Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Leadership & Managing People
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making
The creation of temporary enterprises for project-based work has become an increasingly salient feature of the new economy. These project-based enterprises challenge several tenets of strategic management theory. Film making has a long tradition of project-based organizing. This article presents an intensive case study of a big-budget motion picture project, which provides the context for identifying some paradoxical attributes of project-based enterprises. Each of the paradoxes challenges strategic management theory assumptions of a relatively permanent firm as the locus of learning, knowledge transfer, and competitive advantage. Findings from the film case suggest the importance of human and social capital that is embodied in individual free-agent careers and mobilized within communities of professional and industry practice.
Authors :: Robert J. Defillippi, Michael B. Arthur
Swot Analysis of "Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making" written by Robert J. Defillippi, Michael B. Arthur includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Project Film facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Internet, Organizational structure, Project management and Leadership & Managing People.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making casestudy better are - – banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, wage bills are increasing, technology disruption,
talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Project Film, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Project Film operates in.
According to Harvard Business Review, 75% of the managers use SWOT analysis for various purposes such as – evaluating current scenario, strategic planning, new venture feasibility, personal growth goals, new market entry, Go To market strategies, portfolio management and strategic trade-off assessment, organizational restructuring, etc.
SWOT Objectives / Importance of SWOT Analysis and SWOT Matrix
SWOT analysis of Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Project Film
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Leadership & Managing People field.
4. Making a Leadership & Managing People topic specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Project Film
Strengths Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Project Film in Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making Harvard Business Review case study are -
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Project Film are driving operational speed, building greater agility, and keeping the organization nimble to compete with new competitors. It helps are organization to ideate new ideas, and execute them swiftly in the marketplace.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making Harvard Business Review case study comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the industry, building diversified operations across different geographies so that disruption in one part of the world doesn’t impact the overall performance of the firm, and integrating the various business operations and processes through its digital transformation drive.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Project Film has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Project Film has effective processes in place that helps in exploring new product needs, doing quick pilot testing, and then launching the products quickly using its extensive distribution network.
High brand equity
– Project Film has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Project Film to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Digital Transformation in Leadership & Managing People segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Project Film digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Project Film has successfully integrated the four key components of digital transformation – digital integration in processes, digital integration in marketing and customer relationship management, digital integration into the value chain, and using technology to explore new products and market opportunities.
Learning organization
- Project Film is a learning organization. It has inculcated three key characters of learning organization in its processes and operations – exploration, creativity, and expansiveness. The work place at Project Film is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Ability to lead change in Leadership & Managing People field
– Project Film is one of the leading players in its industry. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in its segment but also across the whole industry. The ability to lead change has enabled Project Film in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Project Film has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive segment. Secondly the value chain collaborators of the firm in Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Project Film in the sector have low bargaining power. Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Project Film to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Project Film has built up over years in its products and services combo offer has resulted in high retention of customers, lower marketing costs, and greater ability of the firm to focus on its customers.
Organizational Resilience of Project Film
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Project Film does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Strong track record of project management
– Project Film is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Weaknesses Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making are -
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Project Film is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Leadership & Managing People segment. Project Film needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Project Film to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making, it seems that company is thinking about the frontier risks that can impact Leadership & Managing People strategy. But it has very little resources allocation to manage the risks emerging from events such as natural disasters, climate change, melting of permafrost, tacking the rise of artificial intelligence, opportunities and threats emerging from commercialization of space etc.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Robert J. Defillippi, Michael B. Arthur suggests that, Project Film is facing high bargaining power of the channel partners. So far it has not able to streamline the operations to reduce the bargaining power of the value chain partners in the industry.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making HBR case study mentions - Project Film takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the industry in last five years.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making HBR case study still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Project Film has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Project Film has some of the most successful products in the industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. firm in the HBR case study - Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making has high operating costs in the. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Project Film 's lucrative customers.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Project Film has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the industry over the last five years. Project Film even though has strong showing on digital transformation primary two stages, it has struggled to capitalize the power of digital transformation in marketing efforts and new venture efforts.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Project Film needs to come up with a strategy to reduce the workers concern regarding automation. Without a clear strategy, it could lead to disruption and uncertainty within the organization.
Need for greater diversity
– Project Film has taken concrete steps on diversity, equity, and inclusion. But the efforts so far has resulted in limited success. It needs to expand the recruitment and selection process to hire more people from the minorities and underprivileged background.
Lack of clear differentiation of Project Film products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Project Film needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Opportunities Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities highlighted in the Harvard Business Review case study Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making are -
Reconfiguring business model
– The expansion of digital payment system, the bringing down of international transactions costs using Bitcoin and other blockchain based currencies, etc can help Project Film to reconfigure its entire business model. For example it can used blockchain based technologies to reduce piracy of its products in the big markets such as China. Secondly it can use the popularity of e-commerce in various developing markets to build a Direct to Customer business model rather than the current Channel Heavy distribution network.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Project Film can leverage digital technologies such as artificial intelligence and machine learning to automate the production process, customer analytics to get better insights into consumer behavior, realtime digital dashboards to get better sales tracking, logistics and transportation, product tracking, etc.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Project Film can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Project Film operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Leadership & Managing People sector.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Project Film can still utilize the low interest rates to borrow money for capital investment. Secondly it can also use the increase of government spending in infrastructure projects to get new business.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Project Film to increase its market reach. Project Film will be able to reach out to new customers. Secondly 5G will also provide technology framework to build new tools and products that can help more immersive consumer experience and faster consumer journey.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Project Film is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making case study suggests that firm can utilize new technology to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Identify volunteer opportunities
– Covid-19 has impacted working population in two ways – it has led to people soul searching about their professional choices, resulting in mass resignation. Secondly it has encouraged people to do things that they are passionate about. This has opened opportunities for businesses to build volunteer oriented socially driven projects. Project Film can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Loyalty marketing
– Project Film has focused on building a highly responsive customer relationship management platform. This platform is built on in-house data and driven by analytics and artificial intelligence. The customer analytics can help the organization to fine tune its loyalty marketing efforts, increase the wallet share of the organization, reduce wastage on mainstream advertising spending, build better pricing strategies using personalization, etc.
