Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Organizational Development
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services
Dave Walker, vice-president of business service opportunities and chairman of the governance team at Procter & Gamble, must decide what to do with P&G's 5,700 employee Global Business Services (GBS) group. GBS brought together internal services such as finance, accounting, employee services, customer logistics, purchasing, and information technology into a single, global organization supporting all P&G business units. Recently, P&G CEO A.G. Lafley questioned whether continued investment in GBS represented the best use of P&G's resources. Walker and the other members of the governance team must decide whether to spin off GBS, outsource GBS services to an outside company, outsource the GBS divisions separately to best-of-breed companies, or keep the group in-house. In making the decision, Walker and the members of the team must consider the impact on the organization of altering the existing relationships between the members of GBS and the other employees at P&G. Teaching Purpose: To consider the issues inherent in any decision to outsource services and the impact of such a change on the company.
Authors :: Thomas J. DeLong, David L. Ager, Warren Brackin, Alex Cabanas
Swot Analysis of "Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services" written by Thomas J. DeLong, David L. Ager, Warren Brackin, Alex Cabanas includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Gbs Walker facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Decision making, Human resource management, Operations management, Organizational culture, Organizational structure and Organizational Development.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services casestudy better are - – increasing energy prices, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, wage bills are increasing, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, technology disruption, increasing transportation and logistics costs, geopolitical disruptions,
customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Gbs Walker, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Gbs Walker 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 Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Gbs Walker
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 Gbs Walker
Strengths Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Gbs Walker in Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services Harvard Business Review case study are -
High brand equity
– Gbs Walker has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Gbs Walker to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Innovation driven organization
– Gbs Walker is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Training and development
– Gbs Walker has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Gbs Walker is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Ability to lead change in Organizational Development field
– Gbs Walker 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 Gbs Walker in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Organizational Development industry
– Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Gbs Walker to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Organizational Development industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Gbs Walker to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Gbs Walker 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 Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Gbs Walker 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
– Gbs Walker is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services 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.
Strong track record of project management
– Gbs Walker is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Gbs Walker in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Weaknesses Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services are -
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Thomas J. DeLong, David L. Ager, Warren Brackin, Alex Cabanas suggests that, Gbs Walker 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Gbs Walker is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Organizational Development segment. Gbs Walker needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Gbs Walker to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
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 Gbs Walker supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes mentioned in the HBR case study - Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services, it is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Gbs Walker vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services 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 Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Gbs Walker is planning to shift buying processes online.
Lack of clear differentiation of Gbs Walker products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Gbs Walker 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, Gbs Walker 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. Gbs Walker 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.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services 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 Gbs Walker has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Gbs Walker 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 - Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Gbs Walker 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Gbs Walker, firm in the HBR case study Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services 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, Gbs Walker is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication mentioned in marketing section of case study Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services can help to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Opportunities Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services | 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 Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services are -
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Gbs Walker is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Gbs Walker has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Gbs Walker to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services case study. Gbs Walker can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
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. Gbs Walker 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. Gbs Walker 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.
Manufacturing automation
– Gbs Walker 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Gbs Walker 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 Gbs Walker to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Loyalty marketing
– Gbs Walker has focused on building a highly responsive customer relationship management platform. This platform is built on in-house data and driven by analytics and artificial intelligence. The customer analytics can help the organization to fine tune its loyalty marketing efforts, increase the wallet share of the organization, reduce wastage on mainstream advertising spending, build better pricing strategies using personalization, etc.
Buying journey improvements
– Gbs Walker can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services suggest that firm can provide automated chats to help consumers solve their own problems, provide online suggestions to get maximum out of the products and services, and help consumers to build a community where they can interact with each other to develop new features and uses.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Gbs Walker 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Gbs Walker 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, Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Gbs Walker 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.
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. Gbs Walker can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
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. Gbs Walker can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Gbs Walker to increase its market reach. Gbs Walker 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.
Threats Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services are -
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Gbs Walker 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.
Increasing wage structure of Gbs Walker
– 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 Gbs Walker.
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. Gbs Walker needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Organizational Development industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services, Gbs Walker 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 .
Environmental challenges
– Gbs Walker 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. Gbs Walker can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Organizational Development industry.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Gbs Walker 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 Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services .
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 Gbs Walker in the Organizational Development sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
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 Gbs Walker business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Regulatory challenges
– Gbs Walker 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.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Gbs Walker has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Organizational Development industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Gbs Walker 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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Gbs Walker with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
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 Gbs Walker 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services 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 Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services 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 Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services 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 Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services 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 Procter & Gamble: Global Business Services 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 Gbs Walker needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
