Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Organizational Development
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B)
Sealed Air Corp.'s CEO and COO are considering what approach they should take to building a seamless corporate culture worldwide. Anticipating continuing growth and expansion, especially outside the United States, they are concerned with preserving and promoting the culture that has been one of the company's key assets. However, their experiences in integrating acquired companies, especially outside the United States, have heightened their awareness of differences among the regional cultures of the world and the challenges they face in maintaining a unified corporate culture.
Swot Analysis of "Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B)" written by Lynn Sharp Paine, Karen H. Wruck includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Sealed Culture facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B) case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Cross-cultural management, Ethics, Growth strategy, Leadership, Organizational structure and Organizational Development.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B) casestudy better are - – technology disruption, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, increasing commodity prices, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings,
customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B)
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B) case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Sealed Culture, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Sealed Culture 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 Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B) can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B) case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Sealed Culture
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 Sealed Culture
Strengths Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Sealed Culture in Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B) Harvard Business Review case study are -
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Sealed Culture 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.
Innovation driven organization
– Sealed Culture is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B) Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B) 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Sealed Culture 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 Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B) HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Analytics focus
– Sealed Culture is putting a lot of focus on utilizing the power of analytics in business decision making. This has put it among the leading players in the industry. The technology infrastructure suggested by Lynn Sharp Paine, Karen H. Wruck can also help it to harness the power of analytics for – marketing optimization, demand forecasting, customer relationship management, inventory management, information sharing across the value chain etc.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Sealed Culture has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Sealed Culture 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.
Learning organization
- Sealed Culture 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 Sealed Culture is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B) Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Organizational Resilience of Sealed Culture
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Sealed Culture does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Sealed Culture in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Digital Transformation in Organizational Development segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Sealed Culture digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Sealed Culture 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Sealed Culture is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B) are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Strong track record of project management
– Sealed Culture 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 Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B) are -
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Sealed Culture 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Sealed Culture 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, Lynn Sharp Paine, Karen H. Wruck suggests that, Sealed Culture 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.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B), is just above the industry average. Sealed Culture 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.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Sealed Culture 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.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B), it seems that company is thinking about the frontier risks that can impact Organizational Development 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.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B), it seems that the employees of Sealed Culture don’t have comprehensive understanding of the firm’s strategy. This is reflected in number of promotional campaigns over the last few years that had mixed messaging and competing priorities. Some of the strategic activities and services promoted in the promotional campaigns were not consistent with the organization’s strategy.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B) 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 Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B) can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Sealed Culture is planning to shift buying processes online.
Need for greater diversity
– Sealed Culture 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 Sealed Culture products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Sealed Culture needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Sealed Culture 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 - Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B) should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Opportunities Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B) | 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 Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B) are -
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Sealed Culture 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.
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 Sealed Culture in the consumer business. Now Sealed Culture can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Manufacturing automation
– Sealed Culture can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Organizational Development 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Sealed Culture 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, Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B), to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Buying journey improvements
– Sealed Culture can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B) 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.
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 Sealed Culture 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Sealed Culture has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Sealed Culture to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B) case study. Sealed Culture can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Developing new processes and practices
– Sealed Culture 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Sealed Culture 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 Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B) - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Sealed Culture to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Sealed Culture to increase its market reach. Sealed Culture 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.
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. Sealed Culture 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. Sealed Culture 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.
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. Sealed Culture can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Sealed Culture can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Sealed Culture operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Organizational Development sector.
Threats Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B) External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B) are -
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Sealed Culture with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Sealed Culture 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.
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. Sealed Culture needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Organizational Development industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Sealed Culture 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.
Environmental challenges
– Sealed Culture 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. Sealed Culture can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Organizational Development industry.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B), Sealed Culture 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 .
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 Sealed Culture business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Increasing wage structure of Sealed Culture
– 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 Sealed Culture.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Sealed Culture 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.
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.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Sealed Culture can face downward pressure on margins from increasing competition from international players. The international players have stable revenue in their home market and can use those resources to penetrate prominent markets illustrated in HBR case study Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B) .
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Sealed Culture is facing in Organizational Development sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Sealed Culture 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B) 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 Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B) 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 Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B) 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 Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B) 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 Sealed Air Corp.: Globalization and Corporate Culture (B) 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 Sealed Culture needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
