Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Strategy & Execution
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency
Vithal Kamat (CMD, Kamat Hotels India Ltd.) is a second generation entrepreneur who has taken the Kamat Hotels brand to new heights. A small restaurant chain was transformed into a full-fledged hospitality services group under his leadership. Kamat Hotels (India) Ltd. included five major verticals from five-star luxury hotels (The Orchid Ecotel) to economy restaurants (namely Kamat Restaurants) that catered to the different customer segments. Kamat had ambitious plans for the expansion of every vertical using alternative growth strategies. However, the recent economic slump had caused a sudden setback due to the fall in average room occupancy and competing room-tariff rates offered by other hotels. In such a tumultuous situation, Kamat planned to use the core competency of the hotel as an 'ecotel,' that is, an environment friendly hotel, to go in for corporate branding and lever its position in the market. The case illustrates the challenges faced by Kamat in extending the core competency of 'The Orchid' to its other verticals. The Orchid had performed better than the industry average until 2008. However, in 2009, the performance dipped, partly because of the economic recession. This prompted the board members of the company to decide on extending the core competency of the ecologically sustainable hotel into other verticals. However, this decision had to be considered carefully in the light of its impact on 'The Orchid' as well as on the other verticals. What are the challenges that will be faced while extending the core competency of 'ecoteling' to the other verticals? There were numerous related issues that needed to be addressed strategically as well as tactically, in order to maintain a balance between extending the core competencies across the verticals while extending the brand per se.
Swot Analysis of "Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency" written by Rama Deshmukh, Atanu Adhikari includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Kamat Verticals facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Entrepreneurship, International business, Marketing and Strategy & Execution.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency casestudy better are - – technology disruption, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, geopolitical disruptions, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, wage bills are increasing, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy,
banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, increasing commodity prices, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Kamat Verticals, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Kamat Verticals 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 Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Kamat Verticals
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 Kamat Verticals
Strengths Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Kamat Verticals in Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency Harvard Business Review case study are -
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Strategy & Execution industry
– Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Kamat Verticals to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Strategy & Execution industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Kamat Verticals to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Innovation driven organization
– Kamat Verticals is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency 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.
Learning organization
- Kamat Verticals 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 Kamat Verticals is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Kamat Verticals in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Diverse revenue streams
– Kamat Verticals is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency 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
– Kamat Verticals is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Kamat Verticals 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 Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Kamat Verticals has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Kamat Verticals 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 brand equity
– Kamat Verticals has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Kamat Verticals to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Kamat Verticals 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.
Training and development
– Kamat Verticals has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency 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.
Weaknesses Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency are -
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency 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 Kamat Verticals 's lucrative customers.
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 Kamat Verticals supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes mentioned in the HBR case study - Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency, it is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Kamat Verticals vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency, it seems that the employees of Kamat Verticals 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.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency, 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.
Need for greater diversity
– Kamat Verticals 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.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency HBR case study mentions - Kamat Verticals takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the industry in last five years.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency, in the dynamic environment Kamat Verticals has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Kamat Verticals has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Kamat Verticals is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Strategy & Execution segment. Kamat Verticals needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Kamat Verticals to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency, is just above the industry average. Kamat Verticals 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.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency 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 Kamat Verticals has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Kamat Verticals 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.
Opportunities Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency | 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 Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency are -
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Kamat Verticals 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.
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. Kamat Verticals 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. Kamat Verticals 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Kamat Verticals 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
– Kamat Verticals 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 Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Kamat Verticals to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
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. Kamat Verticals can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Loyalty marketing
– Kamat Verticals 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Kamat Verticals 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Kamat Verticals is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Kamat Verticals can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Developing new processes and practices
– Kamat Verticals 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.
Manufacturing automation
– Kamat Verticals 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Kamat Verticals 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 Kamat Verticals to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Kamat Verticals 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.
Threats Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency are -
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Kamat Verticals 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.
Increasing wage structure of Kamat Verticals
– 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 Kamat Verticals.
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. Kamat Verticals needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Strategy & Execution industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Environmental challenges
– Kamat Verticals 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. Kamat Verticals can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Strategy & Execution industry.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Kamat Verticals 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.
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 Kamat Verticals in the Strategy & Execution sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
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 Kamat Verticals 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. Kamat Verticals 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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Kamat Verticals is facing in Strategy & Execution sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency, Kamat Verticals 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 .
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Kamat Verticals 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 dependence on third party suppliers
– Kamat Verticals 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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Kamat Verticals with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency 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 Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency 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 Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency 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 Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency 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 Orchid Ecotel: Leveraging Green Hoteling as Core Competency 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 Kamat Verticals needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
