BP experienced some strategic problems before the disaster, during the disaster, and after the disaster.

BP Strategy and the Deepwater Horizon Disaster

Answer the questions by drafting a single spaced 2 page paper in MS Word. Include 10 short headings in the paper relating to each question. Save the file by including your last name in the file name.

While this was an unpleasant environmental disaster, involved the loss of life, and shut down businesses, that is not the point of the article for this course. BP experienced some strategic problems before the disaster, during the disaster, and after the disaster.

Case Questions

1. What external environment (general, industry, and competitive) segments do you think BP considered or didn’t consider prior to their drilling off the Gulf Coast?

2. How should BP have handled an external environmental analysis and what environmental changes and trends (opportunities and threats) might they have discovered?

3. After the fact, use the five forces of competition model, to determine the industry’s attractiveness in terms of profit potential.

4. Based on the case provided, who might be in BP’s strategic group and why?

5. What would a competitor of BP discover about them in a competitor analysis?

6. Describe BP’s strategic relationship with other companies directly involved in the incident? Consider this from an international strategy point of view.

7. Would it have been wise for another company to acquire or merge with BP after this incident? Shell was being considered for a merger earlier. Consider the reasons for doing so and the problems with success.

8. What type of strategic alliance was BP involved in at this time frame?

9. Assess the effectiveness of the board of directors for BP.

10. Describe the relationship between governance mechanisms and ethical behavior at BP.