IMPACT OF LOCKDOWNS AS A RESULT OF CORONA VIRUS PANDEMIC ON NON-ESSENTIAL BUSINESSES AND CHALLENGES IT POSES TO BUSINESS OPERATIONS OF SME’S Student Name: Babatunde Agboola Student ID:19002429 Module Leader: Dr Emily Jervis Date of Submission: 26/03/2021 Module Topic: Research Proposal Table of Contents Introduction. 3 Research Aim.. 3 Research … Continue reading “Research Proposal | My Assignment Tutor”
IMPACT OF LOCKDOWNS AS A RESULT OF CORONA VIRUS PANDEMIC ON NON-ESSENTIAL BUSINESSES AND CHALLENGES IT POSES TO BUSINESS OPERATIONS OF SME’S Student Name: Babatunde Agboola Student ID:19002429 Module Leader: Dr Emily Jervis Date of Submission: 26/03/2021 Module Topic: Research Proposal Table of Contents Introduction. 3 Research Aim.. 3 Research Objectives. 3 Research Questions. 3 Rationale. 4 Literature review.. 4 Methodology. 4 Anticipated outcome. 6 References. 7 Introduction The sudden outbreak of COVID 19 has posed a threat upon organisations especially those that reside under the SME category due to their lack of presence in global markets. For this purpose, there has been a huge loss in managing business processes that are executed by SMEs all over the world. In this study, a proposal has been highlighted that is subjected to provide an overview of Cafe pod coffee as the organisation and its current situation due to the Cortona virus pandemic effect. additionally, the study would also help to demonstrate a series of methodologies that would be applied in context to their business and challenges that are poised upon them due to the pandemic. Research Aim The research aims at providing an analysis of the impacts that are poised upon SMEs due to the lockdown declared due to the coronavirus outbreak and the challenges faced by Cafe pod coffee in executing their business in the market. Research Objectives To understand the impacts that have been poised upon the SMEs due to the sudden outbreak of COVID 19To analyse the current market situation that poses a challenge to the SMEs in executing their business practicesTo evaluate various methodologies to collect information about the pandemic impacts over various non-essential business segmentsTo recommend strategic measures to gain stability in maintaining a sustainable position in the market Research Questions What are the various impacts that have been faced by SMEs due to the lockdown as a result of the coronavirus pandemic in the global aspect?How are non-essential business segments being able to maintain their business position during the pandemic situation?what method would be suitable for collecting data from variable sources regarding coronavirus and lockdown impacts over organisations?What strategies are to be recommended in favour of SMEs for maintaining business stability in the lockdown period? Rationale The lockdown declaration by governments of countries has restricted social gathering in almost every part of the world. This has been decided by the legal bodies in order to reduce the rapid spread of the coronavirus. However, Kalemli-Ozcan et al., (2020) stated that this declaration might not have affected organisations evaluate a business using online platforms but has caused drastic impacts on SMEs who do not possess online business mechanisms. This is because the lack of social gatherings has reduced the frequency of customers visiting the stores to pursue their services. Similarly, Café pod coffee being an organisation under the food sector has faced drastic impacts due to the lockdown as it completely restricted them to executed business offline. For this purpose, the business development manager of the company has proposed to evaluate strategies that would provide them with an opportunity to maintain business position been during the lockdown phase maintaining all norms of social distancing. The study has been conducted to provide an overview of the various strategies that the organisation could apply in order to perform the same. Literature review Overview of the business operations executed by SMEs Business operations are the most essential parts of the organisation to have effective support in managing the essentiality of the process to have appropriate support in managing the operations with higher efficiency. In other words, the process of business consists of many factors that are essential to be managed to have effective support in conducting the operations to have appropriate support. As per the opinion of Omar et al., (2020), revenue gain is one of the major outcomes of the successful management of the business operation to have positive support in the process. Following that management of the business process of SMEs are very essential to have perfect results in the process. Theoretical aspects of business challenge mitigations Figure 1: Kotter’s theory (Source: Razumovskaia et al., 2020) Impact of COVID 19 over organisations The impact of COVID-19 pandemics has been very damaging for the SMEs as the organisations have seen so many losses in the process to have an absolute outcome in the