Company Administration

As we started our company relatively late during the year (beginning of November) we decided that it was not practical to re-elect the function directors. This was because our original function directors would not have experienced enough time within their role if not re-elected, but also because we felt that our selection of roles were quite sound. Our H.R. and finance directors are currently working out remuneration rates. These will be an hourly rate that will then be paid to achievers depending on time spent working for the company.

Before running the after school club members of the company talked to Mrs Jarvis, the head teacher of Peppard C. of E. School, to discuss any possible health and safety issues there might be. She gave the company a lot of help on the matter. Some of her advice included ensuring that there was at least 1 achiever for every 5 pupils and ensuring that we had a competent first aider on the site during the time when the club was in action. For the majority of the clubs we had to first aiders, Miss Rice (our Link Teacher) and Mrs Jarvis. There was no real need to keep members motivated as all involved were enjoying the experience.

This meant that we found it very easy to keep everyone involved. We experienced no personnel problems because there was enough of us to run the after school club. We did have several achievers friends who came to help; without being recruited. We allowed this as it helped us to keep up our achiever to pupil ratio. Our current averaged achiever to pupil ration is 1:3 (1 achiever to every 3 pupils). I.C.T was used within our company to help support the administration. Minutes are typed up onto a computer so that there is a digital copy that can be sent to all board members. We also have a company database that lists the details of all achievers.

We have also used the forms provided by the Young Enterprise Corporation to great effect within our company. For an example of this see appendix 2 or appendix 3.We have attempted to customise our service as much as possible to help maximise the take up for our product. As a company, and with the help of our advisor, we tried to work out what we would look for when buying a product.

We then used our own experience to try to make the after school club perfect. Once the club had started we continued to try and improve. We tried to ensure that we were providing the service that both the parents, and the children, wanted. One of the ways we did this was by talking to parents when they came to pick their children up. This helped us to make sure that the parents would agree with what we were providing. We then tried to adapt our service to suit our target audience. However from this feedback we found out that on the whole we were providing the service that the parents, and the children, wanted.

Our main marketing technique was sending out letters and flyers via the school. We wrote a letter to the Peppard parents giving details of the new club. The school distributed the letters for us and collected replies. We then liased with their office. There was a good response from the first week onwards. We also relied quite heavily on word of mouth; children would tell their friends how much they had enjoyed the club and these children would then use pester power to convince their parents to let them come.

 Personal Evaluation

I had a number of roles within the business. As I.C.T. director it was my job to assess the I.C.T needs of the company. I decided that it would not be cost effective to go out of our way to bring I.C.T. into the company. This meant that the only need of I.C.T. was for the production of company reports such as this one. It was also decided that I should create reports and presentations needed by the company. One such report, the basis for this coursework, was used within the Young Enterprise Achiever Competition. As Human Resources director I also had jobs that must be carried out.

One of these roles was to keep an attendance record in order for the company members to gain their achiever award from the Young Enterprise organisation. A copy of our current achiever attendance record is appendix 1. Currently all but two members of the company are meeting the 80% attendance required to gain the award from Young Enterprise. Of the two who are not one has left the company while the other has been away from school for long periods of time due to illness. 

If I were to run the business again then I would ensure that the clubs were more organised. When running the clubs we were very un-organised and sometimes the activities did not last long enough. If it were to run again then we would need to plan well in advance what we were going to do on each of the days1.