Buying journey improvements
– Project Film can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making suggest that firm can provide automated chats to help consumers solve their own problems, provide online suggestions to get maximum out of the products and services, and help consumers to build a community where they can interact with each other to develop new features and uses.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Project Film in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Leadership & Managing People segment, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– Consumer behavior has changed in the Leadership & Managing People industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Project Film can take advantage of these changes in consumer behavior to build a far more efficient business model. For example consumer regular ordering of products can reduce both last mile delivery costs and market penetration costs. Project Film can further use this consumer data to build better customer loyalty, provide better products and service collection, and improve the value proposition in inflationary times.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Project Film can build a diversified supply chain model across various countries in - South East Asia, India, and other parts of the world. This reconfiguration of global supply chain can help, as suggested in case study, Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Project Film can make experimentation a productive activity and build a culture of innovation using approaches such as – mining transaction data, A/B testing of websites and selling platforms, engaging potential customers over various needs, and building on small ideas in the Leadership & Managing People segment.
Threats Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making are -
Increasing wage structure of Project Film
– Post Covid-19 there is a sharp increase in the wages especially in the jobs that require interaction with people. The increasing wages can put downward pressure on the margins of Project Film.
New competition
– After the dotcom bust of 2001, financial crisis of 2008-09, the business formation in US economy had declined. But in 2020 alone, there are more than 1.5 million new business applications in United States. This can lead to greater competition for Project Film in the Leadership & Managing People sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Project Film high dependence on third party suppliers can disrupt its processes and delivery mechanism. For example -the current troubles of car makers because of chip shortage is because the chip companies started producing chips for electronic companies rather than car manufacturers.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Project Film can face lack of demand in the market place because of Fed actions to reduce inflation. This can lead to sluggish growth in the economy, lower demands, lower investments, higher borrowing costs, and consolidation in the field.
Aging population
– As the populations of most advanced economies are aging, it will lead to high social security costs, higher savings among population, and lower demand for goods and services in the economy. The household savings in US, France, UK, Germany, and Japan are growing faster than predicted because of uncertainty caused by pandemic.
Backlash against dominant players
– US Congress and other legislative arms of the government are getting tough on big business especially technology companies. The digital arm of Project Film business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Project Film in the Leadership & Managing People industry. The Leadership & Managing People industry is already at various protected from local competition in China, with the rise of trade war the protection levels may go up. This presents a clear threat of current business model in Chinese market.
Regulatory challenges
– Project Film needs to prepare for regulatory challenges as consumer protection groups and other pressure groups are vigorously advocating for more regulations on big business - to reduce inequality, to create a level playing field, to product data privacy and consumer privacy, to reduce the influence of big money on democratic institutions, etc. This can lead to significant changes in the Leadership & Managing People industry regulations.
High level of anxiety and lack of motivation
– the Great Resignation in United States is the sign of broader dissatisfaction among the workforce in United States. Project Film needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Leadership & Managing People industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Instability in the European markets
– European Union markets are facing three big challenges post Covid – expanded balance sheets, Brexit related business disruption, and aggressive Russia looking to distract the existing security mechanism. Project Film will face different problems in different parts of Europe. For example it will face inflationary pressures in UK, France, and Germany, balance sheet expansion and demand challenges in Southern European countries, and geopolitical instability in the Eastern Europe.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Project Film demand
– There is a high probability of declining consumer confidence, given – high inflammation rate, rise of gig economy, lower job stability, increasing cost of living, higher interest rates, and aging demography. All the factors contribute to people saving higher rate of their income, resulting in lower consumer demand in the industry and other sectors.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making, Project Film may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Leadership & Managing People .
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Project Film is facing in Leadership & Managing People sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers in the HBR case study Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making needs to zero down on the relative importance of each factor mentioned in the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants.
We can provide the relative importance to each factor by assigning relative weights. Weighted SWOT analysis process is a three stage process –
First stage for doing weighted SWOT analysis of the case study Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making is to rank the strengths and weaknesses of the organization. This will help you to assess the most important strengths and weaknesses of the firm and which one of the strengths and weaknesses mentioned in the initial lists are marginal and can be left out.
Second stage for conducting weighted SWOT analysis of the Harvard case study Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making is to give probabilities to the external strategic factors thus better understanding the opportunities and threats arising out of macro environment changes and developments.
Third stage of constructing weighted SWOT analysis of Paradox in Project-Based Enterprise: The Case of Film Making is to provide strategic recommendations includes – joining likelihood of external strategic factors such as opportunities and threats to the internal strategic factors – strengths and weaknesses. You should start with external factors as they will provide the direction of the overall industry. Secondly by joining probabilities with internal strategic factors can help the company not only strategic fit but also the most probably strategic trade-off that Project Film needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
