Case Study Description of Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance
Mark Verbiest, Chairman of Transpower New Zealand, initiated a performance review of Transpower's board of directors. The review, which took four months to complete, provided board members with individualized feedback on their performance, as well as information on how the overall board functioned as a team. As Verbiest considered the feedback from this process he questioned, was Transpower's board operating at optimal performance levels? Was Transpower's new CEO receiving the support she needed to fulfill her responsibilities? And, in light of the evaluation's findings, what should the board's action plan be?
Authors :: Boris Groysberg, Paul M. Healy, Sarah L. Abbott
Swot Analysis of "Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance" written by Boris Groysberg, Paul M. Healy, Sarah L. Abbott includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Transpower's Transpower facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Boards, Decision making, Human resource management, Leadership and Organizational Development.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance casestudy better are - – increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, increasing transportation and logistics costs, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, wage bills are increasing,
banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, technology disruption, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Transpower's Transpower, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Transpower's Transpower 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 Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Transpower's Transpower
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 Transpower's Transpower
Strengths Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Transpower's Transpower in Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance Harvard Business Review case study are -
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Transpower's Transpower is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance 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.
Analytics focus
– Transpower's Transpower 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 Boris Groysberg, Paul M. Healy, Sarah L. Abbott 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.
Digital Transformation in Organizational Development segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Transpower's Transpower digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Transpower's Transpower 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.
High brand equity
– Transpower's Transpower has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Transpower's Transpower to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Transpower's Transpower in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Strong track record of project management
– Transpower's Transpower is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Transpower's Transpower in the sector have low bargaining power. Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Transpower's Transpower to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Transpower's Transpower has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Transpower's Transpower 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Organizational Development industry
– Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Transpower's Transpower to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Organizational Development industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Transpower's Transpower to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Learning organization
- Transpower's Transpower 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 Transpower's Transpower is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Organizational Resilience of Transpower's Transpower
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Transpower's Transpower does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Weaknesses Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance are -
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Transpower's Transpower 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.
Lack of clear differentiation of Transpower's Transpower products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Transpower's Transpower needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Transpower's Transpower 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.
Need for greater diversity
– Transpower's Transpower 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.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Transpower's Transpower 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance 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 Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Transpower's Transpower is planning to shift buying processes online.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Transpower's Transpower 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.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance, it seems that the employees of Transpower's Transpower 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.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance, 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.
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 Transpower's Transpower supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes mentioned in the HBR case study - Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance, it is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Transpower's Transpower vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance 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 Transpower's Transpower has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Opportunities Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance | 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 Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance are -
Loyalty marketing
– Transpower's Transpower 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.
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. Transpower's Transpower can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Transpower's Transpower 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, Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Transpower's Transpower 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 Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Transpower's Transpower to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Transpower's Transpower can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Transpower's Transpower 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.
Manufacturing automation
– Transpower's Transpower 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.
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. Transpower's Transpower can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Transpower's Transpower 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Transpower's Transpower has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Transpower's Transpower to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance case study. Transpower's Transpower can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Transpower's Transpower 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.
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 Transpower's Transpower 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.
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. Transpower's Transpower 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. Transpower's Transpower 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.
Threats Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance are -
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Transpower's Transpower is facing in Organizational Development sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Transpower's Transpower 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.
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 Transpower's Transpower business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Organizational Development field will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Transpower's Transpower can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
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. Transpower's Transpower needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Organizational Development industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Transpower's Transpower 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.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Transpower's Transpower 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 Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance .
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.
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. Transpower's Transpower 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.
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 Transpower's Transpower in the Organizational Development sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Regulatory challenges
– Transpower's Transpower 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 Organizational Development industry regulations.
Increasing wage structure of Transpower's Transpower
– 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 Transpower's Transpower.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance, Transpower's Transpower 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 Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance 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 Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance 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 Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance 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 Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance 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 Transpower New Zealand: Evaluating Board Performance 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 Transpower's Transpower needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
