Page 2 - CIMA OCS Workbook May 2019 - Day 1 Tasks

SUGGESTED SOLUTIONS

Target setting
Key principles in target setting are as follows:
• Level of difficulty

If targets are considered to be too hard, then it could demotivate the team. On the other
hand, a target set too low could result in suboptimal performance.

For example, the target for sales revenue for commercial contracts signed at the Expo should
be challenging but realistic. This will be tricky with the sponsorship deal as it is the first time
VitaMine has done this

• Participation
Allowing Priya (the team manager) to participate in setting targets is likely to result in greater
motivation and ownership of the resulting targets by the team. The main risk is that Priya will
try to make the targets easier to ensure the team beats them.

However, it should be noted that we currently have little participation in budgeting, so there
may be a need for training in this respect and it could cause wider cultural clashes.
• What should be included

If appraising the project then any costs and revenues traceable to the project should be
included.

However, if appraising the team, then only controllable factors should be used. For example,
the money paid as sponsorship would be relevant for assessing the project but outside of
Priya’s control.

Measuring success
Key ways of measuring project success are as follows:
• Brand awareness

The main reason for doing the project is to boost brand awareness so this should be the
primary measure of success.

The main problem with this is that brand awareness will be affected by many factors,
including VitaMine’s other existing marketing initiatives, so it is difficult to measure precisely
the impact of the sponsorship.

This makes it a difficult measure to incorporate when appraising the efforts of Priya and her
team.

One way of measuring this would be to perform market research on samples of delegates
before and after the event.

• Sales growth / sales leads

For the project to justify the costs involved the increased brand awareness needs to be
translated into sales growth. As with brand awareness, however, it is also difficult to judge
how much of any sales growth is due to the sponsorship. What would work would be to count
the number of leads form domestic clients that translate into consultations to discuss
customer needs in more detail.

• Cost control
Given the fact that the benefits are hard to assess in financial terms, it places more emphasis
on cost control when evaluating whether the project was a success. It is important that the
sponsorship deal can be delivered efficiently within budget.

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