process. Following that, there have been many damages that made the organisations less effective. Therefore, the significant damages are, Literature gap The following literature sheds light on the essential elements related to the impact of the lockdown on small organisations. However, strong research is required to have more information on the research topic to have effete results in the process. Methodology Research Onion Figure 2: Research onion (Source: Saunders et al., 2015) Research Philosophy Research philosophy is the belief that provides effective support in managing the research process to have appropriate support. The research philosophy is about the process of managing the research outcome with the consideration of positivisms, interpretivism and pragmatism (Zangirolami-Raimundo et al., 2018). The following research will be conducted with the assessment of the positivism philosophy. Research approach Research approaches including the inductive and deductive have been focused on the process to have effective results (Nayak and Singh, 2021). The following research will be conducted with the consideration of the deductive approach with the support of the hypothesis and questions. Data collection process Data collection is the most essential part of the research and it is managed with the help of qualitative and quantitative process to have effective support (Ngozwana, 2018). The following research will be managed with the focus of both the methodologies to collect the primary and secondary data to have essential support. Data analysis Data analysis is the process of managing the findings from the management of the research data. MS tools are the most essential tool to make the data analysis have appropriate results in the process and to manage the research outcome. Sampling The application of sampling indicates the selection of participants for the survey process that would be conducted during the research development. In this study, the application of random sampling would be witnessed that would result in selecting 25 participants from among the employees of Café pod coffee. Ethical considerations It is important for researchers to maintain a basic level of ethics such that the privacy of data that would be collected could be maintained. This is because the research might possess information that is confidential in nature which when accessed by unauthorised people might lead to disruptions. For this purpose, the alignment of the Data Protection Act 2018 would be followed for data collection and management purpose (legislation.gov.uk, 2021). With the help of this legislative guideline, the research is expected to meet the basic constraints of privacy and thereafter underpin the prevention of data breaches. Anticipated outcome The research activities that have been proposed to be conducted would result in providing solutions to the issues faced by the SMEs in executing their business during the lockdown situation. Moreover, recommendations would be formulated that would provide an insight into the opportunities that lie beneath the business process management of SMEs in the market. References Al-Fadly, A., 2020. Impact of COVID-19 on SMEs and employment. Entrepreneurship and Sustainability Issues, 8(2), p.629. Dai, R., Feng, H., Hu, J., Jin, Q., Li, H., Wang, R., Wang, R., Xu, L. and Zhang, X., 2021. The impact of COVID-19 on small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs): Evidence from two-wave phone surveys in China. China Economic Review, p.101607. Gregurec, I., Tomičić Furjan, M. and Tomičić-Pupek, K., 2021. The Impact of COVID-19 on Sustainable Business Models in SMEs. Sustainability , 13 (3), p.1098. Kalemli-Ozcan, S., Gourinchas, P.O., Penciakova, V. and Sander, N., 2020. COVID-19 and SME Failures (No. 2020/207). International Monetary Fund. legislation.gov.uk (2021). Data Protection Act 2018. Available at: https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2018/12/contents/enacted [Accessed on 18.3.2021] Nayak, J.K. and Singh, P., 2021. Fundamentals of Research Methodology Problems and Prospects. SSDN Publishers & Distributors. Ngozwana, N., 2018. Ethical Dilemmas in Qualitative Research Methodology: Researcher’s Reflections. International Journal of Educational Methodology, 4(1), pp.19-28. Omar, A.R.C., Ishak, S. and Jusoh, M.A., 2020. The impact of Covid-19 Movement Control Order on SMEs’ businesses and survival strategies. Geografia-Malaysian Journal of Society and Space, 16(2). Razumovskaia, E., Yuzvovich, L., Kniazeva, E., Klimenko, M. and Shelyakin, V., 2020. The Effectiveness of Russian Government Policy to Support SMEs in the COVID-19 Pandemic. Journal of Open Innovation: Technology, Market, and Complexity, 6(4), p.160. Saunders, M.N., Lewis, P., Thornhill, A. and Bristow, A., 2015. Understanding research philosophy and approaches to theory development. Zangirolami-Raimundo, J., Echeimberg, J.D.O. and Leone, C., 2018. Research methodology topics: Cross-sectional studies. Journal of Human Growth and Development, 28(3), pp.356-360
