Memorandum audience
Valero
Energy Corporation
Memorandum
To : Professor Lawrence Clark
From :
Date : August 6, 2016
Re : Audience Analysis – Proposal for Adding New Position at Valero Energy
Introduction:
The objective of this memo is to analyze primary and secondary audiences that are influenced by the initial proposal for adding new position in Valero Energy Corporation due to their expansion plan into international markets. Previously, the company rely its international operation on the headquarter in the San Antonio, Texas (USA). This condition causes the company to be less insensitive when dealing with foreign market demands and preferences.
Furthermore, this situation provides serious demerits for the company as the any cases in the foreign market requires immediate action towards contemporary issues in order to win customers. Therefore, it is essential that Valero add new position that focus on marketing aspect of international markets.
However, prior to the establishment of international operation of Valero Energy Corporation, the company must analyze the primary and secondary audiences for an analytical report. The analysis includes the description of audiences’ level of knowledge, interest, and attitude toward the issue of adding new position for Valero international market.
Since the degree of influence is different from one audience to another, this memo divides the audiences into following two groups:
· Primary: Approval authorities, composing of three executives of Valero Energy.
· Secondary: upper level managers that will be tested to run international business of Valero
Analysis of Primary Audience:
The primary audiences of the adding new position for Valero Energy consist of three executives; they are Executive Vice President of Marketing and Supply, Chief Financial Officer, and Executive Vice President of Corporate Development & Strategic Planning,
The analysis includes the description of audiences’ level of knowledge, interest, and attitude toward the issue of adding new position for Valero international market.
· Mike Ciskowski, Chief Financial Officer. Mike is an experiences finance professional that has taken several key positions in Valero such as Financial Planning Director, and Investor Relations Director. He is the person behind the success of Valero’s acquisitions program within the past years that lead the company to be leading refiner in the U.S. his experience in oil industry is undoubtedly vast since he once worked for Williams Exploration Company and served as officer in financial planning. His vast experience in financial planning and corporate development will keenly questions the need to expand into international market especially into Asia region. His major concerns are the operational budget and overall profitability of expanding into international markets.
· Gene Edwards, Executive Vice President of Corporate Development and Strategic Planning. Gene Edwards is an experience executive that serve Valero for more than 20 years. During the period, he works for many positions in business development and marketing aspects of the company’s operation such as Senior Vice President of Product Supply and Trading and Wholesale Marketing and corporate development. Concerning the proposal for adding new position in Valero international operation, Gene Edwards may be reading the proposal at high level since he is the person who is responsible for deciding the short and long-term strategy of business development at Valero.
· Joe Gorder, Executive Vice President of Marketing and Supply. He is the authorized person at Valero that develops marketing strategy. Looking at the proposal of adding new position at Valero, he will be enthusiastically examine the proposal in terms of country risks, opportunity, the smoothness of international supply and the entry strategy in the chosen country/countries in order to speed up the existence of Valero operation.
Analysis of Secondary Audience:
The secondary audiences in this memo are the selected two mid-level managers that have potential to be appointed as the head of international operation at Valero. Since the international operations require extensive experience and knowledge in marketing and business operations, the two people are those who already have experiences in the two aspects. The chosen candidates are Executive Vice President of Refining Operations and Senior Vice President of Human Resources.
· Executive Vice President of Refining Operations. The person who is appointed as the head of international operation should have extensive experience in multiple positions at Valero. This is because international operations would relate to the presence of marketing strategy, acquisitions and partnership will local refineries etcetera. When reading the proposal of adding new positions at Valero, the EVP of Refining Operations may be interested in operational aspects of the company’s products including the refineries locations, partnership etcetera.
· Senior Vice President of Human Resources. As the adding of new positions will lead to another series of new positions to back up the head of international operations. Under such circumstances, the appointment of a person that has experience in managing human resources is appropriate. When reading the proposal of adding new positions at Valero, he will pore over whether the company will acquire some local managers to run the company’s operations and how many people the company assigns the head of international operations to run the international division at Valero.
Conclusion:
The proposal for adding new positions of international operations at Valero aims at convincing the top-level executives at Valero regarding the need to immediately approve the presence of Valero’ international division. In order to support the approval process, we are seeking the justification from the secondary audiences that have concerns over the refinery operations and human resources management.
Works Cited
Hatch, M. J. (1997). Organization Theory. Oxford University Press
Valero Energy Corporation. (2007). 2006 Annual Report.
—. (2006). 2005 Summary Annual Report.
