED 68.5 billion (USD 18.7 billion) which is equivalent to 5.2 per cent of the total GDP. It was forecast to rise by 3.2 per cent in 2017 and to rise by 5.1 per cent per annum from 2017 to 2027 which would be equivalent to 5.4 per cent of the total GDP in 2027. In year-2016, about 4,440,314 guests stayed in hotels in the Abu Dhabi. This is 8 per cent more than the earlier year. Further, Abu Dhabi Tourism & Culture Authority is working towards the sustainable tourism development of the emirate which also involves launching and implementing 'green' tourism and hotel initiatives. (1) Despite, the proven growth of GDP of United Arab Emirates (UAE) and the apparent expanding business opportunities in Abu Dhabi Emirate, Golden Eyes Tourism has consecutively been experienced a significant reduction in its loyal customers causing diminishing revenue since year 2016. During the last year 2017, company had hardly gained an annual profit of AUD 10 K against a total revenue of AUD 0.5 Million. It is recently investigated that both fixed and variable expenses have considerably been increased over the last three (3) years however, no proper market positioning and business strategies were formulated to understand company’s strengths and weaknesses; to recognize key competitors; to understand customers’ behaviour; and to perform breakeven analyses avoiding down surges/ revenue losses. Different causes including the absence of effective business model; high institutional barriers; poor management; unorganized organisational structure; lack of motivation; and the incompetent staff were identified during my evaluation.

In addition to my primary goals to seek experiential learning, expanding social networking and applying the learned academic theories in real-world trades, my personal motives of this internship were to (i) perform holistically in-depth analysis of Golden Eyes (ii) evaluate its existing management and business model (if any), (iii) identify fiscal problems, (iv) streamline business operations, (v) develop human resource management, marketing and business strategies; (vi) and share ideas related to company’s rebranding. These all professional efforts were purely based on my academic learning and in-built personal attributes. This internship had indirectly provided me real chances to also evaluate my own capabilities, limitations, personal strengths and weaknesses. Indeed, I have enhanced my analytical skills, business development knowledge, communication strength, management and leadership traits; and personal judgment during my current internship. Subsequent sections of this Special Alternative Report (SAR) include all necessary details enabling its readers to better understand my research topic, personal contribution to solve identified problems and proposed recommendations.

2. INTERNSHIP OVERVIEW AND BACKGROUND

Being only focused on theoretical studies and academic learning, higher classes students may have doubts about the practical applications of their learned concepts and theories. It is difficult for students to develop analytical, experimental and managerial skills merely relying on their theoretical studies. Therefore, the role of universities in the local educational system is found extensive in which students’ participation has been seen vigorous to strengthen individual’s qualities and recognise their hidden potentials. In recent times, universities are more focused to provide students necessary creative experiential spaces emphasizing student to learn new skills, build practical qualities and adopt real-life traits. Such efforts in academia are helping students to understand the difference between theory and practice and how to demonstrate their inbuilt capabilities to lead in their job placements.

My true inspiration of this internship was derived from UC Distinctive by Design Strategic Plan 2018 (launched in October 2017) which deeply emphasis on teamwork; student entrepreneurship; experiential learning; deep & creative thinking; and global connectivity through diversified intra-intuitional cooperation. While carrying out my internship, UC Strategic Plan also provided me a necessary guidance to understand co-working spaces by stimulating opportunities and taking risks in the exploration of ideas and pursuit of solutions. I personally feel a deep connection with UC mission, vision and its strategic goals; and recognise my immediate institutional responsibilities to participate globally and expand my knowledge boundaries.

I selected this internship project obtaining an opportunity to practice my learned marketing, business, communication, management and leadership skills; to widen my social networking; and to develop an understanding to real life job activities on the global spectrum. While doing so, I also enhanced my knowledge towards multicultural work environment and pushed myself beyond my existed comfort zone. The other reason for my overseas internship was also to increase University of Canberra visibility in the Middle East resulting more diversified academic-industry collaborations and widened corporate partnerships. Indeed, being an internee- business development manager of Golden Eyes, my role was extremely challenging and results demanding. The success of my internship would certainly provide me more chances to expand my linkages; to penetrate in overseas businesses in Middle East; and to establish a platform for anticipated university-industry partnership for my future commercial research works.

Prior applying for my internship placement, I thoroughly studied relevant academic theories and have gained adequate knowledge about various topics such as market research, brand development, marketing, business development plan, strategic planning including formulation of organisational policies, building mission, visions, objective changes, changes management, assessing different models of public management, human resource management, entrepreneurship, competitors analysis, evaluation of organisational strengths & weakness; and the financial analysis. In-class workshops, assignments and presentations helped me to develop a solid foundation comprised of my business evaluation skills. Further, by preparing a detailed business development plan under my Entrepreneurship Unit; marketing plan under Marketing Unit, research projects evaluating customers’ feedbacks under the Research Method Unit; power theories and managing change in contemporary organisations under Managing Change and Innovation Unit; provided me the essential confidence to start creating commercial plans, constructing innovative business strategies and applying suitable organisational reforms to achieve my Employer’s immediate aims. I think, without my distinguishing academic background, personal observations and previous experiences, it was impossible for me to complete this internship.

3. DURATION AND LIMITATION OF MY INTERNSHIP PROJECT

This is a real-life internship project, demanding my detailed financial analyses, higher level managerial review, immediate organisational reforms, suitable e-marketing and business model development for a small-scale tourism firm. It is also my first project with remote working (distance operation) from Canberra-Australia and for an overseas company located in Abu Dhabi. Therefore, first and obvious confinement of my internship was long distance & time difference which constructed a high barrier for me to physically interact with Golden Eyes’ staff and on-ground investigate the company working environment. Through my confined analysis, I felt difficulty in properly understand the local customers’ behaviours, strengths of competitors and evaluate true opportunities for Golden Eyes to expand its business and introduce innovative trends in its services i.e. desert safari, open sky camping and guided tours within Abu Dhabi Emirate. While enabling myself to fully understand the situation, I mostly relied on the accessible literature and the received information either through company’s CEO and its Director.

