United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) is an organisation committed to promoting for the fulfilment of rights for children - A research was undertaken in one of the districts in Zimbabwe which has a significantly high number of orphans.

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NOTTINGHAM TRENT UNIVERSITY

IN CONJUCTION WITH

OPEN LEARNING CENTRE

COURSE: CERTIFICATE IN MANAGEMENT STUDIES

MODULE: MEETING CUSTOMER NEEDS

STUDENT: VIMBAINASHE NDORO CM15

DUE DATE: 21 JULY 2003

Executive Summary

The vulnerability of orphans and other vulnerable children in Zimbabwe is increasing rapidly due to the consequences of the current HIV/AIDS epidemic, deepening economic hardship and food insecurity. This report is aimed at looking at ways to meet the needs of these specific "customers". United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) is an organisation committed to promoting for the fulfilment of rights for children. A research was undertaken in one of the districts in Zimbabwe which has a significantly high number of orphans. The objective of the research was to establish what the needs of the orphans are and come up with critical actions to undertake in the future to meet these needs. The main areas of concern from the research were the increase in school drop-outs, increase in malnutrition cases and lack of psychosocial support for the orphans.

Recommendations have been clearly outlined aimed at reducing the orphans overall vulnerability through various project interventions by supporting community based orphans and vulnerable children (OVC) programmes and bringing together policy makers and grassroots level service providers at policy level at district and community level.

(to be revised)

TABLE OF CONTENTS

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 2

INTRODUCTION 4

2 MARKETING RESEARCH 6

2.1.1 Research Methods 7

2.1.2 Sampling frame 7

2.1.3 Research Tools 8

3 SITUATION ANALYSIS 10

3.1 MICRO-ENVIRONMENT 10

3.1.1 Nature of the environment 10

3.1.2 The Porter's model of competitive advantage 11

3.1.3 SWOT ANALYSIS 14

3.2 MACRO ENVIRONMENT 15

3.2.1 PEST Analysis 15

3.2.2 TOWS Analysis 18

4 ANALYSIS OF RESEARCH FINDINGS 19

4.1 ANALYSIS OF WHAT UNICEF HAS DONE TO MEET CUSTOMER NEEDS 20

5 GAP ANALYSIS 22

5.1.1 Psycho-social support 22

5.1.2 Right to education 22

5.1.3 Access to food 23

5.2 STAKEHOLDER ANALYSIS 24

5.2.1 Mapping Level Interest 25

5.2.2 Public Sector Portfolio Matrix 26

5.3 MARKETING STRATEGY 27

6 CONCLUSION 28

7 RECOMMENDATIONS 29

8 REFERENCES 30

9 APPENDICES 31

9.1 APPENDIX A - UNICEF PROFILE 31

9.2 APPENDIX B - SWOT ANALYSIS 33

9.3 APPENDIX C - QUESTIONNAIRE 35

9.4 APPENDIX D - QUESTIONNAIRE WITH CARE-GIVERS 47

Introduction

UNICEF is a non-profit, inter-governmental, international organisation and a member of the UN agencies. It is guided by the vision of the world where leaders commit to use their power and influence to assure for every child, the rights and opportunities to grow to adulthood in dignity, security and self-fulfilment.

In order to achieve its aims, all sectors of society need to be committed and hold themselves accountable for taking actions on behalf of children. These include a broad range of partners, including the entire United Nations system, governments, international financial institutions, NGOs, religious groups, the private sector, the media, general public and the children themselves.

UNICEF's current organisational priorities are girls' education , integrated early childhood development, immunisation, fighting HIV/Aids and improved protection of children from violence, exploitation, abuse and discrimination. These organizational priorities have been selected not only because of their worldwide importance and potential impact on children's lives, but also because UNICEF has comparative advantages in these areas, which arise from its mandate as the world's premier organization for children and from years of experience and accumulated expertise.

UNICEF cannot achieve its mandate of advocating for the protection of children's rights, to help meet their basic needs and to expand their opportunities to reach their full potential if it does not know what the children's needs are.

Michael Porter states that in every organisation there are two types of customers internal and external. This paper examines the external customer in this case the children of Zimbabwe. Philip Kotler defines a need as customer's lack of something.

An organisation cannot satisfy the needs and wants of all its customers. To do so may result in a massive drain in company resources. UNICEF has identified the following customer segments: orphans and vulnerable children, women and the general public. Of these customer segments, this paper will focus on the orphans and vulnerable children.

