In late January 2011, the assistant deputy minister of Environment Canada is contemplating the final report of the joint review panel conducting the environmental assessment of Total E&P Canada's $10 billion oil sands project, the Joslyn Mine near Fort McMurray, Alberta. Although the report advised that the project would be in the public interest only if - and it was a big if - adverse effects on species at risk were fully mitigated, she was aware that both the company and provincial officials did not agree with the need for further wildlife protection measures. Further, behind the scenes, the industry lobby group, the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers, opposed any offsite protection of habitat that might be seen as a precedent for future projects. The federal government's priority was jobs, and the assistant deputy minister would soon be under pressure to advise the minister on whether to authorize the project to proceed. Without a mechanism to ensure that threatened wildlife would be protected, she could not recommend approval. She needed to find a solution that would work both for the environment and the project.
Swot Analysis of "Environment Canada" written by Paul Boothe includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Minister Wildlife facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Environment Canada case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Government and Strategy & Execution.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Environment Canada casestudy better are - – cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, increasing commodity prices, wage bills are increasing, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, technology disruption, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation,
banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, increasing transportation and logistics costs, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Environment Canada
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Environment Canada case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Minister Wildlife, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Minister Wildlife 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 Environment Canada can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Environment Canada case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Minister Wildlife
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 Minister Wildlife
Strengths Environment Canada | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Minister Wildlife in Environment Canada Harvard Business Review case study are -
Digital Transformation in Strategy & Execution segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Minister Wildlife digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Minister Wildlife 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.
Strong track record of project management
– Minister Wildlife is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Ability to lead change in Strategy & Execution field
– Minister Wildlife 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 Minister Wildlife in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Environment Canada 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.
Training and development
– Minister Wildlife has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Environment Canada 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 Minister Wildlife are driving operational speed, building greater agility, and keeping the organization nimble to compete with new competitors. It helps are organization to ideate new ideas, and execute them swiftly in the marketplace.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Minister Wildlife 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Minister Wildlife is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Environment Canada 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.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Minister Wildlife 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 Environment Canada - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Minister Wildlife in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Minister Wildlife in the sector have low bargaining power. Environment Canada has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Minister Wildlife to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Learning organization
- Minister Wildlife 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 Minister Wildlife is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Environment Canada Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Weaknesses Environment Canada | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Environment Canada are -
Lack of clear differentiation of Minister Wildlife products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Minister Wildlife needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Environment Canada 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 Environment Canada can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Minister Wildlife is planning to shift buying processes online.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Minister Wildlife 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.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Minister Wildlife 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.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study Environment Canada, in the dynamic environment Minister Wildlife has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Minister Wildlife has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Environment Canada 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 Minister Wildlife has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Minister Wildlife 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.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Environment Canada, it seems that the employees of Minister Wildlife 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.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Paul Boothe suggests that, Minister Wildlife 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Minister Wildlife, firm in the HBR case study Environment Canada needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Minister Wildlife 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.
Opportunities Environment Canada | 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 Environment Canada are -
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Minister Wildlife 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Minister Wildlife 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, Minister Wildlife 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, Environment Canada, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Minister Wildlife has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Minister Wildlife to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Environment Canada case study. Minister Wildlife can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
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. Minister Wildlife 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. Minister Wildlife 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.
Manufacturing automation
– Minister Wildlife can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Strategy & Execution 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Minister Wildlife is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Environment Canada 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 Minister Wildlife to increase its market reach. Minister Wildlife 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– Minister Wildlife 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.
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. Minister Wildlife can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Minister Wildlife 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.
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 Minister Wildlife in the consumer business. Now Minister Wildlife can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Loyalty marketing
– Minister Wildlife 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.
Threats Environment Canada External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Environment Canada are -
Consumer confidence and its impact on Minister Wildlife 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.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Minister Wildlife 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 Environment Canada .
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Minister Wildlife with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
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.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Minister Wildlife 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 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. Minister Wildlife needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Strategy & Execution industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
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.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Minister Wildlife 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.
Environmental challenges
– Minister Wildlife 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. Minister Wildlife can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Strategy & Execution industry.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Minister Wildlife has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Strategy & Execution industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Minister Wildlife 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.
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. Minister Wildlife can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Increasing wage structure of Minister Wildlife
– 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 Minister Wildlife.
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 Minister Wildlife in the Strategy & Execution sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Environment Canada 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 Environment Canada 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 Environment Canada 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 Environment Canada 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 Environment Canada 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 Minister Wildlife needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
