Macro Environment

A company’s macro environment includes all the relevant factors and influences outside the boundaries of the company itself (Thompson et al, 2010). These forces are vital to a company’s business and will influence the company’s decisions, help define the business model and ultimately direct strategy. Strategic groups that are being affected by driving forces may try to shift toward a more favourable position on the map (Thompson et al, 2010). The airline industry is highly dependent on external market conditions (Andal-Ancion, Stravato & Yip, 2002) which are subject to change from time to time.

The improved understanding can form a basis for a better management of the globe’s freshwater resources. Freshwater is increasingly becoming a global resource, driven by growing international trade in water intensive commodities. Apart from regional markets, there are also global markets for water intensive goods such as crop and livestock products, natural fibres and bio-energy. As a result, use of water resources has become spatially disconnected from the consumers. 

The IPCC warns that if present trends continue unchecked, temperatures could rise by over 6 degrees Celsius and sea levels by up to 60 centimetres globally by 2100. This is a conservative estimate compared to more recent studies, which have shown that the geological record of ice melt was non-linear and responded more rapidly. The like consequences of climate change vary from region to region, but include widespread drought, desertification, flooding and glacial melt.

The recent Western fashion for distancing responsibility for climate change, both spatially and temporarily, by attributing it to future car – hungry Chinese or Indians, is a diversion possible only under assumption – shared by elites in North and South alike – that a society that mandates over-consumption is the universal human destiny. Current global efforts to address climate change, however, look absurdly inadequate. 

This has resulted into a series of scandals that characterized significant erosion of values in the business world. This gave us a universal fever in form of economic meltdown, unemployment and financial uncertainties from which we are still trying to recover. The evolutionary landscape of corporate governance is full of analysis and versions that have tested the elasticity of the time. Several committees in different nations have contributed in the evolution of corporate governance.

Competitors from other strategic groups will attempt to improve their market position and close the gap with Southwest Airlines. Southwest Airlines must sustain their competitive advantage through continued strategic analysis and drawing conclusions about where is the best place to be situated and why (Thompson et al, 2010). In addition to defensive strategies to protect their market position, Southwest Airlines should also seek to exploit changes in the macro environment to benefit their business.

POSCO is heavily involved in offsetting its carbon emissions in the steel making processes. POSCO is involved in a forestation project in Uruguay, through which 206,000 tons of CERs will be obtained over the next 30 years. POSCO has been involved in the GHG registry, organized by the Korea Energy Management Corp., since 2005. In 2010, the company acquired 719,050 tons of Korea-CERs through seven GHG reduction projects.