Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Leadership & Managing People
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers
Describes Rob Waldron's actions upon assuming leadership of SCORE! Educational Centers, an after-school tutoring enterprise. Examines the issue of acquiring and growing a small, self-owned company into a professional organization. Focuses on the steps Waldron takes to address a growing employee morale problem. Concludes with Waldron deciding whether or not to alter the company's recruiting strategy. Includes SCORE! background material. A rewritten version of an earlier case.
Authors :: M. Diane Burton, Jeffrey L. Bradach, Naomi Atkins
Swot Analysis of "Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers" written by M. Diane Burton, Jeffrey L. Bradach, Naomi Atkins includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Waldron Score facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Developing employees, Growth strategy, Leadership, Mergers & acquisitions, Organizational culture, Talent management and Leadership & Managing People.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers casestudy better are - – geopolitical disruptions, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, technology disruption, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, increasing household debt because of falling income levels,
central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Waldron Score, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Waldron Score 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 Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Waldron Score
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 Waldron Score
Strengths Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Waldron Score in Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers Harvard Business Review case study are -
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Leadership & Managing People industry
– Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Waldron Score to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Leadership & Managing People industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Waldron Score to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Waldron Score in the sector have low bargaining power. Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Waldron Score to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Strong track record of project management
– Waldron Score is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
High brand equity
– Waldron Score has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Waldron Score to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Waldron Score 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Waldron Score is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers case study a diverse revenue stream that has helped it to survive disruptions such as global pandemic in Covid-19, financial disruption of 2008, and supply chain disruption of 2021.
Learning organization
- Waldron Score 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 Waldron Score is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Digital Transformation in Leadership & Managing People segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Waldron Score digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Waldron Score 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Waldron Score in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Waldron Score 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Waldron Score is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers 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.
Weaknesses Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers are -
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers, is just above the industry average. Waldron Score needs to redesign the compensation structure and incentives to increase the revenue per employees. Some of the steps that it can take are – hiring more specialists on project basis, etc.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers, in the dynamic environment Waldron Score has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Waldron Score has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Lack of clear differentiation of Waldron Score products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Waldron Score needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Waldron Score 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. Waldron Score 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, Waldron Score 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.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Waldron Score has borrowed money from the capital market at higher rates. It needs to restructure the interest payment and costs so that it can compete better and improve profitability.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Waldron Score has not been able to do capital spending to the tune of the competition. This has resulted into fewer innovations and company facing stiff competition from both existing competitors and new entrants who are disrupting the industry using digital technology.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Waldron Score 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 - Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Waldron Score, firm in the HBR case study Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Waldron Score is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication mentioned in marketing section of case study Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers can help to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Waldron Score has created an environment where the organization is dominated by functional specialists rather than management generalist. This has resulted into product oriented approach rather than marketing oriented approach or consumers oriented approach.
Opportunities Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers | 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 Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers are -
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Waldron Score 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.
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. Waldron Score can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Waldron Score 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Waldron Score has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in the sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled, as illustrated in the Harvard case study Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Waldron Score to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Waldron Score can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Waldron Score operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Leadership & Managing People sector.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Waldron Score to conduct training and development for its employees across the world. This will result in not only reducing the cost of training but also help employees in different part of the world to integrate with the headquarter work culture, ethos, and standards.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Waldron Score 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Waldron Score to expand its talent hiring zone. According to McKinsey Global Institute, 20% of the high end workforce in fields such as finance, information technology, can continously work from remote local post Covid-19. This presents a really great opportunity for Waldron Score to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Waldron Score in the consumer business. Now Waldron Score can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Developing new processes and practices
– Waldron Score can develop new processes and procedures in Leadership & Managing People industry using technology such as automation using artificial intelligence, real time transportation and products tracking, 3D modeling for concept development and new products pilot testing etc.
Manufacturing automation
– Waldron Score can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Leadership & Managing People segment. It can use CAD and 3D printing to build a quick prototype and pilot testing products. It can leverage automation using machine learning and artificial intelligence to do faster production at lowers costs, and it can leverage the growth in satellite and tracking technologies to improve inventory management, transportation, and shipping.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Waldron Score is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Waldron Score can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers 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.
Threats Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers are -
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Waldron Score is facing in Leadership & Managing People sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Technology disruption because of hacks, piracy etc
– The colonial pipeline illustrated, how vulnerable modern organization are to international hackers, miscreants, and disruptors. The cyber security interruption, data leaks, etc can seriously jeopardize the future growth of the organization.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Waldron Score 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.
Increasing wage structure of Waldron Score
– 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 Waldron Score.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Waldron Score with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Leadership & Managing People field will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Waldron Score can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
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 Waldron Score in the Leadership & Managing People sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
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. Waldron Score 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.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Waldron Score has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Leadership & Managing People industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Waldron Score needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Leadership & Managing People sector. According to Mckinsey study top managers believe that the adoption of technology in operations, communications is 20-25 times faster than what they planned in the beginning of 2019.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Waldron Score 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.
Environmental challenges
– Waldron Score needs to have a robust strategy against the disruptions arising from climate change and energy requirements. EU has identified it as key priority area and spending 30% of its 880 billion Euros European post Covid-19 recovery funds on green technology. Waldron Score can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Leadership & Managing People industry.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Waldron Score 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
– Waldron Score 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers 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 Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers 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 Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers 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 Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers 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 Rob Waldron at SCORE! Educational Centers 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 Waldron Score needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.