Case Study Description of The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (B)
This is a Darden case study.After the successful implementation of Lean manufacturing concepts at U.S. Navy Aircraft Intermediate Maintenance Depot (AIMD) Lemoore, particularly with regard to the maintenance processes for the F404 engine on the F/A-18 Hornet, these concepts have became the standard by which production across all AIMDs are measured. Now assigned to NAVAIR, the person responsible for these changes is eager to apply the lessons of AIMD Lemoore across the entire NAVAIR Enterprise.
Authors :: Thomas Cross, E. Richard Brownlee II, Robert Osterhoudt, Jeff Pottinger
Swot Analysis of "The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (B)" written by Thomas Cross, E. Richard Brownlee II, Robert Osterhoudt, Jeff Pottinger includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Navair Aimd facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (B) case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Corporate governance, Costs, Operations management and Organizational Development.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (B) casestudy better are - – increasing household debt because of falling income levels, wage bills are increasing, there is backlash against globalization, increasing transportation and logistics costs, geopolitical disruptions, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies,
increasing energy prices, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (B)
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (B) case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Navair Aimd, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Navair Aimd 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 The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (B) can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (B) case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Navair Aimd
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 Navair Aimd
Strengths The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (B) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Navair Aimd in The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (B) Harvard Business Review case study are -
Highly skilled collaborators
– Navair Aimd 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 The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (B) HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Organizational Resilience of Navair Aimd
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Navair Aimd does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Navair Aimd is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Navair Aimd is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (B) 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.
High brand equity
– Navair Aimd has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Navair Aimd to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Digital Transformation in Organizational Development segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Navair Aimd digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Navair Aimd 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.
Training and development
– Navair Aimd has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (B) 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.
Strong track record of project management
– Navair Aimd is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Learning organization
- Navair Aimd 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 Navair Aimd is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (B) Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Navair Aimd has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Navair Aimd 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.
Analytics focus
– Navair Aimd 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 Thomas Cross, E. Richard Brownlee II, Robert Osterhoudt, Jeff Pottinger 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.
Ability to lead change in Organizational Development field
– Navair Aimd 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 Navair Aimd in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Weaknesses The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (B) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (B) are -
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Navair Aimd 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.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Navair Aimd 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 The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (B), it seems that the employees of Navair Aimd 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Navair Aimd 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (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 The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (B) can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Navair Aimd is planning to shift buying processes online.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Navair Aimd is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication mentioned in marketing section of case study The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (B) can help to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Thomas Cross, E. Richard Brownlee II, Robert Osterhoudt, Jeff Pottinger suggests that, Navair Aimd 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.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (B) HBR case study mentions - Navair Aimd takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the industry in last five years.
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 Navair Aimd supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes mentioned in the HBR case study - The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (B), it is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Navair Aimd vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Navair Aimd, firm in the HBR case study The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (B) needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (B) 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 Navair Aimd has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Opportunities The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (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 The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (B) are -
Leveraging digital technologies
– Navair Aimd 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.
Manufacturing automation
– Navair Aimd 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, Navair Aimd 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, The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Navair Aimd is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (B) 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Navair Aimd 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Navair Aimd can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Navair Aimd can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Navair Aimd operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Organizational Development sector.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Navair Aimd to conduct training and development for its employees across the world. This will result in not only reducing the cost of training but also help employees in different part of the world to integrate with the headquarter work culture, ethos, and standards.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Navair Aimd 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Navair Aimd 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Navair Aimd 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 The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (B) - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Navair Aimd 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 Navair Aimd to increase its market reach. Navair Aimd 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Navair Aimd 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 Navair Aimd to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Threats The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (B) External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (B) are -
Environmental challenges
– Navair Aimd 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. Navair Aimd can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Organizational Development industry.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Navair Aimd 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.
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 Navair Aimd in the Organizational Development sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Navair Aimd 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 The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (B) .
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 Navair Aimd business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Technology disruption because of hacks, piracy etc
– The colonial pipeline illustrated, how vulnerable modern organization are to international hackers, miscreants, and disruptors. The cyber security interruption, data leaks, etc can seriously jeopardize the future growth of the organization.
Increasing wage structure of Navair Aimd
– 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 Navair Aimd.
Capital market disruption
– During the Covid-19, Dow Jones has touched record high. The valuations of a number of companies are way beyond their existing business model potential. This can lead to capital market correction which can put a number of suppliers, collaborators, value chain partners in great financial difficulty. It will directly impact the business of Navair Aimd.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (B), Navair Aimd 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 .
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Navair Aimd is facing in Organizational Development sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
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.
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. Navair Aimd can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Navair Aimd with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (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 The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (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 The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (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 The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (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 The F/A-18 F404 Engine: Getting Lean (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 Navair Aimd needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
