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what did everyone put on the slides? I thought it was just odd to try and make three slides, did it mean a slide per director comments? Or did it mean to do a slide per each requirement in that section?
3rd time sitting SBL..the hardest paper to revise for.
I recommend fulfilling Order E fully and Order Bb partially. I didn’t read anywhere that you can partially fill order on the basis of Boxes. Box A surely has maximum contribution . But q mentioned prioritising order not product.
I think it was not bad.
1a) I use Ansoff matrix
b) Strengths and Weaknesses
2) TARA
Recommended the children are insured and the work should be training leading up to a scholarship.
3) Balridge
#FingersCross I pass from 13 in my first attempt!
Remember:- When the world is playing Devil Advocate; keep being an Angel! #ACCA #AngelFor Q3 I was short of words. Didn’t know what to write and from where . Not enough information given. This was first attempt at SBL. I was not prepared and I was sick. Don’t know what to expect 😀
I felt that the exhibits lacked information compared to other exams. There was minimal information on competition, organisation make up etc. I felt I was attempting to answer questions with no real basis to relate to the senario.
The slides were a joke with bullet points with no substance. Surely if ACCA want to test our commercial acumen they would make it more realistic?
Imagine a business advisor going into Lindt with the information provided & being asked to compose such reports? I doubt it very much!!
I hope we all pass, acca needs to consider giving extra time or cutting a question if they want us all to provide good responses as most of people who pass these exams including myself only get 50 or slightly above how does 50% make u ready for the work place as a strategic leader due to time constraints. Beats me
1a was okay- I think it relied more on commercial acumen than the use of a model as it sounded like you had to consider all strategies? I went down the route of what shops, website, and stockists would do for being able to develop new products and markets. Eg customer data from website.
1b I totally messed up- couldn’t get the financial implications down then got flustered!
2 I though was all okay- did the table but it was difficult to get 16 marks worth of points in a table!! Used TARA for part b and then for controls I recommended suppliers having to sign an ethical code of conduct and Dulce carrying out independent, unannounced audits.
3 was a right pain! From the wording of the question I can only assume they were wanting us to take the criteria of the baldridge model for high performing organisations and evaluate how Dulce are doing against these. Eg visionary leadership is one of the criteria; there was nothing to show innovative leadership with a clear vision communicated. Transparency and ethics is another criteria; I brought in the operations directors comments on not doing anything for child labour. Etc…
Could have totally misinterpreted what they were looking for though!This is my first sitting for this exam . I found it quite difficult . the previous June sitting was very much easy exam as compared to September sitting. I managed to answer all the questions using common sense and business acumen and hope it this will get me the required pass mark !!!!!!!!!!!
1a – Did not know how to start, spending much time on this
1b – Spent too much time on financial implication too, then be confused :(. Non-financial I pointed out
+ Location & characteristics of Excelior store & BB
+ Brand name
+ Experience in working with Excelior & BB
+ Other non-financial: 1 high class store only >< a supermarket chain, and one more point now I even couldnt remember what I wrote :))
2a – Same, Wrote but not easy to get 16 marks at all
2b – I used TARA, confused in how to state in 3 slides (key contents)
3 – I could not understand the requirement until now. Really confused.@muland said:
1a was okay- I think it relied more on commercial acumen than the use of a model as it sounded like you had to consider all strategies? I went down the route of what shops, website, and stockists would do for being able to develop new products and markets. Eg customer data from website.1b I totally messed up- couldn’t get the financial implications down then got flustered!
2 I though was all okay- did the table but it was difficult to get 16 marks worth of points in a table!! Used TARA for part b and then for controls I recommended suppliers having to sign an ethical code of conduct and Dulce carrying out independent, unannounced audits.
3 was a right pain! From the wording of the question I can only assume they were wanting us to take the criteria of the baldridge model for high performing organisations and evaluate how Dulce are doing against these. Eg visionary leadership is one of the criteria; there was nothing to show innovative leadership with a clear vision communicated. Transparency and ethics is another criteria; I brought in the operations directors comments on not doing anything for child labour. Etc…
Could have totally misinterpreted what they were looking for though!Agreed, total disaster..exhibits gave very little information…and the last question was…………….nothing close to the specimen papers…
@karldugan said:
I think it said you had to prioritise one order over the other but the second order could be part filled. I just did it to see which of the three options was best to comment on the options. If you can part fill either one I’d assume you can part fill both.
