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Riding With the Blackhorse (A) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution

Case Study Description of Riding With the Blackhorse (A)


Includes color exhibits. To maximize their effectiveness, color cases and exhibits should be printed in color.Colonel Moore reflects on his command of the 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment and its preparation of the United States Army for 21st century adversaries. During his command, Colonel Moore had transformed the regiment from a unit focused on providing conventional force-on-force training as the world-class Opposing Force (OPFOR) to an organization that was preparing to deploy to Iraq to fight the insurgency. He also transformed the very nature of training at the Army's premier Nation Training Center from standard force-on-force conventional battles between two well-equipped adversaries to more complex training scenarios that better reflect the changing nature of warfare that the United States Army was experiencing on battlefields in Iraq and Afghanistan. As Colonel Moore left his command, he could not help but wonder if the 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment would successfully meet the challenge of combat operations in Iraq. When the Army tapped the 11th Armored Cavalry regiment for combat duty in Iraq, Colonel Moore could not help but reflect on the changes he made to the OPFOR. Could the Blackhorse adapt successfully to fighting the insurgency in Iraq? Would the National Guard successfully replace the vaunted Blackhorse Regiment as the OPFOR? Was the OPFOR successfully preparing units for combat operations in Iraq and Afghanistan? Only time would tell.

Authors :: John R. Wells, Sean Hazlett, Niladri Mukhopadhyay

Topics :: Strategy & Execution

Tags :: Organizational structure, Risk management, Strategic planning, Strategy execution, SWOT Analysis, SWOT Matrix, TOWS, Weighted SWOT Analysis

Swot Analysis of "Riding With the Blackhorse (A)" written by John R. Wells, Sean Hazlett, Niladri Mukhopadhyay includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Regiment Iraq facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Riding With the Blackhorse (A) case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Organizational structure, Risk management, Strategic planning, Strategy execution and Strategy & Execution.


Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Riding With the Blackhorse (A) casestudy better are - – competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, increasing transportation and logistics costs, there is backlash against globalization, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, increasing commodity prices, etc



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Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Riding With the Blackhorse (A)


SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Riding With the Blackhorse (A) case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Regiment Iraq, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Regiment Iraq 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 Riding With the Blackhorse (A) can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Riding With the Blackhorse (A) case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Regiment Iraq
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 Regiment Iraq




Strengths Riding With the Blackhorse (A) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The strengths of Regiment Iraq in Riding With the Blackhorse (A) Harvard Business Review case study are -

Cross disciplinary teams

– Horizontal connected teams at the Regiment Iraq 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.

Operational resilience

– The operational resilience strategy in the Riding With the Blackhorse (A) 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.

Superior customer experience

– The customer experience strategy of Regiment Iraq in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.

Ability to lead change in Strategy & Execution field

– Regiment Iraq 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 Regiment Iraq in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.

Highly skilled collaborators

– Regiment Iraq 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 Riding With the Blackhorse (A) HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.

Learning organization

- Regiment Iraq 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 Regiment Iraq is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Riding With the Blackhorse (A) Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.

Analytics focus

– Regiment Iraq 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 John R. Wells, Sean Hazlett, Niladri Mukhopadhyay 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.

Successful track record of launching new products

– Regiment Iraq has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Regiment Iraq 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.

High switching costs

– The high switching costs that Regiment Iraq 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

– Regiment Iraq is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Riding With the Blackhorse (A) 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.

Strong track record of project management

– Regiment Iraq is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.

Innovation driven organization

– Regiment Iraq is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Riding With the Blackhorse (A) Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.






Weaknesses Riding With the Blackhorse (A) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The weaknesses of Riding With the Blackhorse (A) are -

Need for greater diversity

– Regiment Iraq 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.

Interest costs

– Compare to the competition, Regiment Iraq 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.

Capital Spending Reduction

– Even during the low interest decade, Regiment Iraq 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.

Low market penetration in new markets

– Outside its home market of Regiment Iraq, firm in the HBR case study Riding With the Blackhorse (A) needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.

Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy

– From the instances in the HBR case study Riding With the Blackhorse (A), it seems that the employees of Regiment Iraq 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.

Skills based hiring

– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Regiment Iraq 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, John R. Wells, Sean Hazlett, Niladri Mukhopadhyay suggests that, Regiment Iraq 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.

Lack of clear differentiation of Regiment Iraq products

– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Regiment Iraq needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.

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 Regiment Iraq supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes mentioned in the HBR case study - Riding With the Blackhorse (A), it is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Regiment Iraq vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.

High operating costs

– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study Riding With the Blackhorse (A) 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 Regiment Iraq 's lucrative customers.

High dependence on star products

– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Riding With the Blackhorse (A) 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 Regiment Iraq has relatively successful track record of launching new products.




Opportunities Riding With the Blackhorse (A) | 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 Riding With the Blackhorse (A) are -

Redefining models of collaboration and team work

– As explained in the weaknesses section, Regiment Iraq is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Riding With the Blackhorse (A) 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.

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. Regiment Iraq can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.

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 Regiment Iraq 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.

Learning at scale

– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Regiment Iraq 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.

Leveraging digital technologies

– Regiment Iraq 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.

Using analytics as competitive advantage

– Regiment Iraq 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 Riding With the Blackhorse (A) - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Regiment Iraq to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.

Creating value in data economy

– The success of analytics program of Regiment Iraq has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Regiment Iraq to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Riding With the Blackhorse (A) case study. Regiment Iraq can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.

Better consumer reach

– The expansion of the 5G network will help Regiment Iraq to increase its market reach. Regiment Iraq will be able to reach out to new customers. Secondly 5G will also provide technology framework to build new tools and products that can help more immersive consumer experience and faster consumer journey.

Building a culture of innovation

– managers at Regiment Iraq 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.

Low interest rates

– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Regiment Iraq 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.

Lowering marketing communication costs

– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Regiment Iraq 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.

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. Regiment Iraq 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. Regiment Iraq 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 Regiment Iraq 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 Regiment Iraq to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.




Threats Riding With the Blackhorse (A) External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis


The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Riding With the Blackhorse (A) are -

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.

Consumer confidence and its impact on Regiment Iraq 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 acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution

– Regiment Iraq has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Strategy & Execution industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Regiment Iraq 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.

Barriers of entry lowering

– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Regiment Iraq 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.

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. Regiment Iraq 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.

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 Regiment Iraq in the Strategy & Execution sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.

High dependence on third party suppliers

– Regiment Iraq 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 wage structure of Regiment Iraq

– 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 Regiment Iraq.

Stagnating economy with rate increase

– Regiment Iraq 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.

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. Regiment Iraq can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.

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. Regiment Iraq needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Strategy & Execution industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.

Shortening product life cycle

– it is one of the major threat that Regiment Iraq is facing in Strategy & Execution sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.




Weighted SWOT Analysis of Riding With the Blackhorse (A) 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 Riding With the Blackhorse (A) 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 Riding With the Blackhorse (A) 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 Riding With the Blackhorse (A) 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 Riding With the Blackhorse (A) 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 Regiment Iraq needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.



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