The orphans and vulnerable children include orphans, children with one parent, neglected children and children affected/infected by HIV/AIDS.

The modern marketing concept can be expressed as :

"The achievement of corporate goals through meeting and exceeding customer needs better than the competition." (Jobber 1995)

This is the 'approach or concept which can be used as the guiding philosophy for all of the activities of an organisation. Peter Drucker once wrote "There is only one valid definition of business purpose: to create a customer." At its simplest, if you do not have any customers for the product or service your business offers, then there is no reason for continuing existence.' [Adcock et al 1995].

According to Philip Kotler organisations should adopt a marketing concept. He describes a market oriented company as one striving to better serve its customer's needs.

Marketing objectives, goals and targets have to be monitored and met, competitor strategies analysed, anticipated and exceeded. Through effective use of market and marketing research an organisation should be able to identify the needs and wants of the customer and try to deliver benefits that will enhance or add to the customers lifestyle, while at the same time ensuring that the satisfaction of these needs results in a healthy turnover for the organisation. To find out the needs of its most vulnerable customers, the orphans a marketing research was undertaken in one of the districts UNICEF supports.

2 Marketing Research

According to Peter Drucker marketing is so basic that it cannot be considered a separate function. It is the whole business seen from the point of view of its final result , that is from the customer's point of view. He goes on to say business success is not determined by the producer but the customer. (Kotler,1996)

Corey also explains marketing as consisting of all activities by which a company adapts itself to its environment - creatively and profitably. The marketing process begins with customer needs analysis. (Kotler, 1996)

The current situation in Zimbabwe is such that there is a great need to match the capacities, capabilities and efforts of the organisation to the needs of customers. To date HIV/AIDS has affected and infected an estimated 36 million people and claimed 22 million lives globally. The HIV/AIDS epidemic is leaving increasing numbers of vulnerable children in need of special care and protection. This is the reason why it is vitally important that the needs of these orphans be identified and something be done to assist them to grow to adulthood in dignity.

The American Marketing Association defines marketing research as the systematic gathering, recording and analysis of data about problems relating to the marketing of goods and services.

Research is the only tool an organisation has to keep in contact with its external operating environment.

The investigation has been undertaken in the spirit of societal marketing concept, being a process of collecting information from clients/customers in order to answer such questions which will enable any organisation to address the need of meeting customer needs. Social marketing is defined by Kotler(1975) as the design, implementation, and control of programs seeking to increase the acceptability of a social idea, cause, or practice in a target group. It utilizes market segmentation, consumer research, concept development, communications, facilitation, incentives and the exchange theory to maximize target group response.

2.1.1 Research Methods

Qualitative research methods have been carried out by means of in-depth interviews with orphaned children between 6 and 12 years of age and focus group discussions with organisations working directly with the orphans and vulnerable children.

A qualitative research method was used as it focuses on people's opinions and attitudes towards a service which is what the research intended to get.

The aim being to find out the needs of the orphans and vulnerable children and what they expect from UNICEF.

2.1.2 Sampling frame

In-depth interviews with the orphans were done at Mudzi District. Mudzi is situated in the North Eastern part of Mashonaland East Province. It borders with Mutoko District in the South West, Uzumba-Maramba- Pfungwe in the North West, Nyanga District in the South East, Mozambique in the North East and Rushinga in the north. Its proximity to Nyamapanda border post makes the people of Mudzi district more susceptible to HIV/AIDS transmission resulting in an increase of mortality cases due to HIV/AIDS. The number of orphans within the District continues to swell due to escalating deaths from HIV/AIDS. Orphan care services need to be more available in the district. The database at district level indicates that 5000 children are orphans as at March 2002 but the figure is not exhaustive. Of the estimated 5000 orphans in the district, in-depth interviews were done with 20 children from different wards in the district. See Appendix C for the questionnaire used.

Questionnaires were also distributed to 10 caregivers with the aim of getting information of what they think the children need most and how the organisation can assist. (See Appendix D for the questionnaire.)

The focus group discussions were held with the 6 district officials with the aim of getting information on the organisations assisting the orphans and vulnerable children and what they had done for the community. (See Appendix E for the questionnaire used.)

The research aimed at addressing the following:

. To establish the number of orphans who have not been registered that is, with no birth registration certificates as it means they cannot enrol for school.

