Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Strategy & Execution
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Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies
Companies face much uncertainty about the competitive effects of the recently adopted Kyoto Protocol on global climate change and the current and future regulations that may emerge from it. Companies have considerable discretion to explore different market strategies to address global warming and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Examines these strategic options by reviewing the market-oriented actions that 136 large companies that are part of the Global 500 are currently taking. Companies use six different market strategies to address climate change, consisting of different combinations of the market components available to managers. Managers can choose between a greater emphasis on improvements in their business activities through innovation or employing compensatory approaches such as emissions trading. They can either act by themselves or work with other companies, NGOs, or (local) governments.
Swot Analysis of "Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies" written by Ans Kolk, Jonatan Pinkse includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Climate Emissions facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Regulation, Sustainability and Strategy & Execution.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies casestudy better are - – increasing commodity prices, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, geopolitical disruptions, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies,
there is backlash against globalization, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Climate Emissions, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Climate Emissions 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 Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Climate Emissions
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 Climate Emissions
Strengths Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Climate Emissions in Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies Harvard Business Review case study are -
Training and development
– Climate Emissions has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies 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 Climate Emissions 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.
Digital Transformation in Strategy & Execution segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Climate Emissions digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Climate Emissions 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.
Innovation driven organization
– Climate Emissions is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Ability to lead change in Strategy & Execution field
– Climate Emissions 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 Climate Emissions in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Learning organization
- Climate Emissions 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 Climate Emissions is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Climate Emissions 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 Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Analytics focus
– Climate Emissions 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 Ans Kolk, Jonatan Pinkse 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Climate Emissions in the sector have low bargaining power. Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Climate Emissions to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Climate Emissions has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Climate Emissions 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.
Strong track record of project management
– Climate Emissions 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 brand equity
– Climate Emissions has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Climate Emissions to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Weaknesses Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies are -
Lack of clear differentiation of Climate Emissions products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Climate Emissions needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Climate Emissions 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. Climate Emissions 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Climate Emissions 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Climate Emissions 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.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Climate Emissions is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication mentioned in marketing section of case study Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies can help to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Climate Emissions 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.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Ans Kolk, Jonatan Pinkse suggests that, Climate Emissions 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.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies 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 Climate Emissions has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Climate Emissions, firm in the HBR case study Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies 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 Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Climate Emissions is planning to shift buying processes online.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies, is just above the industry average. Climate Emissions 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.
Opportunities Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies | 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 Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies are -
Developing new processes and practices
– Climate Emissions 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Climate Emissions 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Climate Emissions 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Climate Emissions can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
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 Climate Emissions 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Climate Emissions 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 Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Climate Emissions to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Climate Emissions 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Climate Emissions 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Climate Emissions 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 Climate Emissions to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
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. Climate Emissions can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Climate Emissions can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Climate Emissions operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Strategy & Execution sector.
Manufacturing automation
– Climate Emissions 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Climate Emissions can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies 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.
Threats Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies are -
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 Climate Emissions.
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
– Climate Emissions 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.
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 Climate Emissions business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
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. Climate Emissions 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.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Climate Emissions 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.
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. Climate Emissions needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Strategy & Execution industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Climate Emissions 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 Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies .
Increasing wage structure of Climate Emissions
– 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 Climate Emissions.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Climate Emissions is facing in Strategy & Execution sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
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 acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Climate Emissions has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Strategy & Execution industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Climate Emissions 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.
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 Climate Emissions in the Strategy & Execution sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies 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 Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies 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 Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies 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 Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies 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 Business Responses to Climate Change: Identifying Emergent Strategies 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 Climate Emissions needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.