Case Study Description of Wainwright Industries (A): Beyond the Baldrige
Traces the growth of Wainwright, a small automotive supply company, focusing on its commitment to quality in 1981 and the evolution of its quality culture. Breakthrough programs that stress "trust and belief" in the workforce and commitment to customers result in Wainwright winning the Malcolm Baldrige Award in 1994.
Swot Analysis of "Wainwright Industries (A): Beyond the Baldrige" written by Rosabeth Moss Kanter, Norman Klein includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Wainwright Baldrige facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Wainwright Industries (A): Beyond the Baldrige case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Change management, Customers, Ethics, Product development and Technology & Operations.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Wainwright Industries (A): Beyond the Baldrige casestudy better are - – supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , increasing energy prices, 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, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, there is increasing trade war between United States & China,
central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Wainwright Industries (A): Beyond the Baldrige
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Wainwright Industries (A): Beyond the Baldrige case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Wainwright Baldrige, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Wainwright Baldrige 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 Wainwright Industries (A): Beyond the Baldrige can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Wainwright Industries (A): Beyond the Baldrige case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Wainwright Baldrige
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 Wainwright Baldrige
Strengths Wainwright Industries (A): Beyond the Baldrige | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Wainwright Baldrige in Wainwright Industries (A): Beyond the Baldrige Harvard Business Review case study are -
Highly skilled collaborators
– Wainwright Baldrige 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 Wainwright Industries (A): Beyond the Baldrige HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Wainwright Baldrige has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Wainwright Baldrige 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Wainwright Baldrige in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Organizational Resilience of Wainwright Baldrige
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Wainwright Baldrige does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Training and development
– Wainwright Baldrige has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Wainwright Industries (A): Beyond the Baldrige 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Wainwright Industries (A): Beyond the Baldrige 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.
Digital Transformation in Technology & Operations segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Wainwright Baldrige digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Wainwright Baldrige 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.
Ability to lead change in Technology & Operations field
– Wainwright Baldrige 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 Wainwright Baldrige in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Learning organization
- Wainwright Baldrige 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 Wainwright Baldrige is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Wainwright Industries (A): Beyond the Baldrige Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Diverse revenue streams
– Wainwright Baldrige is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Wainwright Industries (A): Beyond the Baldrige 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
– Wainwright Baldrige is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Wainwright Baldrige is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Wainwright Industries (A): Beyond the Baldrige are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Weaknesses Wainwright Industries (A): Beyond the Baldrige | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Wainwright Industries (A): Beyond the Baldrige are -
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study Wainwright Industries (A): Beyond the Baldrige, is just above the industry average. Wainwright Baldrige 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 bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Rosabeth Moss Kanter, Norman Klein suggests that, Wainwright Baldrige 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.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Wainwright Baldrige 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 - Wainwright Industries (A): Beyond the Baldrige should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Wainwright Industries (A): Beyond the Baldrige HBR case study mentions - Wainwright Baldrige 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.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Wainwright Baldrige 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.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Wainwright Baldrige 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Wainwright Baldrige is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Technology & Operations segment. Wainwright Baldrige needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Wainwright Baldrige to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Wainwright Baldrige 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 operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study Wainwright Industries (A): Beyond the Baldrige 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 Wainwright Baldrige 's lucrative customers.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Wainwright Industries (A): Beyond the Baldrige 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 Wainwright Baldrige has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Need for greater diversity
– Wainwright Baldrige 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.
Opportunities Wainwright Industries (A): Beyond the Baldrige | 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 Wainwright Industries (A): Beyond the Baldrige are -
Developing new processes and practices
– Wainwright Baldrige 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Wainwright Baldrige to increase its market reach. Wainwright Baldrige 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Technology & Operations industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Wainwright Baldrige can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Wainwright Baldrige 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.
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. Wainwright Baldrige 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. Wainwright Baldrige 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Wainwright Baldrige 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.
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 Wainwright Baldrige 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Wainwright Baldrige 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 Wainwright Baldrige to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Wainwright Baldrige can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Wainwright Baldrige can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Wainwright Baldrige 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. Wainwright Baldrige can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Loyalty marketing
– Wainwright Baldrige 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Wainwright Baldrige 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 Wainwright Industries (A): Beyond the Baldrige External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Wainwright Industries (A): Beyond the Baldrige are -
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 Wainwright Baldrige business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Aging population
– As the populations of most advanced economies are aging, it will lead to high social security costs, higher savings among population, and lower demand for goods and services in the economy. The household savings in US, France, UK, Germany, and Japan are growing faster than predicted because of uncertainty caused by pandemic.
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. Wainwright Baldrige 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
– Wainwright Baldrige 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 international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Wainwright Baldrige 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 Wainwright Industries (A): Beyond the Baldrige .
Consumer confidence and its impact on Wainwright Baldrige 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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Wainwright Baldrige with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
Environmental challenges
– Wainwright Baldrige 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. Wainwright Baldrige can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Technology & Operations industry.
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. Wainwright Baldrige needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Technology & Operations industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Wainwright Baldrige has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Technology & Operations industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Wainwright Baldrige 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 Wainwright Baldrige in the Technology & Operations sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Wainwright Baldrige 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.
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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Wainwright Industries (A): Beyond the Baldrige 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 Wainwright Industries (A): Beyond the Baldrige 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 Wainwright Industries (A): Beyond the Baldrige 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 Wainwright Industries (A): Beyond the Baldrige 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 Wainwright Industries (A): Beyond the Baldrige 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 Wainwright Baldrige needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