It was merely one month, very short duration internship project containing numerous interesting tasks and challenging assignments to complete. Further to my remote working, the most difficult parts of my internship were tight scheduling and multitasking. During my internship, I was given satisfactory liberty to examine, evaluate and innovate ideas however, very limited space was extended to implement plans and communicating higher management especially company’s Director and Marketing Manager. Also, my study of company’s human resource management and its evaluation was restricted to office-based staff. Officials working at camp-site to arrange desert safari and its related activities were not included in my HR analysis. Moreover, I was asked by CEO to deeply review the financial details of his company however, complete details of company’s commercial assets and accounts were not provided by the company’s accountant. Accordingly, I mainly conducted a high-level financial review to find out the root cause of company’s previous business losses and unexpected expenses. Based on the accessible data, provided information and my limited evaluation, I challengingly developed company’s future financial objectives which might not display the most accurate figures.

4. SUPERVISION/ REPORTING

My direct and most of the communication remained with company’s Chairman and CEO Mr. Rashid who appreciated my academic knowledge trusted my skills and provided me the adequate confidence to carry out my tasks. Mr. Rashid was born in Liwa, UAE about 40 years ago in Al-Khwarizmi family, a family famous for its commercial traits blossomed in widespread Arabian Desert. I worked for Rashid thinking him as my business client as well as my supervisor, therefore, he remained my focal person for day to day reporting, sharing ideas, developing plans and discussing new marking strategies. Being practicing entrepreneur and business owner, Rashid had his own lesson learned and traditional business techniques to share with me therefore, I considered him my supervisor and my reporting officer. On the other hands, having more knowledge of contemporary businesses and financial skills, he took me as his business consultant/ manager. Depending on each other’s strengths and expertise, we collaboratively achieved a mutual understanding of executing reforms in Golden Eyes. Such cooperation was essential to ensure a smooth transition from old traditional business model to new business model.

At the initial stage of my internship, it was jointly agreed to work remotely and whenever needed, Skype meetings could be arranged. Alternatively, I suggested Rashid to develop a separate management group on WhatsApp to share plans, track records of implantation progress and daily communications. Upon my request, Mr. Rashid also informed Abu Dhabi officials about my proposed role and given authorities.

5. PROFILE OF GOLDEN EYES TOURISM

Golden Eyes was established in early August 2009, Golden Eyes Tourism was pioneer company to provide traditional tourism activities for Arab families. Following the dream of UAE founding father and leader H.H. Zayed bin Al Nahyan i.e. “greenery before modernity” Mr. Rashid envisioned and turned a piece of his ancestor’s desert/ barren land into green farm at Al Khazna located at the outer skirts of Abu Dhabi City. It had taken many years of Rashid’s life to transform a piece of desert and convert into a commercial camp for his desert safari, night camping and other business activities. During my internship interview, he shared with me that his initial intention was to facilitate the locals and foreign visitors through his camp and to provide in-depth sights of the UAE traditions and norms. The entrepreneurial idea of blending UAE tradition, history and culture with contemporary desert safari was encouraged and supported by Khalifa Fund Program in Abu Dhabi. His business was financially supported by interest-free loan through Khalifa Fund which Rashid had returned all in year-2016.

Golden Eyes’ existing camp is more likely a desert resort in Abu Dhabi focused on the heritage, tradition and culture; provides tourism activities along with horizon of hospitality in Safari desert. Rashid told me that Golden Eyes is more than a business, this was his first passion and original obsession. At initial years of his business, he himself used to work with his employees seven days a week and driving special customers as well. Following products and services are offered by Golden Eyes:

- Half day desert safari;
- Overnight desert safari; and
- Quad bikes adventure tour Golden Eyes has a wide range of corporate clients which come under the following categories:
- Local & Expat Residents, Tourists and visitors in the UAE
- Embassies, Foreign and local Companies and Schools
- Government Offices and Official delegates in the UAE

6. IDENTIFIED PROBLEMS

As evident from my initial communication with the company’s CEO Mr. Rashid in Canberra that Golden Eyes’ business and organisational structure need immediate improvements to cater the ongoing market needs and growing customers’ expectations. I utilised Fishbone Diagram (Ishikawa) - Cause & Effect Diagram technique to identify main reasons for business losses and the root causes of decreased customers’ loyalty. My developed diagram displaying various major causes of Golden Eyes’ poor operations and effect is illustrated below in Figure-2:

Editorial Note: Figure removed due to copyright issues

Fig-2: Fishbone Diagram for Golden Eyes Business Evaluation

During my original investigation & detailed evaluation of Golden Eyes management, human resources, finance, marketing, leadership and business model, I reached at the following apparent findings:

- Lack of business interest and passion by CEO due to consecutive apparent losses;
- Absence of expertise, knowledge and excessive use of executive power by company’s Director;
- Duplication of roles and responsivities by multiple staff due to mismanagement;
- Disorganized company structure without a clear line of actions;
- Untrained staff and lack of desired qualifications to perform assigned roles;
- More consideration on business operation rather on marketing and product positioning;
- No developed financial objectives and business targets to follow in the current budget year;
- No human resource management plan and use of coercive power instead of rewarding policy;
- Resistance to change and be remained in the old business model;
- Distortion in communications and wrong interpretations;
- Non-professional website indicating inaccurate and dodgy information for customers;
- Multiple Facebook accounts operated by company’s third-party IT services;
- Lack of capital and resources to implement proposed reforms;
- Ignorance of latest business models and e-commerce

In my personal observations and findings, major problems were actually associated with the top management’s incompetence and misallocation of the available resources. Company’s Director was given unnecessary power to apply on staff by the CEO. Company’s Director was found more focused on her own position and job recognition instead of developing the suitable business plan, marketing strategies and expanding business through social media. Only being graduate in mass-media education, she was trying to compensate in business operations, for which she never had expertise, trainings and background knowledge. Therefore, she never knew how to develop business goals, financial objectives and future policies to cope with the market trends, challenges and customers’ demands. Moreover, over the last few years, more competitors have been introduced in the local tourism industries with better infrastructure, management and marketing style. These all factors were demanding Golden Eyes to skim into the tourism market with better rates, products/ service offers augmented by necessary promotions, products’ differentiation and higher quality customer’s services.

