Assignment Help on Tamaki brothers – Entrepreneurship
Executive Summary:
The development of an enterprise is termed as an entrepreneurial venture, which particularly means that a decision maker of the business is motivated by the possibility that he might earn a financial gain, takes the initiative of creating a functional unit and starts off its operations. Venture means that there is risk involved while the savvy business people take calculated risks by convincing the stakeholders, such as venture capitalists, investors and lenders, to whom the venture will pay off at a later time.
The paper talks about the concept of Entrepreneurial Venture by explaining a case of Tamaki brothers, who initiated a business in Tourism industry and later expand their business by gaining revenues and providing opportunities for growth to the local villagers of that region. The paper progresses through by answering the three questions from the case and later concluded the paper with a conclusion.
Introduction:
The case study is about the Entrepreneurial venture of two brothers Maori brothers, Mike and Doug Tamaki. The case shows how a successful business is been launched. For an enterprise’s long term success the higher management must consider the enterprise’s culture and the surrounding environment in which it has to work in. To attain success the higher management must understand the conditions which could foster the growth and the development of the business along with its effectiveness and efficiency. However, the conditions that could foster the efficiency and effectiveness of the firm must be considered so that the enterprise could succeed on the basis of strong and positive organizational culture.
Question No. 1:
How did the Tamaki brothers use their cultural heritage in starting their business? Do you think this was to their advantage when assuring success?
The process of pursuing a fresh and original venture is personified in the entrepreneurial process. It includes problem solving in a classic management position (Jernej, et. al, 2010). The Tamaki brothers used this concept and applied it over the cultural heritage. Initially Mike did the background research and convinced his brother Doug in initiating the venture they found that the cultural heritage of Tamaki Maori is by far hidden from the outside world and it can prove to be a great tourists spot. The Maori brothers evaluated the venture; their sole vision was to provide the visitors with a reliable, deeper and a more spiritual kind of experience of the Maori culture by running a successful Maori business. The brothers developed the business opportunity by overcoming the barriers through the involvement of the local villagers, which provided the local villagers an opportunity to initiate their own business in the village. With the involvement of the local villagers it became easy for the Tamaki brothers to overcome those forces and groups that resisted the tourism in that region. According to Baker & Sanika (2005) the process of cultural based entrepreneurial venture can be divided into four distinct phases:
Identifying & Evaluating the opportunity:
In the first step Mike Maori identified that there is a need of displaying the culture in way that the culture of Maori needs to be appropriately depicted. The culture only used to be portrayed instead of letting the tourists to experience the culture itself. Maroi brothers evaluated the opportunity and found it to be a potential opportunity to initiate venture where they can offer services of more than just sightseeing.
Development of the plan:
The Maroi brothers planned to offer the tourism services in a way that they would provide a meaningful experience of what is the place, who are the people and what traditions do they follow. They wanted to fill in the gap in the market by offering more personalized tours that would contain the elements of storytelling and culture.
Determining the required resources:
Mike already had the required experience as he used to be driving the tour buses in the region for a tour company. They only needed a tour bus, which was purchased by selling the Harley Davidson of his brother Doug. The promotion was of the business was been done by hand painted signs on the tour bus and through the brochures that promoted the “Tamaki Tours”.
Management of “Tamaki Tours”:
After launch of the business the next step was to manage the business successfully. In this regard, the two brothers made the business successful through their vison, hard work and the personal sacrifices that they gave for Tamaki Tours. They rejected the idea of taking financial assistance from Government or any other institution as they wanted to built their business on the basis of their own zeal and zest and through their personal sacrifices. It helped them in making the business more successful.
[maxbutton id=”4″ ]
Question No. 2:
How does a policy of enterprise culture fit in with the success of the Tamaki brothers?
The enterprise culture is considered as a main determiner of a company’s success with respect to performance, particularly through enhancing the morale of the employees (Atuahenme et. al, 2005). A number of researches show that the enterprise culture along with the values is of critical importance by improving the business ethics so as to ensure the enterprise success (Jernej, 2009; Jernej et. al, 2010). Enterprise culture can also be defined as the organizational environment that promotes and makes initiative and innovation possible. An organization with a enterprise culture is normally more profitable and competitive. This type of organization is considered as rewarding and stimulating to work. According to Hofstede the enterprise culture is the collective programming of the mind that differentiates the employees of one organization from the other (Belak & Jernej, 2009).
