Lululemon Athletica employs strategic goals which include vision and mission to guide the employees to achievethe organizations
Question:
Lululemon Athletica employs strategic goalswhich include vision and mission to guide the employees to achievethe organization’s goals. Very often, yoga or sports attire giantof its size like Lululemon Athletica tend to become a stronginfluence to the customer rather than just an ordinary retailer.It’s more of a aspirational athletic-wear maker which its brandingand image cut deep into the people minds, affecting how its brandfollowers think and effectively motivate people, be it employee orcustomers, to think, behave and live better. However, in its recentcampaign promoted in 2020 which promoted a yoga workshop billed asan opportunity to “resists capitalism” which supposedly was meantto guide people to not chase fame, status and money and chill,relax and enjoy instead (Helmore, 2020). Unfortunately, this hasreceived vigorous criticism from the media because the idea ofpromotion contradicts with the company. The verdict is thatLululemon itself is capitalism, it is literally a privately-ownedcorporation that raked in half a billion dollars in pure profitslast year, merely by selling overpriced yoga pants to women willingand able to pay for this luxury. This greatly contradicts with thecompany’s strategic goals which uses its vision and mission toguide the employees. The company cannot contradicts itself toconfuse the employees.
Lululemon Athletica’s growth has been very impressive over thelast 5 years at an average annual rate of 17%, toping $1.2 billionper year (Team, 2019).However, in its aggressive growth process,their products are criticized for being way overpriced. In Europeand America, the product price tag is consider expensive but withtheir expansion to other regions such as Asia, the prices are skyrocket numbers through the roof. This contradicts with the companyvision to try and stay competitive. The criticism may seemunsignificant given Lululemon’s huge successful growth over theyears, but it is somewhat valid given there are other emergingbrands who are joining the industry with more affordablepricing.
Lululemon only uses a low proportion of eco-friendly materials.While it has set an absolute target to reduce greenhouse gasemissions generated from its owned operations by 100% by 2021, itis unclear whether it has set a supply chain target. There is noevidence it has taken meaningful action to reduce or eliminatehazardous chemicals, nor does it have adequate policies orinitiatives on water reduction. Lululemon talks about ways toimprove environmental impact (Wolfe, 2020). Although this ispositive, in reality, it doesn’t reflect any meaningful action. Fora global brand such as Lululemon, there really is no excuse not todo its part for the environment.
For Lululemon’s organization structure wise, they are overallvery well managed. They employed function structure whichessentially group labour force of the same function together toefficiently carry out tasks together. Lululemon has also been ableto identify and cultivate talent of different individuals of whattheir specializations are at and never put them at the wrongposition, killing off their talents. For operation, they understoodthe best communication & understanding between teams areputting everyone at one another’s shoe, for instance operation needto experience and understand what sales guy are doing sales to ableto better support, vice versa. That is what exactly Lululemon hasdone, by putting job rotation for their employees, it does not justcreate better understanding, solid relationship and effectivecommunication between the team but also created a workingenvironment that is less linear, getting to learn something neweveryday. It is thought that, Lululemon has done that exceptionallywell and definitely considered as highly competitive.
A good leadership is assessed through a person’s character,communication, knowledge and wisdom. However, one may haveforgotten that another important factor is setting an example whichis more significant than all the above. As many good leadersshould, they practice what they preach, their good actionsinfluence and motivates their staffs and partners. In Lululemon’scase, its leadership received huge questions, criticism anddissatisfaction from both the public and its internal employees.All this is due to its former CEO - Laurent Potdevin who recentlyresigned from his position. While Lululemon provided vagueexplanation for the exit, merely telling that Potdevin neglect theresponsibility of maintaining proper company standards andprofessional practices. Upon deeper digging, it was found thatPotdevin actually maintained years-long relationship with anemployee of the company. Potdevin disclosed the relationship withthe designer staff during a announcement session which known as“clearing” – A Lululemon’s style of confession in which employeesare encourage to share anything that might be holding them back toperform at their jobs (Lieber, 2018). There are controversies tothis declaration, some felt absurd because of how Potdevin did nottry to hide the relationship, ruining the workplace professionalismand some felt okay because they thought there were transparency andintegrity. However, the real fire came when staff found out thatthe designer got preferential treatment at the company (e.g.extended off time, first-class travel opportunities and frequentpay raise). Potdevin’s poor example to the company staff is thereal critique here and should not be like this which reflects poorleadership.
a)Provide recommendations on how the principles and concepts ofmanagement can be applied more effectively by the LululemonAthletica company in order to solve problems and/or further enhancethe operations in order to become innovative and competitive (referto passage above).
SUBJECT: MANAGEMENT PRINCIPLES
Contemporary Business Mathematics with Canadian Applications
ISBN: 978-0134141084
11th edition
Authors: S. A. Hummelbrunner, Kelly Halliday, Ali R. Hassanlou, K. Suzanne Coombs