Another reason of losing customers and diminishing business was identified as the lack of company’s vision. Golden Eyes being an old-fashioned tourism company had been operated without any social media manager. It was more focused on direct marketing instead of e-marketing and paid advertisements. On other hands, existing competitors already switched to latest marketing trends and increasing their customers and brand loyalty through intensive social media and local tourism websites. No SWOT analysis was performed before my internship to realise the strengths and weakness of the company and understand external threats. Also, management was found least interested in fiscal management, risk and the resource management. In short, the business was left purely on customers’ preferences and their selection while no marketing strategies were formulated to counter for the faced problems and business needs.

7. EXISTING MARKET AND CUSTOMERS’ BEHAVIOR

Abu Dhabi, capital of United Arab Emirates is the second most populous city of the United Arab Emirates after Dubai. The capital is an innovation and opportunities demanding city holding around 2.9 million population in 67,340 sq. km area. Amongst this, around 2.3 million are expatriates representing different nationalities, working here. (2) The Emirate of Abu Dhabi and United Arab Emirates as whole are internationally recognized for enviable lifestyle, strong, stable economy and business-friendly environment. Abu Dhabi is a great place to live, work and do business which is known for the luxury, tourism, hospitality, tradition and famous spot for international travelers during their connected flights. As per Abu Dhabi Statistics Center, only in 2016, total Number of passengers using the Emirate’s airports 24.6 million with over 194,284 flights at UAE international airports. (3) Abu Dhabi Tourism & Cultural Authority confirmed that during 2016, 4.4 million visitors checked into hotels in the emirate compared with 4.1 million the year before. Further, Abu Dhabi expects to attract more visitors this year by focusing on its top source markets, including India and China, after achieving 8 percent growth. (4)

The city is also known for educated workforce with high labor productivity, modern infrastructure and competitive business costs. According to Khaleej Times (One of the most selling newspaper in Abu Dhabi), UAE economy is on the fast track of diversification and total spending in the tourism sector is predicted to increase 4.5 per cent year on year in 2017. (5) One of the article “Tourist numbers for 2017 expected to grow in Abu Dhabi” by written Sananda Sahoo and published in The National (UAE famous English newspaper) expressed that “India, China, Saudi Arabia, the US, the UK and Germany are Abu Dhabi’s focus markets this year, based on flight connections to and from the emirate and forecast arrival numbers.” (6)

Desert safari and adventures are growing trends in Abu Dhabi amongst workers particularly, good earning hands and educated expatriates. Outdoor activities are increasingly during national holidays and weekends because of pressed works get some time to relax and enjoy with their families, friends, colleagues and business partners. Night camps (whole year) and Desert Safari (in winter) are very popular adventures in the Emirates therefore, companies offer such services are ten a penny around the city. Extreme weather of Abu Dhabi during hot summer also plays a negative role affecting the consumers’ behaviors for outdoor activities. This was also echo by J Christopher Holloway, Claire Humphreys and Rob Davidson (2009) in their book-The business of Tourism that “A problem facing all sectors of tourism is the highly seasonal nature of most tourist traffic. This market is however, also highly price-sensitive and longer period of holiday entitlement. This has meant that tour operators can spread their fixed cost more evenly over the entire year, rather than concentrating them in the peak periods, helping to reduce process further. Operators also use marginal costing techniques to attract client out of seasons. This means that holidays need to be proved to cover variable costs and make some contribution to fixed costs.” (7) As per Annual Weather Report, August is the hottest month in Abu Dhabi with an average temperature of 36°C (96°F) and the coldest is January at 18°C (64°F). The wettest month is February with an average of 20mm of rain. The best months for desert safari are from November to April when the average atmospheric temperature and air humidity are bearable. (8)

Based on my online demographic research, local customers’ buying behavior and market segmentation, I found out that most of the tourist operators and tourism-related firms designed their desert safari and city tours packages to be fit for all ages irrespective of gender, sex orientation and ethnic values. Special discounts and cost-efficient services are offered for large groups and families. Both demographic groups i.e. Arabian locals and expatriates do contribute to the tourism industry by either direct or indirect participation through online reviews, blogs and actual visits using service of local inbound and outbound tour operators, travel agents and local guides. I had also come across another trend of groups’ desert safari and camping is the team building and get together activities offered by major corporates (mostly multinational and oil-gas related firms) to their workers and staff as token of appreciation.

8. SPECIFIC TASKS AND MAJOR RESPONSIBILITIES

My immediate role was to evaluate existing operations of Golden Eyes business and develop necessary business strategies to transform old-fashioned structure into new business model supported by latest trends of marketing, public management, customer services and product positioning. Prior to carrying out these all tasks, I had to study the marketing trends and identify company’s major customers related to tourism and desert safari. In the absence of my physical journey and direct interaction with local market and customers of Abu Dhabi City, I had modified my research method through online data analyses and competitors’ reviews. I had identified key competitors such as Abu Dhabi Desert Safari, Arabian Adventures and Desert Rose Tourism offering similar products and services in the local tourism industry and then investigated threats and opportunities for future actions.

Later, during my assessment of existed Golden Eyes organisational structure and key staff’s qualifications and major responsibilities, I found numerous discrepancies in the day to day management and serious gaps in business operations like the absence of objectives, targets, plans, executing strategies and risk mitigation plans etc. Accordingly, I decided to introduce contemporary organisational reforms replacing its traditional operations by proposed new organisational policies and business strategies such as organized hierarchy, modified roles and responsibilities of key staff, latest marketing style, promotions, social media linkages and better financial control by trained staff.

