Module 7 - Changing Corporate Behaviour to Respond to Changing Demographics

Objectives
Instructor Comments
Assignment

Module 7 - Changing Corporate Behaviour to Respond to Changing Demographics

Objectives

The aim of this assignment is to assess how the operations of a company might change when the demographic make-up of regions surrounding its operating locations change.
Instructor Comments

An important source of information for analysts of corporate behavior is census data. Statistics Canada and the U.S. Census Bureau host demographic data for their respective countries and make it available in many useful ways. In both cases, online researchers can access demographic profiles of towns, cities, counties, provinces and states in a matter of seconds. This is relevant for a course in change management as the demographic makeup of a region or locale can differ dramatically in different regions of the continent. Changes to the demography of a company's operating locations can dramatically alter how it does business. The challenges of operating a business differ when the surrounding population is predominantly French as opposed to English or any other language. It also differs when much of the population is comprised of 1st generation immigrants as opposed to individuals families that have lived in a region for decades. Different demographic make ups of surround environments affect how a company sells, what is sells, who it hires, how it hires and why it hires. This assignment is about exploring how a change in office location might alter how a company does business.

Assignment

You should base your responses to the following questions on the insight found on the following websites.

Federal Express http://www.fedex.com.
Statistics Canada http://www.statcan.gc.ca.
U.S. Census Bureau http://www.census.gov.

In this situation, Federal Express has decided to open three new offices. One is in St. John's Newfoundland, a second is in Miami, Florida, while a third office is in Surrey British Columbia. Please assume that they currently do not have operations in those cities. When using the Statistics Canada website, under the Find Statistics heading, click on Community Profiles. When using the U.S. Census Bureau website, under Data Finder, look at Population Finder.

Please answer the following questions:

Please examine the demographic make-up of these three communities. What are the important ways that they differ?

How much bigger or smaller would Fedex's operations need to be to serve the local markets of Miami and Surrey? How did you arrive at your estimate?

Based on the demographic data, how might Fedex's workforce differ in Surrey and Miami from that in St. John's?

What might Fedex do differently to serve each of these three markets? In other words, how might it slightly customize service to respond to each of these markets?

So what?