Every organization carries out activity strives for some kind of global goal: producing cars, providing loans, providing services. As a significant player in the global marketplace, Caterpillar Inc also presents its short- and long-term goals. The company’s global mission is to promote economic growth through infrastructure and energy development and provide solutions that support communities and protect the planet. Caterpillar Inc.’s long-term goal is to contribute to the sustainability of the company’s products, services, solutions, and operations. Management has divided this global and long-term goal into several short-term goals to be accomplished during the work year. In the area of operations, the company has set itself several specific goals related to the environment. These include reducing energy intensity and greenhouse gas emissions by 50 percent (Lysak et al., 2020). In addition, the company has set a goal of using alternative and renewable sources to meet part of its energy needs. Also included in the production goals are reductions in workplace injuries among factory employees and the number of lost work hours due to injuries.
Caterpillar also set short-term goals for product quality management. These include, for example, doubling the hours of operation of the managed fleet and increasing sales of remanufactured equipment. The company also wants to maintain leadership in keeping people safe while using its products. To meet its sustainability goal, Caterpillar regularly conducts mergers and acquisitions. Deals over the past five years have helped improve the company’s operational efficiency. At the same time, they have had little impact on its global organizational goals. The reason for this is that the company chooses partners similar in goals and production principles. When companies with similar goals merge, they begin to work on achieving them together rather than making changes. One such merger was with CarbonPoint in September 2021 (Lysak et al. 2020). This merger, whose type of integration is defined as a takeover, had a positive impact on the company in the context of improving its efficiency.
CarbonPoint Solutions’ proprietary carbon capture systems have been applied to turbines at oil and gas facilities and distributed industrial plants. In this way, Caterpillar was able to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions, which in turn helped it achieve its climate protection goal. With this deal, the company’s organizational goals did not change but only strengthened. One of the essential mergers for Caterpillar was the acquisition of Bucyrus International in 2010 (Lysak et al., 2020). I chose this particular deal because it is the largest and most expensive acquisition in its history. This merger is also notable for the fact that it greatly expanded the company’s production capacity and increased efficiency in achieving its crucial production goals.
Based on the above, Caterpillar’s operating plan is sufficiently compelling for global strategies. In the context of the company’s international strategy, the operating plan is effective in increasing the company’s visibility. Its execution implies a quality marketing strategy to promote the company’s product abroad. The operating plan can also be called effective in the area of transnational with strategies. Through mergers and acquisitions, Caterpillar maintains the status of a multinational corporation cooperating with the same organizations. The operating plan also means making up for the multinational strategies effectively. It includes efforts for the national differentiation of the company’s employees in order to maintain diversity and difference. Thus, Caterpillar’s operating plan and merger strategies contribute to its efficient operation and sustainable development.
Reference
Lysak, A., Marmon, R., & Schoen, E. J. (2020). Whistleblowing and Caterpillar Inc.’s Swiss tax strategy. Journal of business ethics education, 17(1), 237-250. Web.