I discussed my initial suggestions with company’s Chairman and CEO Mr. Rashid and sought required level of confidence to carry out my proposed modifications in company frame of operations. I identified following tasks to be carried out on priorities during my internship project:

- Evaluation of existing business operations and financial review
- Examination of existing organisational structure and human resource management
- Development of new organisational structure and formulation of new business strategies
- Crafting effective roles of key positions and pinpoint core responsibilities;
- Evaluation of existing commercial activities and develop new financial objectives;
- Create company profile, moto, visions, mission and objectives;
- Identify key marketing, priorities and major business given customers;
- Perform necessary SWOT analysis and identify main competitors
- Critically analyse company’s website and Facebook page; and suggest effective modifications;
- Draft a plan to implement new changes in company’s hierarchy;
- Suggest innovative ideas for future businesses avoiding losses.
- Assist CEO to organize interviews and rehiring fresh staff as required

To perform these all mentioned assignments, I had demanded the following information and documents to evaluate however, I received only a portion of my requested data. Main reason for not accessing the requested documents was found that most of the documents were not produced since the company’s formation. The absence of vital data and company’s key documents in fact had created additional workloads on my shoulders. I explained the importance of the requested documents to company’s CEO and he asked me to produce these all based on my best knowledge and expertise. Accordingly, I created most of the company’s missing documents in a very short period and submitted to CEO for review and acceptance. Mr. Rashid had appreciated my efforts and creativity. Details of the requested data received information and my actions are illustrated as follows in Table-1:

Table-1: Details of received information and produced documents

Abbildung in dieser Leseprobe nicht enthalten

9. ACTION PLANS AND MY CONTRIBUTION

After conducting my extensive reviews of the available data and carrying out a reasonable research on my internship topic, I started working on my action plans to either fix or control the identified problem. I had divided different causes associated with company’s business and grouped them into main six (6) categories as mentioned in my constructed Fishbone diagram. It helped me for better analysis and creating modification and mitigation plans. For marketing reforms and rebranding activities, I was asked to prioritize my actions while, for other organisational change related plans and risk management; I was advised to hold my assignments until the final instructions. Such organisational decisions were only made by my direct reporting officer Mr. Rashid. I helped my Employer (Golden Eyes) in it business improvements through contemporary marketing, brand development, reshaping business practices, human resource management, financial reporting, commercial forecasting and risks management. I either wholly or partially worked for the following practical areas during my current internship:

- Assessment of existing business procedures including its financial performance (2016-2017)
- Identification of loose poles causing decrease in customers and diminishing business’ profits
- Formulation of new business model by introducing contemporary human resource management procedures and results-oriented policies
- Increase company’s brand awareness and visibility through mixed marketing (direct - indirect)
- Development of company’s motto, history, mission, vision and objectives to allow all employees knowing the common goals.
- Development of company financial goals for years 2018-2020 directing all managers to work in right direction well focused on agreed targets
- Development and review of company’s new website and suggesting needed modifications such as introducing company history, background, promotional activities particularly on national days and major local festivals
- Restructuring organisational hierarchy and creating key positions’ responsibilities matrix for the key positions (managers)
- Motivation company key staff and ideas sharing with Chairman/CEO to attain synergy in common goals and harmony in mutual thoughts.
- Review of company staff’s performance, qualifications, and experiences; and then suggest alternative positions with revised responsibilities.
- Communication with company CEO and Director to discuss proposed strategies and plans while introducing novel changes through the required reforms.
- Creating desired expertise for each of the key positions, helping in hiring staff and taking interview along with company CEO and Director.
- Publishing hiring advertisement on Dubizzle (UAE largest online platform similar to Gumtree) and assisting CEO for telephonic interview and final selection.

Above mentioned activities and milestones are mostly completed and commenced avoiding possible friction and crossing the existed organisational barriers. However, despite of my efforts, few unfortunate incidents happened such as resignation of company’s existing Director due to her proposed reassignment as Operational Manager. This resignation was not accepted and using solution seeking aptitude, her position was held with new responsibilities and updated targets to meet in the next six (6) months. Alternatively, existing director to step down from her position for alternative candidate possessing the required suitable qualifications and expertise to run the Golden Eyes operations.

10. SWOT ANALYSIS OF GOLDEN EYES

A proper scan of the internal and external factors influencing Golden Eyes business operations and impacting its marketing is an important part of its strategic planning and future strategies. “The SWOT analysis provides information that is helpful in matching the organization's resources and capabilities to the competitive environment in which it operates”. (9) This was the first time when someone had carried out SWOT analysis for Golden Eyes indicating company’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats based on current organisational factors and market condition. My analysis covered both internal and external threats and opportunities requiring risks mitigations and exploitations. Illustration of my initial SWOT Analysis is presented in Table-2 below:

Table-2: Golden Eyes SWOT Analysis

Abbildung in dieser Leseprobe nicht enthalten

Upon my evaluation, I suggested to Golden Eyes’ management to keep updating SWOT analysis by reviewing future competitors, changing customers’ behavior and employees’ feedback. In addition to the SWOT analysis performed to gather needed information about Golden Eyes, I was also able to identify many other associated problems impacting its operations and businesses. The details of my key findings are listed in the aforementioned sections of my report which highlights the deficiencies requiring improvement as follows:

- Change in management by introducing new dedicated experienced staff to fill the current gaps
- Change in organisational structure to build staff confidence by achieving a clear control
- Change in marketing style to meet the latest trends i.e. e-marketing and effective market mix
- Change in business operations allowing staff to work whole year without many forced vacations
- Improve the skills and essential knowledge of existing staff by necessary training programs
- Revise job’s descriptions and responsibilities meeting the contemporary business requirements
- Revise the staff’s salary structure based on roles, performance and contribution to the business
- Augment existing relations with public offices and larger companies to increase visibility
- Improve company representation through better brand management and awareness
- Introduce new business goals, financial objectives, mission and vision of the company
- Expand networking and develop effective strategies meeting local customers’ expectations
- Differentiate product and innovate new features of desert safari and its related adventures

In short, my SWOT analysis would help Golden Eyes providing its management a clear picture of organisational features possessing main strengths and critical weakness to be addressed by suitable strategies and prioritized mitigation actions.

