1. National University of Ireland, Dublin
Master of Science (Singapore) MSc21
Module: Learning Journal
Essay Title: Marketing Myopia
Submitted by: Pei Shan, Leow
Student Number: 08297835
Lecturer: Dr Emily Chua
Submission Date: 19 April 2010
____________________________________________________________________
I declare that all materials included in this report is the end result of my own work and that due
acknowledgement have been given in the bibliography and references to ALL sources be they printed,
electronic or personal.
Leow Pei Shan 19th April 2010 – MSc21-MKTGMM/RPLJ

2. Content
1. Marketing - The misunderstood discipline Page 1
2. The Organization Gap Page 3
3. Organization Restructure or Restructure the Organization Page 7
4. Supply Chain Management - a Critical Marketing Factor Page 11
5. Conclusion Page 15
Leow Pei Shan 19th April 2010 – MSc21-MKTGMM/RPLJ

3. 1. Marketing - The misunderstood discipline
Marketing adopts a lot of concepts from other business disciplines such as business
management and human resources. Concepts like Porter’s five forces or the Maslow
hierarchy of needs are commonly adapted as part of the foundational chapters in many
marketing courses. Marketing concepts are then build up or derived from some of
these precepts. Perhaps, the Ansoff matrix is one of the more distinctive marketing
model that marketers rely and consider in the course of business development. As
such, the way marketing is being taught is also constantly undergoing changes. For
example, what is termed as business marketing nowadays used to be known as
industrial marketing. This change reflects the changing context of the business
environment where in the past, businesses focuses more on a simplistic business
model that involves the manufacturing of goods and selling them. However,
nowadays, the more complex environment entails more than a linear transaction.
Frequently, over the course of the past year, when people found out that I was doing
this marketing course, they deemed it as a fluke. Some were condescending and even
queried my decision to do this postgraduate program. Why bother to do marketing,
they asked and “kindly” extended their offer to “teach” me marketing. It is at best
annoying and at worst a feeling of being superbly patronized. It is quite an energy
draining activity to engage in any further discussions with people who hold a rather
myopic and fixated mindset about what marketing is all about. Having to deal with
minds that cannot agree to disagree inevitably makes one apathetic. Hence, this
energy is better channelled towards more constructive activities such as developing
better thought process so as to better comprehend the business complexity of current
times.
Despite all the definitions from academia as to what marketing or marketing
management is about, my take is that at the very core, marketing is a mindset
orientation that a company adopts and employs to ensure that the business strategy is
brought to light. This orientation is pervasive in that all departments within the
organization needs to be marketing orientated. The people within each department
might not understand what marketing is but this is where ideally, the chief marketing
officer needs to work at putting structures and activities in place to ensure that the
people work in a manner that is marketing orientated, hence, marketing management.
Leow Pei Shan 19th April 2010 – MSc21-MKTGMM/RPLJ

4. This is so that everyone is effectively geared towards meeting the needs of the end
customer. An effective marketing orientation will eventually manifest itself
quantitatively in terms of the revenue figures. A certain pharmaceutical company to
my understanding appears to have adopted such an approach rather transparently.
Members within each department are inculcated with the mindset of identifying who
their immediate customers are. The question of who my immediate customer is, is
conscientiously brought up to the mind of each employee and each is reminded that
they are performing a customer service to the other. KPI’s of each individual is also
inevitably tied to the corporate missions and values. Although the notion of treating
each other as a “customer” can be disputed as mere basic respect for the other
individual, but the fact that this was brought up as a philosophy of the company
speaks for how much the company understands the importance of customer service
and to orientate itself internally in one manner such that the company’s brand value
gets propagated and eventually transmitted to the end customer.
As classification for the purpose of human learning has caused marketing to be so
misunderstood by many (it is definitely not just operational or promotional activities
carried out by a single department), we need to look at it in a pervasive way in terms
of how it should be infiltrating each department. This learning journal will look at 3
areas of interests, namely: 1- The Generation Gap, 2- Organization Restructure or
Restructure Organization and 3- Supply Chain Management - a critical marketing
factor
Leow Pei Shan 19th April 2010 – MSc21-MKTGMM/RPLJ