Swot Analysis of "Harold Morton and the Rivendell Board (B)" written by F. Warren McFarlan, Ingrid Vargas includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Rivendell Trustee facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Harold Morton and the Rivendell Board (B) case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, and Strategy & Execution.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Harold Morton and the Rivendell Board (B) casestudy better are - – digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, increasing transportation and logistics costs, wage bills are increasing,
central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Harold Morton and the Rivendell Board (B)
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Harold Morton and the Rivendell Board (B) case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Rivendell Trustee, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Rivendell Trustee 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 Harold Morton and the Rivendell Board (B) can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Harold Morton and the Rivendell Board (B) case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Rivendell Trustee
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Strategy & Execution field.
4. Making a Strategy & Execution topic specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Rivendell Trustee
Strengths Harold Morton and the Rivendell Board (B) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Rivendell Trustee in Harold Morton and the Rivendell Board (B) Harvard Business Review case study are -
Analytics focus
– Rivendell Trustee 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 F. Warren McFarlan, Ingrid Vargas 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 recruit top talent
– Rivendell Trustee is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Harold Morton and the Rivendell Board (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.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Rivendell Trustee has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Rivendell Trustee 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.
Digital Transformation in Strategy & Execution segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Rivendell Trustee digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Rivendell Trustee 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.
High brand equity
– Rivendell Trustee has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Rivendell Trustee to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Rivendell Trustee 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.
Ability to lead change in Strategy & Execution field
– Rivendell Trustee 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 Rivendell Trustee in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Organizational Resilience of Rivendell Trustee
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Rivendell Trustee does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Rivendell Trustee 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 Harold Morton and the Rivendell Board (B) HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Strong track record of project management
– Rivendell Trustee is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Rivendell Trustee 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Harold Morton and the Rivendell Board (B) Harvard Business Review case study comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the industry, building diversified operations across different geographies so that disruption in one part of the world doesn’t impact the overall performance of the firm, and integrating the various business operations and processes through its digital transformation drive.
Weaknesses Harold Morton and the Rivendell Board (B) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Harold Morton and the Rivendell Board (B) are -
Need for greater diversity
– Rivendell Trustee 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.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study Harold Morton and the Rivendell Board (B) has high operating costs in the. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Rivendell Trustee 's lucrative customers.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Rivendell Trustee is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Strategy & Execution segment. Rivendell Trustee needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Rivendell Trustee to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Harold Morton and the Rivendell Board (B), it seems that company is thinking about the frontier risks that can impact Strategy & Execution 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Rivendell Trustee 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.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study Harold Morton and the Rivendell Board (B), is just above the industry average. Rivendell Trustee 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 bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, F. Warren McFarlan, Ingrid Vargas suggests that, Rivendell Trustee 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Rivendell Trustee 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.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Rivendell Trustee 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 - Harold Morton and the Rivendell Board (B) should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Harold Morton and the Rivendell Board (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 Harold Morton and the Rivendell Board (B) can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Rivendell Trustee is planning to shift buying processes online.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Rivendell Trustee 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.
Opportunities Harold Morton and the Rivendell Board (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 Harold Morton and the Rivendell Board (B) are -
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Rivendell Trustee 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, Rivendell Trustee 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.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– Consumer behavior has changed in the Strategy & Execution industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Rivendell Trustee 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. Rivendell Trustee 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Rivendell Trustee 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Rivendell Trustee in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Strategy & Execution segment, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Rivendell Trustee 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, Harold Morton and the Rivendell Board (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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Rivendell Trustee 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 Rivendell Trustee to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Rivendell Trustee 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 Harold Morton and the Rivendell Board (B) - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Rivendell Trustee to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Buying journey improvements
– Rivendell Trustee can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Harold Morton and the Rivendell Board (B) 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– Rivendell Trustee can develop new processes and procedures in Strategy & Execution 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Rivendell Trustee is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Harold Morton and the Rivendell Board (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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Rivendell Trustee to increase its market reach. Rivendell Trustee 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Rivendell Trustee 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 Strategy & Execution segment.
Threats Harold Morton and the Rivendell Board (B) External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Harold Morton and the Rivendell Board (B) are -
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Strategy & Execution field will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Rivendell Trustee can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Environmental challenges
– Rivendell Trustee 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. Rivendell Trustee can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Strategy & Execution industry.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Rivendell Trustee 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.
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.
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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Rivendell Trustee with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Rivendell Trustee in the Strategy & Execution industry. The Strategy & Execution 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.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Rivendell Trustee 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.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Harold Morton and the Rivendell Board (B), Rivendell Trustee may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Strategy & Execution .
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. Rivendell Trustee needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Strategy & Execution industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Rivendell Trustee has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Strategy & Execution industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Rivendell Trustee needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Strategy & Execution 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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Rivendell Trustee is facing in Strategy & Execution sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Increasing wage structure of Rivendell Trustee
– 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 Rivendell Trustee.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Harold Morton and the Rivendell Board (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 Harold Morton and the Rivendell Board (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 Harold Morton and the Rivendell Board (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 Harold Morton and the Rivendell Board (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 Harold Morton and the Rivendell Board (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 Rivendell Trustee needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.