Case Study Description of Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C)
Focuses on the development of a "market driven" culture at Hewlett-Packard (HP); the conflict between autonomous, well integrated divisions making products responsive to their own markets and a greater degree of systems integration at the corporate level; and the integration of the sales, marketing, and research and development functions.
Swot Analysis of "Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C)" written by Benson P. Shapiro, Lawrence B. Levine includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Packard Hewlett facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C) case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Organizational culture, Product development and Sales & Marketing.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C) casestudy better are - – wage bills are increasing, there is backlash against globalization, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, increasing transportation and logistics costs,
technology disruption, geopolitical disruptions, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C)
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C) case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Packard Hewlett, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Packard Hewlett 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 Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C) can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C) case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Packard Hewlett
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 Packard Hewlett
Strengths Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Packard Hewlett in Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C) Harvard Business Review case study are -
Digital Transformation in Sales & Marketing segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Packard Hewlett digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Packard Hewlett 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 Packard Hewlett
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Packard Hewlett does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Packard Hewlett 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.
High brand equity
– Packard Hewlett has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Packard Hewlett to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Training and development
– Packard Hewlett has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C) 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.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Packard Hewlett 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Packard Hewlett in the sector have low bargaining power. Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C) has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Packard Hewlett to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Packard Hewlett has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Packard Hewlett 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Packard Hewlett 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 Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C) HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Packard Hewlett is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C) are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Packard Hewlett in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Diverse revenue streams
– Packard Hewlett is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C) 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.
Weaknesses Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C) are -
Products dominated business model
– Even though Packard Hewlett 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 - Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C) should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C), in the dynamic environment Packard Hewlett has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Packard Hewlett has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C) 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 Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C) can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Packard Hewlett is planning to shift buying processes online.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Benson P. Shapiro, Lawrence B. Levine suggests that, Packard Hewlett 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Packard Hewlett 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.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Packard Hewlett 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. Packard Hewlett 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 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 Packard Hewlett supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes mentioned in the HBR case study - Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C), it is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Packard Hewlett vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C), 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.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C) 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 Packard Hewlett has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Packard Hewlett 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.
Need for greater diversity
– Packard Hewlett 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.
Opportunities Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C) | 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 Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C) are -
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Packard Hewlett can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Packard Hewlett operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Sales & Marketing sector.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Packard Hewlett is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C) 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Packard Hewlett to increase its market reach. Packard Hewlett 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.
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 Packard Hewlett 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Packard Hewlett can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C) 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.
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 Packard Hewlett in the consumer business. Now Packard Hewlett can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Packard Hewlett in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Sales & Marketing segment, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Packard Hewlett 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 Packard Hewlett to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Packard Hewlett can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Packard Hewlett 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Packard Hewlett 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 Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C) - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Packard Hewlett to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Loyalty marketing
– Packard Hewlett 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.
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. Packard Hewlett 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. Packard Hewlett 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 Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C) External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C) are -
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Packard Hewlett has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Sales & Marketing industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Packard Hewlett 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.
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. Packard Hewlett can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Packard Hewlett 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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Packard Hewlett with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Packard Hewlett 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 Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C) .
Regulatory challenges
– Packard Hewlett 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 Sales & Marketing industry regulations.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C), Packard Hewlett 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 dependence on third party suppliers
– Packard Hewlett 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.
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 Packard Hewlett.
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.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Packard Hewlett 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 Packard Hewlett business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
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. Packard Hewlett 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C) 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 Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C) 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 Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C) 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 Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C) 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 Hewlett-Packard: Manufacturing Productivity Division (C) 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 Packard Hewlett needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.