I recommended BB be fully filled first though, even though I had excelsior with a higher contribution – mentioned supplier relationship already existed, growth opportunities if successful as trial was 10% of stores, Excelsior was in high end sector and Northland was going through recession so would customers would be downgrading which shops they went to where as BB was a supermarket so unlikely to be as badly affected.Fair comments. i am sure you will get marks for it. However, i did the opposite. I choose Excelsior because its a new partner. Customers there are more likely to buy because they look for quality instead of price. Whereas, in the supermarket, people probably wont even notice it because of the high price (because it is luxury handmade) so it would be better for BB to test it with a small order first.
Re Q2, My control recommendations for the FD was to amend the contract between Dulce and suppliers to ensure the cocoa farms do no employ children, therefore pushing the liability onto the supplier to make sure their audit is performed well. Second control was to either attend the audit yourselves, or if this is not possible, to send in an independent auditor.
on the first slide I used the TARA model – this was the only model I used in the exam – bit odd?Re Q3, I answered this generically, which was the only way you could by using the ideas they generated (the questions specifically stated to only use this exhibit), how these would improve the strategic aims of retaining customers and keeping them loyal. So all of the brainstormed points you just needed to say how it could possibly retain and keep customers loyal – to be honest I had to read this question a few times.
Re the question about the supply contract with BB and Excelrios, did you all go with BB because of contribution per hour (and other factors) for all products and then Excelrios had all of Box a, then I think 666 of Box 2 (remaining hours)
HI
Question asked us to add notes from the slides prepared by the sales director or to determine which sales strategy to afopt ?Does anyone remember exact figures for calculating contribution ? My calculations showed that doing full Excelrios and part of Bb would give optimal contribution, anyone had the same ?
@kdesilva said:
Did anyone opt for Excelsior?????I opted for E. The hand made chocolate is a niche product. Niche products means higher price where E’s customers will surely buy as it is a high class store. Moreover, due to lack of skill labour, Dulce will not be able to fulfill the future orders of BB. Better to supply in lower volume at high quality than mass production.
My first attempt at SBL and I must say it was quite difficult.
Time management was an issue for me in this exam as I only had 20 minutes for question 3, 10 of those minutes were spent staring at the question trying to understand what it was asking.
1a) I spent too much time on question 1, I felt like I couldn’t use any particular model for this question (correct me if i’m wrong). I was cross examining the Sales Directors strategy (Exhibit 2) and the Annual Report (Exhibit 1), looking at ways that his strategy would fulfill the ains of the business. The aims being – Continue to supply highy quality chocolate and performing key factors of performance excellence. I felt my answers were vague.
1b) Stratgeic analysis using quant and non-quant data. Found it difficult to pull together financial data as the data sheet was very limited. I worked around the figures of labour hours and the increased % of sales orders from BB over Exsilor. Recommended BB – due to long standing relationship, enhanced customer relations, still sell under own brand, the assurance that BB gave that the roll out would go to all stores etc.
2a) Can’t remember the question exactly but it was to do with the risk register and how it impacts the business and any recomendations to mitigate the impact.
2b) various small questions on identify the risk, assess and recomendations on controls. I used TARA and two controls I used were supervision and organisation from SPAMSOAP internal controls model.
3) I just put pen to paper and wrote if they have done what they claimed in the board meeting etc and if it ticks the boxes of Baldridge performance excellence.
@therealrondon1989 said:
want a piece of pie?Sure, why not
@mannyx1993 said:
Time management was an issue for me in this exam as I only had 20 minutes for question 3, 10 of those minutes were spent staring at the question trying to understand what it was asking.
Same here.
I was reading the same sentence for 15 minutes, over and over again. Desperate to understand what they were asking….Did anyone use Ansoff’s growth vector matrix. Dulce was using market penetration with existing products and existing markets, they also had product development in mind as they wanted to expand their product range, they were also trying develop new markets using their existing products and finally diversify using horizontal integration via their related gifts products?
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