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McDonald's Corp. SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution

Case Study Description of McDonald's Corp.


McDonald's has over many years built an operating strategy based on consistency and quality through a limited product range. Competitive forces have drawn the company into a much wider variety of foods and services in order to maintain growth. Now, new competitors threaten to beat McDonald's at its own, original game. In addition, McDonald's faces unprecedented challenges in its environmental policy. The case teaches approaches and dangers arising from flexibility, and the identification of capabilities that support different types of flexibility. The integration of environmental concerns with operations strategy is also addressed.

Authors :: David M. Upton, Joshua D. Margolis

Topics :: Technology & Operations

Tags :: Diversity, Growth strategy, Mergers & acquisitions, Operations management, Product development, Strategy execution, Sustainability, SWOT Analysis, SWOT Matrix, TOWS, Weighted SWOT Analysis

Swot Analysis of "McDonald's Corp." written by David M. Upton, Joshua D. Margolis includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Mcdonald's Flexibility facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in McDonald's Corp. case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Diversity, Growth strategy, Mergers & acquisitions, Operations management, Product development, Strategy execution, Sustainability and Technology & Operations.


Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the McDonald's Corp. casestudy better are - – there is backlash against globalization, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, wage bills are increasing, increasing transportation and logistics costs, increasing commodity prices, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, etc



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Introduction to SWOT Analysis of McDonald's Corp.


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




Strengths McDonald's Corp. | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The strengths of Mcdonald's Flexibility in McDonald's Corp. Harvard Business Review case study are -

Superior customer experience

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

Training and development

– Mcdonald's Flexibility has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in McDonald's Corp. 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.

Low bargaining power of suppliers

– Suppliers of Mcdonald's Flexibility in the sector have low bargaining power. McDonald's Corp. has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Mcdonald's Flexibility to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.

Operational resilience

– The operational resilience strategy in the McDonald's Corp. 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.

Ability to recruit top talent

– Mcdonald's Flexibility is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the McDonald's Corp. are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.

Effective Research and Development (R&D)

– Mcdonald's Flexibility 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 McDonald's Corp. - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.

Digital Transformation in Technology & Operations segment

- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Mcdonald's Flexibility digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Mcdonald's Flexibility 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.

High switching costs

– The high switching costs that Mcdonald's Flexibility 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.

Cross disciplinary teams

– Horizontal connected teams at the Mcdonald's Flexibility 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.

High brand equity

– Mcdonald's Flexibility has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Mcdonald's Flexibility to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.

Learning organization

- Mcdonald's Flexibility 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 Mcdonald's Flexibility is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in McDonald's Corp. Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.

Highly skilled collaborators

– Mcdonald's Flexibility 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 McDonald's Corp. HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.






Weaknesses McDonald's Corp. | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The weaknesses of McDonald's Corp. are -

Ability to respond to the competition

– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study McDonald's Corp., in the dynamic environment Mcdonald's Flexibility has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Mcdonald's Flexibility 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 McDonald's Corp., it seems that the employees of Mcdonald's Flexibility don’t have comprehensive understanding of the firm’s strategy. This is reflected in number of promotional campaigns over the last few years that had mixed messaging and competing priorities. Some of the strategic activities and services promoted in the promotional campaigns were not consistent with the organization’s strategy.

High 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 Mcdonald's Flexibility supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes mentioned in the HBR case study - McDonald's Corp., it is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Mcdonald's Flexibility vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.

High operating costs

– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study McDonald's Corp. 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 Mcdonald's Flexibility 's lucrative customers.

Slow to harness new channels of communication

– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Mcdonald's Flexibility is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication mentioned in marketing section of case study McDonald's Corp. can help to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.

Workers concerns about automation

– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Mcdonald's Flexibility needs to come up with a strategy to reduce the workers concern regarding automation. Without a clear strategy, it could lead to disruption and uncertainty within the organization.

High cash cycle compare to competitors

Mcdonald's Flexibility 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.

Need for greater diversity

– Mcdonald's Flexibility 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.

Aligning sales with marketing

– It come across in the case study McDonald's Corp. 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 McDonald's Corp. can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Mcdonald's Flexibility is planning to shift buying processes online.

Lack of clear differentiation of Mcdonald's Flexibility products

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

Increasing silos among functional specialists

– The organizational structure of Mcdonald's Flexibility is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Technology & Operations segment. Mcdonald's Flexibility needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Mcdonald's Flexibility to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.




Opportunities McDonald's Corp. | 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 McDonald's Corp. are -

Loyalty marketing

– Mcdonald's Flexibility 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.

Increase in government spending

– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Mcdonald's Flexibility can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Mcdonald's Flexibility operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Technology & Operations sector.

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. Mcdonald's Flexibility can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.

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 Mcdonald's Flexibility 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.

Developing new processes and practices

– Mcdonald's Flexibility can develop new processes and procedures in Technology & Operations 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.

Redefining models of collaboration and team work

– As explained in the weaknesses section, Mcdonald's Flexibility is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. McDonald's Corp. 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.

Leveraging digital technologies

– Mcdonald's Flexibility 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

– Mcdonald's Flexibility 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 McDonald's Corp. - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Mcdonald's Flexibility to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.

Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities

– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Mcdonald's Flexibility 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 Mcdonald's Flexibility to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.

Lowering marketing communication costs

– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Mcdonald's Flexibility 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.

Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains

– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Mcdonald's Flexibility can build a diversified supply chain model across various countries in - South East Asia, India, and other parts of the world. This reconfiguration of global supply chain can help, as suggested in case study, McDonald's Corp., to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.

Creating value in data economy

– The success of analytics program of Mcdonald's Flexibility has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Mcdonald's Flexibility to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the McDonald's Corp. case study. Mcdonald's Flexibility can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.

Learning at scale

– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Mcdonald's Flexibility 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 McDonald's Corp. External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis


The threats mentioned in the HBR case study McDonald's Corp. are -

Increasing wage structure of Mcdonald's Flexibility

– 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 Mcdonald's Flexibility.

Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins

– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Mcdonald's Flexibility 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 McDonald's Corp. .

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.

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. Mcdonald's Flexibility needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Technology & Operations industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.

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.

Trade war between China and United States

– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Mcdonald's Flexibility 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. Mcdonald's Flexibility 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.

Stagnating economy with rate increase

– Mcdonald's Flexibility 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.

Shortening product life cycle

– it is one of the major threat that Mcdonald's Flexibility is facing in Technology & Operations sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.

Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution

– Mcdonald's Flexibility has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Technology & Operations industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Mcdonald's Flexibility needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Technology & Operations 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 Mcdonald's Flexibility in the Technology & Operations sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.

Barriers of entry lowering

– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Mcdonald's Flexibility with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.

Consumer confidence and its impact on Mcdonald's Flexibility 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.




Weighted SWOT Analysis of McDonald's Corp. 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 McDonald's Corp. 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 McDonald's Corp. 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 McDonald's Corp. 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 McDonald's Corp. 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 Mcdonald's Flexibility needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.



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