11. PROPSOSED REFORMS AND BEST PRACTICES IN LIGHT OF LITERATURE

Changes (either operational or managerial) for a small private firm are different from larger corporate, government organisations and multinational companies due to its limited resources, defined business spread and organisation internal factors. Smaller private businesses may adopt new technologies, innovative reforms and re-organisation smoothly as compared to larger setups and government corporations. Transformation, tuning, re-creation, rebranding and change adaption may also depend upon the staff’s psyche, organisational processes, management priorities, fear of losing control and jobs both on micro and macro levels. An interesting view was expressed by in Norma Carr-Ruffino in his book Managing Diversity: People Skills for Multicultural Workplace, 2000 “Workplace diversity deserves attention, it can be a major source of innovation, global savvy and profitability- or a source of conflict and chaos. It all depends on us as individuals and together as organizations- on how we respond to workplace changes, and on our ability to build productive relationships with people from many cultures and lifestyles”. (10) He further added that “The work world is a dynamic place, and it’s changing more rapidly every day. It is becoming more diverse, more technical more global and at the same time more dependent than ever on productive working relationships. Being business leaders, we need to create an inclusive work environment building our multicultural interactions skills”. (11)

Considering the old fashioned organisational practices, unorganized management system and poor operational policies, I had envisioned that existing business structure needs some holistic reforms ranging from best practices in management, best practices in marketing, best practices in brand development and best practices in business expansion including the financial control and its improvement. Raymond J. Stone (as cited in Managing Human Resources 2010, p.4) stated that “Human resource management involves the productive use of people in achieving the organization’s strategic objectives and the satisfaction of individual employee needs. High performance HR management policies and practices generate profitability gains, share price increases, higher company survival rates, increased sales, higher export growth, increased organizational commitment and lower turnover.” (12) Raymond had further mentioned that “Not surprisingly, an organization may often find it difficult to simultaneously satisfy all of its stakeholders. Individual stakeholders also may find themselves in conflict situations. Employees may want higher wages and improved benefits bust shareholders may desire higher profits.” (13)

Technical and managerial staff are generally considered the core elements of any organisation. The higher fragment of management’s skeleton always plays a vital role in the decision making leading towards the success or failure of company’s plans due to conceived expertise, diversified knowledge and higher qualifications. Top management must be responsible to develop organisational policies, business plans, marketing strategies to meet their established business objectives. Key management generally also develops and updates company’s core values, mission and vision to achieve collegiality and collaboration between different departments. The top management should also be responsible to create such an environment where staff can easily share ideas and juniors also feel encouragement to innovate and bring rewarding changes associated with products’ differentiation and marketing penetration. Alan Nankervis, Marian Baird, Jane Coffey and John Shields (2014) had concluded “that Strategic planning is the process of setting major organizational objective and developing comprehensive plans to achieve them. It involves deciding on the major directions of the organization, including its structure, strategies, policies and the contribution of its various resources. A strategic corporate planning process usually includes: definition of corporate philosophy, formulation of suitable strategies, development of mission, vision and objectives, evaluation of organizational strengths and weakness.” (14)

In my academic view, best management practices for Golden Eyes must be focused on its top management, led by company’s CEO who should engage all its key players and provide his adequate time for his own business. Main identified management problem was that the Mr. Rashid being CEO/ Chairman of Golden Eyes rarely available full-time to look after his business and engage himself to supervise its top management while living overseas. Therefore, I had suggested him to hire a new qualified and full-time dedicated experienced CEO from India to implement needed reforms in his company. Appointment of new CEO would also help to eliminate existing nepotism and promote diversity. New CEO will take care of all business while Mr. Rashid must act as Sponsor and Chairman to run the company. New CEO will definitely bring new changes to establish company’s standards operation and principles of management. He will be key person responsible to integrate all departments and provide adequate oversight of the organisation's operations and required further changes. New CEO along with new Managing Director (as per my suggestions) will also perform best practices associated with better human resource management including regular scheduled appraisals of the staff performance, establishment of accounting procedures sufficient to safeguard finances.

The top experienced management and experienced tourism staff will jointly create updated marketing strategies well focusing on product development, e-marketing and e-commerce. Roman Eggar and Dimitrios Buhalis, 2008 had shared in their book ‘etourism case studies’ that “Tourism organizations, known as destination management organization (DMOs),assume the functions of building the tourism product, presenting the office, lobbying the marketing in order to secure long-term competitiveness as strategic objectives such as profile, demand, implementation of quality standers, saleable preparation of the range of tourism products, image care and brand creation, marketing, development and implementation of strategies, positioning, sensitization of the population of tourism.” (15) At this stage, most important action is to initiate new changes by unfreezing existing staff and enterprise factors. As an internee, I also tried to established change management plan however, company’s Director did not cooperate and pressurized CEO to wait for next year and rely on existing planning and executing schemes (which in fact were never generated and remained verbal at least during my internship period).

As cited in Graets F, Rimmer M, Smith A and Lawrence, A (2011), “Change is evident everywhere from the simplest everyday changes to the most difficult situations encountered by human resource (HR) managers as management grapples with reorganizations, downsizing and/or cutbacks. A crucial factor in the effectiveness of an organization is the ability to adapt to change.” (16) An interesting view was expressed by Osborne P and Brown 2000 that “Change is a normal part of business life. In fact, the ability to enact meaningful change is critical to an organization’s competitive success however, successful change management is both challenging and intense. Four variables i.e. culture, context, knowledge and technology affect change. The purpose of change is to make an organization more productive by change can also fail because of organization members’ resistance to or lack of motivation towards the challenging of change.” (17) “Managing change in the uptake and use of new ways of doing things, generating and selecting ideas, translating ideas into innovations, and moving the organization forward to meet the shifting demands of dynamic business environments is a complex business” (Dawson P & Andriopoulos C- 2009). Based on my findings and evaluations, I successfully convinced company’s CEO that previous losses were due to numerous reasons. Major internal factor was allocated low budget for marketing and social media campaigns. Company’s budget for next fiscal year must be governed Golden Eyes’ financial objectives. Next year budgets must be prepared after careful planning which will articulate the priorities of Golden Eyes to reach its goals and future expansion in the tourism market. To different from others, Golden Eyes needs to innovate and lead in the futurist changes well focused on its mission and vision.

