Discipline and Structure: In your business studies, you may have encountered PESTEL and Porter's 5 Forces. You probably also have encountered SWOT analysis. All three provide a structure for analyzing a business situation in microcosm and/or macrocosm. Each individually is a powerful tool, and as you get to work with them, you can make adjustments in terms of how they might apply to the business situation that you are trying to analyze. In some ways, each is a "checklist" of ideas to consider when conducting an analysis, and the more items that you can check off, the more detailed your analysis will be.

Let’s consider sports as a business for this. Consider any of the major US-based sports leagues (MLB, NFL, NBA, or NHL) and conduct an analysis that includes up to two aspects of Porter's 5 Forces or of PESTEL. (If you choose Porter, then select two of the 5 forces; if you select PESTEL, then select two of the 6 concepts.) Explain how these factors or aspects from the selected framework explain the business characteristics of any of these sports business leagues.

You will need to think about this in an outside-the-box manner. You will want to discuss one team “competing” against another team. The franchises in a league do not compete as we understand it in a business class. Leagues compete with other leagues and other forms of entertainment, and the games that leagues produce are the products that fans, TV, and radio consume. Also, you may think that “fans” are the buyers in these industries, but they do not have the power that TV and radio have.

Try to be concise and remain on point. The concepts may seem easy at first, that is, until you try to work with them in some detail.