After the launch of the product “Urewera tours” the Maori brothers emphasized on employing the vision of the business that is authentic and an spiritual experience of Maori culture to become the center piece of the business. The Maori brothers took an step back and worked on developing a proper infrastructure for the organization. They devised a development plan that spread over three years time. The essence of the business was continuous Research and Development and to search for new opportunities in the market.
So the Tamaki brothers tried to align their existing enterprise culture with their traditional and cultural norms to follow the business ethics that were acceptable in the culture and traditions. They improved their business ethics to make sure that the enterprise succeeds by following a cultural based enterprise system. This combination of enterprise culture with cultural norms allowed the Tamaki brothers to develop their own business ethics that lead them towards success.
Question No. 3:
How did the Tamaki brothers manage to combine the need to be culturally sensitive and commercially aggressive? Do you think their solution was agreeable?
After the successful launch of marae tour the Tamari brothers realized that they were running out of spots and they had to work on developing on their own site for providing a particular marae experience. For this purpose they selected the native forest, which was owned by a Maori trust.
The development of the site was not easy for the Tamari brothers. They intended to develop a product that consists of a traditional and a sacred culture. For this reason the business must follow a culturally sensitive and commercially aggressive approach. They already feared that they might face the tension and apprehension with the Tamakis, as they are more concerned with the commercialization of the cultural enterprise and do not wanted to compromise their culture just for the sake of earning money. In this regard they had to follow certain sacred protocols that were associated with the Maori, so a consultative approach was utilized in which the two groups Imi and Tamakis had consultation for about six months and reached to a solution. In this process Imi expressed their concern on certain issues and the Tamakis addressed those issues and reconciled them. After a severe consultation both groups reached to a solution that ensured that the development of tourism was suitable to the culture and it still remained a commercially viable project.
The solution was agreeable to both the parties as it was providing the business an opportunity to grow as well as supporting the local villagers in developing their local art and craft manufacturing system. It also allowed the local Maoris to start their own small businesses while providing employment opportunities to a number of local Maoris. It allowed the local Maoris to enforce their culture by developing their skills and businesses and to develop the village on the whole. Similarly the project was also beneficent for the two brothers as it won them the Maori Tourism Award and the New Zealand’s Supreme Tourism Award. These evidences show that the mutual agreement of the project’s solution benefited both the groups to some extent.
Conclusion:
It can be concluded that an entrepreneurial venture can be made successful through untiring efforts and dedication towards the work. As the two brothers devoted themselves along with their skills and time to make the business successful. The Maori brothers first evaluated the venture and developed a plan through which they can provide the visitors with a reliable, profound and a more spiritual kind of experience of the Maori culture by running a successful Maori business. In this regard the brothers developed the business opportunity by removing the barriers through the efforts and hard work. They involved the local villagers, which provided the local villagers an opportunity to work on their arts and skills and even to initiate their own business in the village. With the involvement of the local villagers by providing them a platform for growth it became easy for the Tamaki brothers to overcome those forces and groups that resisted the tourism in that region. The Tamaki brothers also benefited by benefiting the local Maori villagers as it provided their business a opportunity to grow and expand their services. They also won the two Tourism award in New Zealand.
[maxbutton id=”1″ ]
References
Atuahene. G, K., Slater, S. F., Olson, E. M. (2005). The Contingent Value of Responsive and Proactive Market Orientations for New Product Program Performance. The Journal of Product Innovation Management, 22, pp. 464- 482.
Baker W. E., Sinkula, J. M. (2005). Market Orientation and the New Product Paradox. The Journal of Product Innovation Management, 22 (6), pp. 483-502.
Jernej. B, (2009) Business Ethics Implementation at Different Stages of the Enterprise Life Cycle. MER Publishing House in Maribor, Maribor.
Belak. J, & Mulej, M. (2009) Enterprise Ethical Climate Changes over Life Cycle Stages, Kybernetes: The International Journal of Systems & Cybernetics, Vol. 38, No. 7/8, pp. 1377-1398.
Jernej, B. Duh, M., Mulej, M., Štrukelj, T. (2010) Requisitely Holistic Ethics Planning as Pre-Condition for Enterprise Ethical Behaviour. Kybernetes:The International Journal of Systems & Cybernetics, Vol. 39, No. 1, pp. 19- 36.
Janko. B, (2010) Integralnimanagement – MER model. Založba MER – MER Evrocenter, Maribor.
