Swot Analysis of "Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987" written by V. Kasturi Rangan includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Baldwin Ingersoll facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987 case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Product development, Sales and Sales & Marketing.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987 casestudy better are - – increasing commodity prices, wage bills are increasing, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, there is backlash against globalization,
competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, increasing transportation and logistics costs, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987 case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Baldwin Ingersoll, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Baldwin Ingersoll 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 Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987 can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987 case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Baldwin Ingersoll
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 Baldwin Ingersoll
Strengths Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987 | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Baldwin Ingersoll in Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987 Harvard Business Review case study are -
Training and development
– Baldwin Ingersoll has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987 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.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Baldwin Ingersoll has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Baldwin Ingersoll 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
– Baldwin Ingersoll 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 Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987 HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
High brand equity
– Baldwin Ingersoll has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Baldwin Ingersoll to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Baldwin Ingersoll is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987 are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Sales & Marketing industry
– Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987 firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Baldwin Ingersoll to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Sales & Marketing industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Baldwin Ingersoll to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Baldwin Ingersoll 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.
Innovation driven organization
– Baldwin Ingersoll is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987 Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Learning organization
- Baldwin Ingersoll 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 Baldwin Ingersoll is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987 Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Diverse revenue streams
– Baldwin Ingersoll is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987 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.
Ability to lead change in Sales & Marketing field
– Baldwin Ingersoll 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 Baldwin Ingersoll in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Baldwin Ingersoll 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 Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987 - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Weaknesses Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987 | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987 are -
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987, it seems that the employees of Baldwin Ingersoll 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.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987, is just above the industry average. Baldwin Ingersoll 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.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987, 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.
Lack of clear differentiation of Baldwin Ingersoll products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Baldwin Ingersoll needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Baldwin Ingersoll is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Sales & Marketing segment. Baldwin Ingersoll needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Baldwin Ingersoll to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987 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 Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987 can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Baldwin Ingersoll is planning to shift buying processes online.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987 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 Baldwin Ingersoll has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Baldwin Ingersoll 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Baldwin Ingersoll, firm in the HBR case study Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987 needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Baldwin Ingersoll 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 - Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987 should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Need for greater diversity
– Baldwin Ingersoll 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 Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987 | 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 Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987 are -
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Baldwin Ingersoll 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 Sales & Marketing segment.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Baldwin Ingersoll 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Baldwin Ingersoll can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Baldwin Ingersoll 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 Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987 - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Baldwin Ingersoll to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Baldwin Ingersoll can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Baldwin Ingersoll 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Baldwin Ingersoll 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.
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. Baldwin Ingersoll can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Baldwin Ingersoll can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Baldwin Ingersoll operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Sales & Marketing sector.
Developing new processes and practices
– Baldwin Ingersoll 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.
Manufacturing automation
– Baldwin Ingersoll 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Sales & Marketing industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Baldwin Ingersoll can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Baldwin Ingersoll 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.
Threats Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987 External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987 are -
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. Baldwin Ingersoll can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
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 Baldwin Ingersoll in the Sales & Marketing sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
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. Baldwin Ingersoll 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.
Increasing wage structure of Baldwin Ingersoll
– 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 Baldwin Ingersoll.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Baldwin Ingersoll 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 Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987 .
Regulatory challenges
– Baldwin Ingersoll 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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Baldwin Ingersoll 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.
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 Baldwin Ingersoll.
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. Baldwin Ingersoll needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Sales & Marketing industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Environmental challenges
– Baldwin Ingersoll 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. Baldwin Ingersoll can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Sales & Marketing industry.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Baldwin Ingersoll 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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Baldwin Ingersoll is facing in Sales & Marketing sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987 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 Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987 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 Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987 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 Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987 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 Ingersoll-Rand (C): Managing Multiple Channels--1987 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 Baldwin Ingersoll needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.