Case Study Description of Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged)
Becton Dickinson's Vacutainer business was largely based in the United States, but in 1980 management determined to grow the business aggressively first in Europe and then Japan. These areas demanded new products that were tailored to local markets. Despite the change in strategy, the resource allocation process continued to allocate development resources to U.S.-targeted products.
Swot Analysis of "Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged)" written by Clayton M. Christensen includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Becton Vacutainer facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged) case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Growth strategy, International business, Product development, Strategic planning, Strategy execution and Strategy & Execution.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged) casestudy better are - – supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , geopolitical disruptions, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings,
increasing commodity prices, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged)
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged) case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Becton Vacutainer, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Becton Vacutainer 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 Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged) can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged) case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Becton Vacutainer
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 Becton Vacutainer
Strengths Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Becton Vacutainer in Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged) Harvard Business Review case study are -
Training and development
– Becton Vacutainer has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged) 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.
Innovation driven organization
– Becton Vacutainer is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged) Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Becton Vacutainer 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 Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged) - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Learning organization
- Becton Vacutainer 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 Becton Vacutainer is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged) Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Ability to lead change in Strategy & Execution field
– Becton Vacutainer 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 Becton Vacutainer in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Becton Vacutainer in the sector have low bargaining power. Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged) has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Becton Vacutainer to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Analytics focus
– Becton Vacutainer 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 Clayton M. Christensen 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.
High brand equity
– Becton Vacutainer has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Becton Vacutainer to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Diverse revenue streams
– Becton Vacutainer is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged) 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 recruit top talent
– Becton Vacutainer is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged) are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Becton Vacutainer in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Strategy & Execution industry
– Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged) firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Becton Vacutainer to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Strategy & Execution industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Becton Vacutainer to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Weaknesses Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged) are -
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Becton Vacutainer, firm in the HBR case study Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged) needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged) 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 Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged) can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Becton Vacutainer is planning to shift buying processes online.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged), 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.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Becton Vacutainer has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the industry over the last five years. Becton Vacutainer even though has strong showing on digital transformation primary two stages, it has struggled to capitalize the power of digital transformation in marketing efforts and new venture efforts.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged), in the dynamic environment Becton Vacutainer has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Becton Vacutainer has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Becton Vacutainer 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.
Lack of clear differentiation of Becton Vacutainer products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Becton Vacutainer needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged), it seems that the employees of Becton Vacutainer 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 cash cycle compare to competitors
Becton Vacutainer 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Becton Vacutainer 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.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Clayton M. Christensen suggests that, Becton Vacutainer 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.
Opportunities Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged) | 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 Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged) are -
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. Becton Vacutainer 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. Becton Vacutainer 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.
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. Becton Vacutainer can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Becton Vacutainer 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Becton Vacutainer 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Becton Vacutainer 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 Becton Vacutainer to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Becton Vacutainer 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Becton Vacutainer 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.
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 Becton Vacutainer 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.
Manufacturing automation
– Becton Vacutainer 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Becton Vacutainer 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, Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged), to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Becton Vacutainer is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged) 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Becton Vacutainer 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Becton Vacutainer 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 Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged) - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Becton Vacutainer to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Threats Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged) External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged) are -
Regulatory challenges
– Becton Vacutainer 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.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Becton Vacutainer has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Strategy & Execution industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Becton Vacutainer 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.
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. Becton Vacutainer needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Strategy & Execution industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Increasing wage structure of Becton Vacutainer
– 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 Becton Vacutainer.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Becton Vacutainer 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.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Becton Vacutainer 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 Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged) .
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 Becton Vacutainer.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Becton Vacutainer 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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Becton Vacutainer 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.
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.
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. Becton Vacutainer 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.
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. Becton Vacutainer can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged), Becton Vacutainer 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 .
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged) 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 Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged) 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 Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged) 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 Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged) 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 Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team (Abridged) 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 Becton Vacutainer needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.