This technical note proposes some useful strategies for improving spreadsheet design. It urges students to think of spreadsheets as communication tools whose sole purpose is to deliver a clear message to the reader. Thus, spreadsheets should not be seen simply as technical tools but as stories meant to engage the reader and, ultimately, drive a response. To this end, we gather inspiration from writers and journalists - story experts whose processes can be put to use in the creation of "story spreadsheets." We supply 12 principles of spreadsheet creation that are useful in maximizing effective communication of the message, and we urge readers to use these principles when designing their own story spreadsheets.
Swot Analysis of "Story Spreadsheets" written by Neil Bendle, Simon Bendle includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Spreadsheets Story facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Story Spreadsheets case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, and Sales & Marketing.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Story Spreadsheets casestudy better are - – cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, technology disruption, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, geopolitical disruptions, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings,
increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, increasing transportation and logistics costs, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Story Spreadsheets
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Story Spreadsheets case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Spreadsheets Story, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Spreadsheets Story 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 Story Spreadsheets can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Story Spreadsheets case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Spreadsheets Story
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Sales & Marketing field.
4. Making a Sales & Marketing topic specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Spreadsheets Story
Strengths Story Spreadsheets | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Spreadsheets Story in Story Spreadsheets Harvard Business Review case study are -
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Spreadsheets Story are driving operational speed, building greater agility, and keeping the organization nimble to compete with new competitors. It helps are organization to ideate new ideas, and execute them swiftly in the marketplace.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Spreadsheets Story 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Spreadsheets Story in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
High brand equity
– Spreadsheets Story has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Spreadsheets Story to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Strong track record of project management
– Spreadsheets Story is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Digital Transformation in Sales & Marketing segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Spreadsheets Story digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Spreadsheets Story 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.
Organizational Resilience of Spreadsheets Story
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Spreadsheets Story does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Spreadsheets Story 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 Story Spreadsheets HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Analytics focus
– Spreadsheets Story 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 Neil Bendle, Simon Bendle 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.
Innovation driven organization
– Spreadsheets Story is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Story Spreadsheets Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Spreadsheets Story is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Story Spreadsheets are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Spreadsheets Story in the sector have low bargaining power. Story Spreadsheets has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Spreadsheets Story to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Weaknesses Story Spreadsheets | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Story Spreadsheets are -
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Spreadsheets Story 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.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Neil Bendle, Simon Bendle suggests that, Spreadsheets Story 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.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Spreadsheets Story 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Spreadsheets Story 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.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Story Spreadsheets, it seems that company is thinking about the frontier risks that can impact Sales & Marketing 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.
Need for greater diversity
– Spreadsheets Story 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.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Spreadsheets Story 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 - Story Spreadsheets should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Spreadsheets Story, firm in the HBR case study Story Spreadsheets needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study Story Spreadsheets, is just above the industry average. Spreadsheets Story 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.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Spreadsheets Story 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.
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 Spreadsheets Story supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes mentioned in the HBR case study - Story Spreadsheets, it is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Spreadsheets Story vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Opportunities Story Spreadsheets | 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 Story Spreadsheets are -
Loyalty marketing
– Spreadsheets Story 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Spreadsheets Story 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 Story Spreadsheets - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Spreadsheets Story to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
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 Spreadsheets Story in the consumer business. Now Spreadsheets Story can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Spreadsheets Story 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Spreadsheets Story can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Story Spreadsheets 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Spreadsheets Story 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 Spreadsheets Story to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
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. Spreadsheets Story can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Manufacturing automation
– Spreadsheets Story can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Sales & Marketing 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– Spreadsheets Story can develop new processes and procedures in Sales & Marketing 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Spreadsheets Story to increase its market reach. Spreadsheets Story 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 Sales & Marketing industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Spreadsheets Story 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. Spreadsheets Story 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Spreadsheets Story can still utilize the low interest rates to borrow money for capital investment. Secondly it can also use the increase of government spending in infrastructure projects to get new business.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Spreadsheets Story can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Threats Story Spreadsheets External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Story Spreadsheets are -
Increasing wage structure of Spreadsheets Story
– 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 Spreadsheets Story.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Story Spreadsheets, Spreadsheets Story may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Sales & Marketing .
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. Spreadsheets Story needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Sales & Marketing industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
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 Spreadsheets Story in the Sales & Marketing sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Environmental challenges
– Spreadsheets Story 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. Spreadsheets Story can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Sales & Marketing industry.
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 Spreadsheets Story business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Spreadsheets Story with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Spreadsheets Story has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Sales & Marketing industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Spreadsheets Story needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Sales & Marketing 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.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Spreadsheets Story high dependence on third party suppliers can disrupt its processes and delivery mechanism. For example -the current troubles of car makers because of chip shortage is because the chip companies started producing chips for electronic companies rather than car manufacturers.
Aging population
– As the populations of most advanced economies are aging, it will lead to high social security costs, higher savings among population, and lower demand for goods and services in the economy. The household savings in US, France, UK, Germany, and Japan are growing faster than predicted because of uncertainty caused by pandemic.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Sales & Marketing field will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Spreadsheets Story can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Spreadsheets Story 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.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Spreadsheets Story in the Sales & Marketing industry. The Sales & Marketing 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 Story Spreadsheets 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 Story Spreadsheets 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 Story Spreadsheets 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 Story Spreadsheets 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 Story Spreadsheets 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 Spreadsheets Story needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