12. EFFECTS OF MY CONTRIBUTION TO GOLDEN EYES (BEFORE & AFTER)

My direct or indirect contributions certainly brought positive changes in the managerial actions and business operations. I have noticed that Mr. Rashid’s interest to his business has again redeveloped and he became optimistic to a certain level, required to execute my proposed changes in his company. Based on my proposal, company’s organisational hierarchy was changed and new staff such as Social Media Manager was hired meeting the suggest qualifications, expertise and in-depth knowledge. Salaries of few staff were also adjusted to meet the market demand helping company to retain experienced, sincere and dedicated workers for future challenges. He also agreed to promote company’s existing accountant and camp supervisor to their new positions requiring additional targets to achieve. Considering my human resource management discussion with Mr. Rashid, he advised company’s Director to arrange some useful trainings for lower staff and conduct frequent meetings to ensure cooperative behavior.

All old jobs’ descriptions were updated and revised to my newly created jobs’ designation and responsibilities. Mostly, staff were found excited having new roles and targets linked with reward policies instead of penalties. Social Media Manager’s priorities and responsibilities were also updated based on my findings requiring key focus on e-marketing and advertisement. By introducing my developed moto, new business objectives, vision and mission; all staff were found aligned to meet the given targets which also helped Golden Eyes management to differentiate in the corporates’ operations. Company’s brochures, social website, Facebook were also updated highlighting new organisational changes. Further, based on my professional advice, company also created official page on LinkedIn.

Upon my discussions and communication with CEO, he found more confident in new commercial and marketing approaches and therefore agreed to spend more capital on social media projection and brand awareness in the local market by participating in the local events, tourism seminars and sponsoring small events. Mr. Rashid and his business team are now more familiar with market research, pricing strategies through breakeven analysis and brand differentiation, marketing mix, benefits to create unique selling position, competitors’ analysis, customer management, power of social media, risks identification, importance of intellectual property and change management. Financial reporting and accounts titles were also modified as I had suggested and shared. Simpler format was introduced, and my one-page reporting visualization was also accepted to implement for CEO reporting. Based on my evaluation, following financial objectives were drafted for further review:

- Control repair and maintenance cost of existing automobiles
- Keeping employee labor cost between 20%-30% of total revenue.
- Profitability in the 2018 year and more than 10% by 2020.
- Personnel expenditure must be controlled to lower the variable cost
- Increase profit margin each year for next five years up to year 2023
- An increased customer per month by 20% in the year 2018 following by 10% in 2019.
- Increase marketing and advertisement budget for the year 2018 to expand brand visibility

It is worth mentioning here that accurate financial objects require actual and exact information about the company’s accounts, expenses and customers’ details to identify influencing customers’ groups and estimate accurate breakeven point of each product and services offer by Golden Eyes. Unfortunately, complete information and details were not provided to me due to some unexamined reason and delayed tactics by the company’s officials. Therefore, these financial objectives will be refined further in future.

13. INTERNSHIP SELF-EVALUATION AND THOUGHTS ON PERSONAL IMPROVEMENTS

This internship indirectly provided me real chances to also evaluate my own capabilities, limitations, personal strengths and weaknesses. Indeed, I enhanced my analytical skills, business development knowledge, communication strength, management and leadership traits; and personal judgment during my current internship. During my internship, being a business internee, I got many chances to improve my soft and hard skills in addition to evaluation and making precise judgment. I learned new knowledge areas in my practical life while performing different tasks and involving in challenging assignments. I certainly, increased my understanding about new business trends and expanded my existing knowledge related to leadership, conflict resolution, resource and time management as well.

I have listed down important areas of my experiential learning which I can defined as “self-learning”.

- Project planning and management using sequential approach to execute ideas and implement new change(s) in existing structure
- Added skills of business development and business evaluation attributes particular in tourism industry in Abu Dhabi
- E-marketing and policies formulation fit for UAE market
- Challenging myself to adapt myself with remote working and multi-linguistic communication (verbal and written) with key staff from diverse background
- Enhancement of personal skills and business knowledge through practical experiences
- Decision making, team building and intrapersonal collaboration
- International e-marketing, global connectivity through electronic media and intra-net
- Critical and deep thinking to predict the outcomes and understand consequences.
- Multicultural and diversified organisational spaces
- Unfreezing and refreezing, exploration and exploitation
- Intellectual development through research and literature review
- Widen relationship and open networking for future recruitment
- Evaluating personal thresholds i.e. strengths and weakness, goals and lessons learned

Under my current internship, I also experienced practical application of key knowledge areas of project management i.e. initiating, planning, executing and monitoring stages while formulating my ideas, performing my activities and managing the change. I learned that planning is an important aspect of organisational management process which leads to project executing, monitoring and controlling if follows accurately. Also, I feel that closing or freezing stage of a change process is very vital to establish stability once a change has been completely enforced and concrete in the new system. Further consistency in the work quality is also an important element achieving self-confidence and self-respect. During the proposed reforms in the existing organisational system, I also experienced that change is not comfortable for human psyche and require efforts to implement, maintain and promote. Therefore, prior implementing my new reform ideas, I remained in touch with company CEO to first make him understand that why my suggested changes, revised budget allocation, or new business strategies are essential and beneficial for company businesses and employees’ future. I also observed that human in general are lazy, resistive and volatile to accept new changes, but I think more likely this situation changes when people feel themselves closer to the deadlines. Our recognition level increase with the passage of time and become more likely to adopt later stage either due to reward or punishment. If there is no urgency or motive to change most of us will do nothing and will remain in our existing norms.

In my academic view point, in any organisational systematic change either through external factor or internal needs; unfreezing stage is probably one of the most important and critical stage. During initial days of my business development strategies formulation I also given my complete priorities to make existing staff comfortable with my suggested business strategies and proposed organisational changes in hierarchy and roles. I tried to make key staff getting ready to accept new proposed changes. I think the more we feel that change is necessary, the more urgent it is, the more motivated we are to make the change and then we all act in the right direction.

I utilized various methods of communications varying verbal, written and visual/ body language to decode and encode messages between my colleagues. I used e-mails, WhatsApp, presentation and visual through diagram and graphics. I tried to use simple words in my communication enabling different minds to better understand my messages. Mostly, my correspondences remained with company CEO but at a few occasions, I also communicated with company’s Director and Social Media Manager. I analyzed capacities of each individuals to whom I communicated and accordingly, modify my words and change my tones. I found written communication far better than oral exchange of ideas. I think, written communication is superior for record keeping and reminding tasks’ deadline i.e. through Outlook calendar.

