Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Technology & Operations
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration
Managing an organizational transformation is a risky and difficult endeavor. This article examines the lessons learned from the transformation of the Veterans Health Administration (VHA), one of the largest agencies in the federal government. The transformation, which has proven to be highly successful, has focused on changing the agency from a health care delivery system emphasizing inpatient-oriented tertiary care to a health care delivery system that can meet the growing needs of veterans for outpatient-oriented primary care. The VHA's experience reveals the importance of selecting leaders whose qualifications match the needs of the transformation, developing a coherent transformation plan, maintaining a focus on key transformation goals, and managing external changes to complement internal ones. In addition, the VHA's experience reminds us that a transformation often raises significant issues concerning employee training and education, communication with frontline employees, and the balance between centralized control and operating unit flexibility.
Swot Analysis of "Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration" written by Gary J. Young includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Transformation Veterans facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Government and Technology & Operations.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration casestudy better are - – competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, increasing commodity prices, wage bills are increasing, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, increasing transportation and logistics costs, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google,
talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Transformation Veterans, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Transformation Veterans 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 Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Transformation Veterans
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Technology & Operations field.
4. Making a Technology & Operations topic specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Transformation Veterans
Strengths Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Transformation Veterans in Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration Harvard Business Review case study are -
Innovation driven organization
– Transformation Veterans is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Transformation Veterans 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.
Strong track record of project management
– Transformation Veterans is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Transformation Veterans 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 Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Training and development
– Transformation Veterans has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Transformation Veterans is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
High brand equity
– Transformation Veterans has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Transformation Veterans to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Digital Transformation in Technology & Operations segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Transformation Veterans digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Transformation Veterans 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Transformation Veterans in the sector have low bargaining power. Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Transformation Veterans to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Organizational Resilience of Transformation Veterans
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Transformation Veterans does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Analytics focus
– Transformation Veterans 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 Gary J. Young 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
– Transformation Veterans has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Transformation Veterans 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.
Weaknesses Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration are -
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Gary J. Young suggests that, Transformation Veterans 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.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration, in the dynamic environment Transformation Veterans has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Transformation Veterans has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration, it seems that the employees of Transformation Veterans 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Transformation Veterans 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.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration HBR case study mentions - Transformation Veterans 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.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Transformation Veterans has some of the most successful products in the industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. firm in the HBR case study - Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Transformation Veterans 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration 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 Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Transformation Veterans is planning to shift buying processes online.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration 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 Transformation Veterans 's lucrative customers.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Transformation Veterans 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Transformation Veterans 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.
Opportunities Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration | 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 Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration are -
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Transformation Veterans 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Transformation Veterans 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 Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Transformation Veterans to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Transformation Veterans 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Transformation Veterans 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 Technology & Operations segment.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Transformation Veterans is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration 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.
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. Transformation Veterans can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Buying journey improvements
– Transformation Veterans can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Transformation Veterans can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Transformation Veterans operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Technology & Operations sector.
Loyalty marketing
– Transformation Veterans 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.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– Consumer behavior has changed in the Technology & Operations industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Transformation Veterans 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. Transformation Veterans 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Transformation Veterans to increase its market reach. Transformation Veterans 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Transformation Veterans in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Technology & Operations segment, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Transformation Veterans 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.
Threats Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration are -
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Technology & Operations field will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Transformation Veterans can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
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 Transformation Veterans.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Transformation Veterans with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
Environmental challenges
– Transformation Veterans 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. Transformation Veterans can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Technology & Operations industry.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Transformation Veterans 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.
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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Transformation Veterans is facing in Technology & Operations sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Transformation Veterans 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.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Transformation Veterans 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.
Regulatory challenges
– Transformation Veterans 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 Technology & Operations industry regulations.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Transformation Veterans in the Technology & Operations industry. The Technology & Operations 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.
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. Transformation Veterans 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.
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 Transformation Veterans business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration 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 Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration 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 Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration 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 Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration 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 Managing Organizational Transformation: Lessons from the Veterans Health Administration 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 Transformation Veterans needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
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