Case Study Description of Evergreen Executive Education, LLC
This is a Darden case study.This case presents students with an opportunity to develop an action plan for an executive education client program needs analysis. Evergreen Executive Education LLC (EEEL) has just landed a large, new corporate client. The case presents some basic background information pertaining to the client company and their general program needs. Students are expected to create a learning needs analysis plan by merging that background information with their own focused thinking pertaining to how best to uncover and make actionable a corporate learning agenda. The plan should be robust and focused enough to ensure that the insights emerging from its execution will serve as the key inputs in developing a detailed program design. Students are not asked to develop a management education program design.
Swot Analysis of "Evergreen Executive Education, LLC" written by Mark E. Haskins includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Education Evergreen facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Evergreen Executive Education, LLC case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, and Strategy & Execution.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Evergreen Executive Education, LLC casestudy better are - – supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, increasing energy prices, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, geopolitical disruptions,
increasing transportation and logistics costs, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Evergreen Executive Education, LLC
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Evergreen Executive Education, LLC case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Education Evergreen, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Education Evergreen 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 Evergreen Executive Education, LLC can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Evergreen Executive Education, LLC case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Education Evergreen
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 Education Evergreen
Strengths Evergreen Executive Education, LLC | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Education Evergreen in Evergreen Executive Education, LLC Harvard Business Review case study are -
Organizational Resilience of Education Evergreen
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Education Evergreen does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Diverse revenue streams
– Education Evergreen is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Evergreen Executive Education, LLC 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.
Digital Transformation in Strategy & Execution segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Education Evergreen digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Education Evergreen has successfully integrated the four key components of digital transformation – digital integration in processes, digital integration in marketing and customer relationship management, digital integration into the value chain, and using technology to explore new products and market opportunities.
Training and development
– Education Evergreen has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Evergreen Executive Education, LLC 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.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Education Evergreen 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.
Strong track record of project management
– Education Evergreen is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Education Evergreen 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Education Evergreen in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
High brand equity
– Education Evergreen has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Education Evergreen to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Education Evergreen has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Education Evergreen 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Evergreen Executive Education, LLC 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Education Evergreen 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 Evergreen Executive Education, LLC HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Weaknesses Evergreen Executive Education, LLC | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Evergreen Executive Education, LLC are -
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Evergreen Executive Education, LLC HBR case study mentions - Education Evergreen takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the industry in last five years.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Education Evergreen 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Education Evergreen 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.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study Evergreen Executive Education, LLC, in the dynamic environment Education Evergreen has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Education Evergreen has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Evergreen Executive Education, LLC, it seems that the employees of Education Evergreen 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.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Education Evergreen has borrowed money from the capital market at higher rates. It needs to restructure the interest payment and costs so that it can compete better and improve profitability.
Need for greater diversity
– Education Evergreen 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 Evergreen Executive Education, LLC 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 Education Evergreen 's lucrative customers.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Evergreen Executive Education, LLC 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 Evergreen Executive Education, LLC can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Education Evergreen is planning to shift buying processes online.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Education Evergreen is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Strategy & Execution segment. Education Evergreen needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Education Evergreen to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
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 Education Evergreen supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes mentioned in the HBR case study - Evergreen Executive Education, LLC, it is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Education Evergreen vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Opportunities Evergreen Executive Education, LLC | 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 Evergreen Executive Education, LLC are -
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Education Evergreen 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Strategy & Execution industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Education Evergreen can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
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. Education Evergreen 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. Education Evergreen 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Education Evergreen 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 Education Evergreen to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Education Evergreen is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Evergreen Executive Education, LLC case study suggests that firm can utilize new technology to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Loyalty marketing
– Education Evergreen 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Education Evergreen 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 Education Evergreen can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
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 Education Evergreen in the consumer business. Now Education Evergreen can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Education Evergreen 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Education Evergreen 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 Evergreen Executive Education, LLC - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Education Evergreen to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
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 Education Evergreen 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Education Evergreen 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, Evergreen Executive Education, LLC, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Threats Evergreen Executive Education, LLC External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Evergreen Executive Education, LLC are -
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 Education Evergreen in the Strategy & Execution sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
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 Education Evergreen.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Education Evergreen with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
Regulatory challenges
– Education Evergreen 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 Strategy & Execution industry regulations.
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 Education Evergreen business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Environmental challenges
– Education Evergreen 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. Education Evergreen can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Strategy & Execution industry.
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.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Education Evergreen has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Strategy & Execution industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Education Evergreen 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 Education Evergreen is facing in Strategy & Execution sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Education Evergreen 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.
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. Education Evergreen can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
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. Education Evergreen 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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Education Evergreen 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Evergreen Executive Education, LLC 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 Evergreen Executive Education, LLC 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 Evergreen Executive Education, LLC 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 Evergreen Executive Education, LLC 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 Evergreen Executive Education, LLC 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 Education Evergreen needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.