I also noticed that communication is also age, gender and culture dependent. To speak with male and female is also different particularly, in Arab ethos and working environment. I met couple of times with Mr. Rashid (Golden Eyes CEO) in Canberra. He is native Emirati and Arabic speaker. Fortunately, my intermediate grip on Arabic language helped me to understand him when he failed to find alternative words in English during his communication. Further, I used Urdu and English with other staff depending upon the situation and audience. I also encouraged criticism and all types of feedback (both positive & negative). I tried to avoid unnecessary repetition, mumbling and humorous in my speech and correspondence with my colleagues. Overall, I learnt better and effective ways of communication methods in a multicultural and diversified work place. I experienced challenges and distortion in messages while working remotely which will help me in my future employment(s). As stated earlier that this internship also indirectly helped me to identify my limitations and evaluate my own in-built capabilities including personal strengths and weakness listed down:

13.1 Identified Personal Strengths:

- Written communication and report writing
- Quick judgment and decision making
- Evaluation and critical thinking
- Team work and leadership
- Time and resource Management
- Conflict resolution and negotiation
- Flexibility and cooperation
- IT skills, creativity and innovation
- Planning and multi-tasking
- Approaching attitude and social networking
- Financial analysis and budgeting
- Generous in sharing ideas
- Business development and branding
- Human resource management
- Diversity and Integrity with high professionalism
- Quick learner in fast paced work environment
- A positive attitude and the willingness to grow
- Cooperative and collaborative approach
- Speaking in multiple languages
- Hardworking, regularity and dedication
- Creativity and innovation

13.2 Identified Personal Weaknesses:

- Verbal communication
- Social media and marketing
- Straight forward and not diplomatic
- Careless and neglecting to take credit
- Sensitive and perfectionism
- High expectation from my co-workers and supervisors
- Taking too many responsibilities and risks
- Handling many tasks simultaneously causing fatigue
- Too detail oriented creating problems for teammates
- Discomfort with leaving my task unfinished
- Spontaneous to respond (might be sign of impatience)
- Unable to hide frustration with underperformers
- Split thinking-handling multiple tasks
- Bossy to lazy workers to meet deadlines
- Don’t like resistance and pressure from management
- Don’t like interference in my work by co-workers
- Poor in delegating tasks (fear to delay my submittals)

14. FACED CHALLENGES AND LESSONS LEARNED

I faced multiple challenges in my current internship. I think every job and every organisation has some specific requirements and working culture which are not common. Moreover, people with power also behave differently even in the same organisational structure which generally require additional efforts to work in cooperation. I personally believe that challenges provide us chances for new learning and strengthening our in-built abilities to withstand with the unexpected situation. The key challenge for me was to work remotely and in the complete absence of personal and physical interactions with my team mates. It was critical to mutually understand ideas and be on the same level of communicational acceptance.

14.1 Faced Challenges During My Internship:

Following is the list of my identified major challenges, faced during my current internship:

- Resistance to change and lack of cooperation by existing staff particularly, by existing Director
- Different working spaces (remote working and time difference)
- Lack of mutual collaborative capabilities even in the key staff
- Undefined organisational and management structures
- Demographic variation and geographic distances caused a major barrier in personal interaction and proper evaluation of existing staff.
- Communication distortion and linguistic barriers forced me to use multiple languages such as English, Urdu, Arabic, Punjabi
- Unexpected management’ influences (CEO sometime didn’t agree with my suggestions)
- Traditional practices and personal priorities by key staff and CEO
- Disorganized and inexperienced staff handling customers on site.
- Asymmetric information for customers, auditor and CEO

14.2 Lessons Learned While Performing My Internship’s Activities:

What I learnt from my internship is that “Nothing is perfect in this world not even in work placement. Practical life is far different than theory and volatile”. I observed that every new day brings new problems, complexed tasks to solve and provide suitable alternatives. In fact, many unexpected things happened while implementing my business ideas, marketing strategies, hiring new staff, developing company financial objectives; and the most important when I evaluated capacities of existing staff and tries to change organisation’s existing structure. I have listed down major lessons learned which I think are important to mention to avoid repetition in future employment:

- Significant difference between theory and practice. Everything never goes smoothly as per plan and developed model. People behaviours are unpredicted and there is no method to absolutely measure its variation.
- Business is not a gambling therefore, risks need to be identified in planning stage. Therefore, all risks must be calculated with necessary mitigation and controlling actions.
- I never expected sever resistance in the organisational hierarchy reform. I learned that we must get ready to expect the unexpected and stop day dreaming.
- Real world is more complexed and competitive pushing us to enhance our skills, expand networking, open eyes for opportunities and be prepared for the multiple tasks and different roles in the job placement.
- I have witnessed grouping and learned a lesson about the collusion between staff to avoid “change” in the existing business.
- Power of social media in contemporary businesses is pushing old business to implement new business reforms and transform marketing towards holistic solution approach i.e. e-marketing and e-commerce
- I also witnessed discrimination and nepotism in the company operational system where some staff prefer some vendors and trying to hire closer friends without any solid background and qualification i.e. a clear indication of personal preference of “skins over skills”.

