Chronicles how the birth of Sheryle Bolton's second son with a life-threatening illness made Bolton reconsider her professional ambitions. Her son's misfortune had grounded Bolton in the belief that whatever she did professionally had to serve society. As a result, Bolton quit her successful career as an investment banker. Several years later, Bolton and her husband discussed her career options: She had just received an offer from a venture capital fund for an $8 million investment in a business plan that targeted consumer health information services. She had also been offered the CEO position at a start-up that was developing a product that helped turn poor young readers into good ones.
Authors :: Kathryn Shaw, Carly Irestone, Angela Shelton, Alexander Tauber
Swot Analysis of "Sheryle Bolton" written by Kathryn Shaw, Carly Irestone, Angela Shelton, Alexander Tauber includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Bolton Sheryle facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Sheryle Bolton case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Entrepreneurship, Gender, Psychology, Social responsibility, Work-life balance and Organizational Development.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Sheryle Bolton casestudy better are - – cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, increasing commodity prices, increasing transportation and logistics costs, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies,
customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Sheryle Bolton case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Bolton Sheryle, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Bolton Sheryle 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 Sheryle Bolton can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Sheryle Bolton case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Bolton Sheryle
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Organizational Development field.
4. Making a Organizational Development topic specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Bolton Sheryle
Strengths Sheryle Bolton | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Bolton Sheryle in Sheryle Bolton Harvard Business Review case study are -
Successful track record of launching new products
– Bolton Sheryle has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Bolton Sheryle 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.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Bolton Sheryle 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.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Bolton Sheryle 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.
Digital Transformation in Organizational Development segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Bolton Sheryle digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Bolton Sheryle 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.
Innovation driven organization
– Bolton Sheryle is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Sheryle Bolton Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Bolton Sheryle in the sector have low bargaining power. Sheryle Bolton has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Bolton Sheryle to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Training and development
– Bolton Sheryle has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Sheryle Bolton Harvard Business Review case study by analyzing – employees retention, in-house promotion, loyalty, new venture initiation, lack of conflict, and high level of both employees and customer engagement.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Organizational Development industry
– Sheryle Bolton firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Bolton Sheryle to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Organizational Development industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Bolton Sheryle to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Learning organization
- Bolton Sheryle 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 Bolton Sheryle is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Sheryle Bolton Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Bolton Sheryle has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in, as mentioned in case study Sheryle Bolton - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Ability to lead change in Organizational Development field
– Bolton Sheryle 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 Bolton Sheryle in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Organizational Resilience of Bolton Sheryle
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Bolton Sheryle does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Weaknesses Sheryle Bolton | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Sheryle Bolton are -
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Bolton Sheryle is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Organizational Development segment. Bolton Sheryle needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Bolton Sheryle to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Bolton Sheryle has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Bolton Sheryle 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 - Sheryle Bolton 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 Sheryle Bolton 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 Bolton Sheryle 's lucrative customers.
High dependence on existing supply chain
– The disruption in the global supply chains because of the Covid-19 pandemic and blockage of the Suez Canal illustrated the fragile nature of Bolton Sheryle supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes mentioned in the HBR case study - Sheryle Bolton, it is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Bolton Sheryle vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Bolton Sheryle 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.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Bolton Sheryle 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. Bolton Sheryle 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Bolton Sheryle, firm in the HBR case study Sheryle Bolton needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Bolton Sheryle 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.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Kathryn Shaw, Carly Irestone, Angela Shelton, Alexander Tauber suggests that, Bolton Sheryle 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Sheryle Bolton that the firm needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department in the case Sheryle Bolton can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Bolton Sheryle is planning to shift buying processes online.
Opportunities Sheryle Bolton | 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 Sheryle Bolton are -
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Bolton Sheryle 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Bolton Sheryle 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Bolton Sheryle 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 Bolton Sheryle to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Developing new processes and practices
– Bolton Sheryle can develop new processes and procedures in Organizational Development 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Organizational Development industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Bolton Sheryle can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– Consumer behavior has changed in the Organizational Development industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Bolton Sheryle 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. Bolton Sheryle 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Bolton Sheryle 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Bolton Sheryle in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Organizational Development segment, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
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. Bolton Sheryle can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
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 Bolton Sheryle 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Bolton Sheryle is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Sheryle Bolton 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Bolton Sheryle 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, Sheryle Bolton, 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 Bolton Sheryle 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 Organizational Development segment.
Threats Sheryle Bolton External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Sheryle Bolton are -
Increasing wage structure of Bolton Sheryle
– 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 Bolton Sheryle.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Bolton Sheryle is facing in Organizational Development sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Environmental challenges
– Bolton Sheryle 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. Bolton Sheryle can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Organizational Development industry.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Bolton Sheryle in the Organizational Development industry. The Organizational Development 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.
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 Bolton Sheryle business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
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. Bolton Sheryle 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
– Bolton Sheryle has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Organizational Development industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Bolton Sheryle needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Organizational Development 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
– Bolton Sheryle 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.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Bolton Sheryle 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.
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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Bolton Sheryle with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
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 Bolton Sheryle in the Organizational Development sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Sheryle Bolton, Bolton Sheryle may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Organizational Development .
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Sheryle Bolton 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 Sheryle Bolton 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 Sheryle Bolton 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 Sheryle Bolton 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 Sheryle Bolton 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 Bolton Sheryle needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.