The Active Sports Equipment Company

The Active Sports Equipment Company (ASE) is a small to medium-sized manufacturer of high-quality sports equipment It was founded 35 years ago and currently employs around 50 people to manufacture a specialist piece of sporting equipment. Their current turnover is 4m and 65% of output is exported worldwide. The founder of the company is a mechanical engineer. He established ASE to produce a specialist piece of sports equipment based on his own original and highly innovative design. He is still the Managing Director and his obsessive concern with the details of design and engineering excellence dominate the culture of the company.

This concern for engineering excellence has served the company well. It has built itself an enviable reputation as the standard by which all other sporting equipment in this specialist category is judged, even though the basic design of ASE's product has evolved little over the years. Recently, however, several challenges to this dominant position have emerged as other sports equipment manufacturers have sought to enter what they regard as an attractive market with newer designs. These newcomers compete effectively on price and many aspects of performance and specification, although they still fail to match ASE's product on ease, speed of assembly and the compactness of the fold for transportation. Much of the success of the ASE product is based on its well-engineered and robust construction that enables it to be folded and unfolded easily and quickly. However, it is with such challenges in mind that ASE introduced several innovations, the most significant of which was the option of several titanium parts that deliver important weight-saving advantages.

But what about the future? ASE might continue to focus on its core competence and seek to retain its current competitive advantage by further improving the design of its product. Product and production engineering are highly valued within the company.

There is no doubt that it is engineering that has created the ASE brand and made it what it is today. There is, however, the risk that engineering alone may not guarantee that the current record of success will be sustained.

Source: Hayes, John 2022 The Theory and Practice of Change Management, 6th ed., McMillian. PP72-73.

As the Change Practitioner:

1. If you were a manager in ASE how would you identify the needs for change?
2. Would you actively try to influence the company's strategic agenda? If not, why not? If yes, how would you attempt this?