15. CONCLUSIONS AND FUTURE BEYOND THE CURRENT INTERNSHIP

After involving myself in numerous assignments, performing different nature of tasks, executing my plans and testing learned theories, I concluded my findings and solutions as follows:

15.1 Conclusion about Golden Eyes and Tourism Industry in Abu Dhabi:

- Tourism industry is flourishing in Abu Dhabi, demanding reforms to meet contemporary drifts
- Smaller businesses are under tremendous pressure of adopting new technologies, management style and rebranding to differentiate their products in the growing competitive market
- Tourism industry in Abu Dhabi generally experiences a significant reduction in revenue during summer (May to August) seasons.
- Local tourism and SME hospitality industry in Abu Dhabi is open to compete with global firms however, traditional business model is major hinderance in their expansion
- Native Arab customers are not price conscious, but more luxuries demanded while expatriates in general are found more price conscious and attracted by promotional bundles and packages.
- Local tourism companies’ offers are quite comparable with each other and therefore, competition is basically governed by product distinction and innovation.
- Companies with old-fashioned operations and marketing style are losing business and visibility.
- Golden Eyes being a small size (20 staff) firm has groomed and grew over period however, their brand awareness and loyalty hasn’t developed in the same proportion due to poor management and lack of business expertise.
- Golden Eyes has many local competitors with better organizational structure, smart management and dynamic social media presence.
- Existing management needs to be replaced by qualified, experienced and competent people having up-to-date knowledge of tourism industry and efficient management qualities.
- Customers these days encourage online booking, shopping and reviewing product/ services, therefore, it is essential for Golden Eyes to use bilingual information (Arabic and English) to capture a bigger market and to distinguish its features.
- Better reviews on traveling and tourist websites and social media pages directly link to the higher values of company Intellectual Property i.e. higher value of company’s assets for future sales
- Change is not easy and comfortable. People in any organisation generally oppose new changes and hence a proper change management plan needs to be prepared prior introducing new change.
- Staff needs, career growth opportunities, training programs, occasional rewards, self-respect and self-esteemed are important factors to retain them in a company.
- Distance or remote working is challenging way of modern work which is associated with communication distortion, confusion and condensed cooperation amongst team players.
- Diversity originates ideas and innovation. Different minds produce creativity while similar minds yield synergy and efficiency. Therefore, management must be aligned with consistent and uniform vision and mission whereas lower staff must look after creative ideas, innovation and efficient collaboration.
- If Golden Eyes needs to grow and sustain in near future, then it must introduce pragmatic and systematic reforms in its original operational structure.
- Golden Eyes’ management to control its salaries and maintenance expenses. While doing so, Golden Eyes must inject more capital for its extensive marketing, social media awareness and advertisement in local tourism market.
- Golden Eyes’ financial management to understand new trends of e-market to develop an alternative source of earning/ capital through e-commerce.
- Existing business losses of Golden Eyes is multi-directional which are directly associated with inappropriate management and indirectly by externalities such as competitors and customers.
- A holistic approach is required enabling Golden Eyes to augment its businesses for future.
- Developing future strategies and company’s policies must be top management’s responsibilities
- Interaction with multicultural staff and working with different people help fresh graduates to expand networking for future jobs and career development advices.

15.2 My Value Suggestions for Future Internees:

In addition to my above specific conclusions about tourism industry, I also concluded the following personal suggestions for future internees:

- Enjoy your work, own it and be consistent;
- Give your maximum output and remain efficient;
- Failure does not equate to failing (fall forward);
- Be sure to have both long-term and short-term plan;
- Your strength is your weakness, keep improving it;
- Learn quickly and create your own space;
- Take challenges for new roles and don’t feel fear;
- Always welcome constructive criticisms;
- Be flexible, adaptive and ready to change;
- Be polite, approachable and cooperative;
- Don’t be afraid to seek advices from co-workers;
- Don’t be afraid to share ideas with senior management;
- Ask seniors to attend meetings and important events;
- Don’t burn any bridge and close communication;
- Be punctual and regular in you work place;
- Pay attention to details and avoid repeating mistakes;
- Don’t promise for something which you can’t meet;
- Given full intention to your written communication;
- Don’t lose temper and annoyed for unexpected behaviour from seniors.
- Try to work harder than the full-time employees;
- Be proactive to learn and keep eyes on opportunities;
- Always be enthusiastic and motivated about your work;
- Never lose hope and keep trusting your passion

Further I have concluded that “successful career depends upon a well mix of organizational environment like employer’s policies, business objectives, operating structure; management’s beliefs in co-workers, employees personal intention to learn and lead and most important is working relation with immediate boss. In my personal perception to find an ideal boss is very difficult whereas to become a perfect boss is almost impossible. Simply, no one can make everybody happy all the times. Overall, it is very subjective and might depends upon type of person, gender, cultural background, industry, location, task nature, time and duration of employment.

16. RECOMMENDATIONS FOR GOLDEN EYES TOURISM

- Based on my findings, evaluation, creative works and conclusions, it is highly recommended that management of Golden Eyes to introduce all necessary changes and organisational reforms systematically by avoiding major business disruption and the operational stagnations.
- Mr. Rashid to hire new experienced and qualified Managing Director and CEO of his company to operate his business with better and effective management. He must be focused on capabilities and strengths of new hires and he himself only act as company’s Chairman and Sponsor without interfering the business operations.
- All major organisational decision must be made mutually by Chairman, CEO and MD. Future financial targets and hiring key positions must be discussed with Chairman to seek consent and official approval.
- It is recommended to complete ongoing upgrade works of company’s official website and Facebook immediately.
- All promotional mix and advertisement must be aligned with the allocated budget and updated breakeven analysis
- Company to introduce necessary training programs and human resource management policies
- Golden Eyes must be focused on its original key customers (large corporates) to ensure their satisfaction and brand loyalty
- Golden Eyes to attract more customers through their product differentiation and incentives to new customers.
- Golden Eyes to inject more capital in its brand awareness, loyalty program, advertisement and e-marketing.
- Golden Eyes to keep sharp eyes on its main competitors’ promotions, product designs and participation in local events. SWOT must be kept updated based on new changes, customers’ feedback and market trends.
- Golden Eyes to look alternative business means to retain its existing staff working whole years without additional financial burden avoiding forced vacations particularly, during hot summer.
- In case of business closure, Golden Eyes’ main selling point must be its online ranking in local tourist industry and global TripAdvisor platform therefore, social media visibility is vital.

It is also recommended that reviewers and readers of this report must combine my all efforts in form of three submittals i.e. (i) Personal Presentation, (ii) Reflective Diary and this (iii) Special Alternative Report for better understanding of my Internship project, personal experiential learning and my extensive contribution in a very short period of time.

BIBLIOGRAPHY/ ACADEMIC REFERENCES:

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Appendices comprise sensitive, confidential and private information

Therefore, are not included herewith.