2. Establishing baselines on the well-being of orphans and vulnerable children against which progress can be measured and programme adjustments can be made

3. Establishing how many children are benefiting from the community support services compared to all the orphans and vulnerable children at community level

4. To establish if children are getting the much needed psychosocial support

5. To establish the focal groups involved in the care of orphans and vulnerable children which UNICEF can support.

2.1.3 Research Tools

The research tools used were questionnaires which were distributed to the community care-givers, in-depth interviews with orphaned children between the ages of 6 and 12 and focus group discussions with local groups in the community who assist the orphans.

The table below explains the merits and de-merits of the research tools used.

Method

Overall Purpose

Advantages

Challenges

Questionnaires

When need to quickly and/or easily get lots of information from people in a non threatening way

* Can complete anonymously

* Inexpensive to administer

* Easy to compare and analyse

* Administer to many people

* Can get lots of data

* Might not get careful feedback

* Wording can bias client's responses

* Are impersonal

* Doesn't get full story

Focus groups

Explore topic in depth through group discussion, e.g. about reactions to an experience or suggestion, understanding common complaints, etc : useful in evaluation and marketing

* Quickly and reliably get common impressions

* Can be efficient way to get much range and depth of information in short time

* Can convey key information about programs

* Can be hard to analyse responses

* Need good facilitator for safety and closure

* Difficult to schedule 6-8 people together

The in-depth interviews with orphaned children between 6 and 12 years of age aimed at identifying problems of orphans in relation to care, education and primary health care by interviewing the orphans themselves.

Focus group discussions were conducted with the community members to identify local groups in the community and the extent to which they collaborate with each other. This tool helped identify local groups that can be used to improve care for the orphans and vulnerable children.

The reports with the research findings have been attached to this report . See Appendix E

The following were the major issues raised:

. Lack of appropriate counselling and psychosocial support for orphans and vulnerable children

2. Inadequate protection of orphans and vulnerable children from all forms of abuse, violent, exploitation, discrimination, trafficking and loss of inheritance

3. Most orphans and vulnerable children do not go to school because they are not allowed to enrol since they do not have birth certificates depriving them of their right to education.

3 Situation Analysis

3.1 Micro-environment

3.1.1 Nature of the environment

UNICEF is a non-profit organisation thus the notion of competition seems a curious contradiction. While each non-profit organisation has its own unique mission, all share the same basic goal of improving the human condition. Non-profit defines success in a different way and measures it with different criteria of collaboration.

Nonetheless non-profit sector competition can be understood as a mechanism that drives organisations to consider the behaviour of rivals when setting strategy. This perspective differs from the private sector in that it does not presuppose hostility as a necessary consequence of divergent, mutually dependent interests.

Competition among nonprofits is not necessarily a zero sum game , but something that can generate net benefits for both the incumbent and new entrants.

Despite the incentives for nonprofits to cooperate, the delivery of non-profit services has seen a marked rise in competition in recent years. This trend has been simultaneously propelled by consumers, managerial style and external factors.

Competitive position

Non profits are not simply businesses that choose not to make money, but a unique form of organisation with distinct goals and challenges. (Drucker 1990, Lovelock and Weinberg 1989)

To analyse the competitive forces acting upon UNICEF, I have used the Porters model of competitive advantage(Hannagan ,1998). This provides an interesting and usable framework to base the analysis on.

Porters model of competitive advantage(Hannagan 1998) Figure 1

Source: Adapted from Competitive Strategy Techniques for Analyzing Industries and Competitors by Michael Porter.

3.1.2 The Porter's model of competitive advantage

To analyse the competitive position of the organisation I have used the Porter's five forces framework.

Threat of new entrants

The major threats to entry for UNICEF are new organisations seeking money from the same donors but with a different strategy but aiming to achieve the same goal. These include non-governmental organisations (NGO) who are not affiliated to the government of Zimbabwe for example Plan International. Most donors prefer to support organisations which are independent of the government.

New entrants use the performance driven approach to management as the boardroom demands for accountability force organisations to clearly define objectives and strive for specific targets.(Drucker 1989, Porter and Kramer 1999) Thus poor management of funds can shrink the donor base and destroy viability of the organisation.
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Distribution channels controlled by existing players are a major barrier to entry. UNICEF maintains a very good relationship with the government and the district officials at the community level therefore it is not difficult to coerce the government to enforce laws in favour of orphans. A new entrant will have to set up this connection which is very challenging and can be cumbersome.

Trust plays an especially key role in determining whether a prospective donor will deal with a specific nonprofits agency (Arrow 1963). This presents an important barrier to entry. It is always wise to be ...

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