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Cardosa's Quest for Certification SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution

Case Study Description of Cardosa's Quest for Certification


In organizations, learning and the associated changes it brings cannot be forced. Individuals who act as "learning champions" within an organization need to be convinced of the benefits of the learning initiative themselves so that they can take the "positive" message to their teams and become key facilitators and enablers within the organization. Otherwise, their negativity can influence their team members, especially if the team members are not sold on the initiative in the first place.

Authors :: Amber Gul Rashid

Topics :: Technology & Operations

Tags :: Communication, Organizational culture, SWOT Analysis, SWOT Matrix, TOWS, Weighted SWOT Analysis

Swot Analysis of "Cardosa's Quest for Certification" written by Amber Gul Rashid includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Learning Cardosa's facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Cardosa's Quest for Certification case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Communication, Organizational culture and Technology & Operations.


Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Cardosa's Quest for Certification casestudy better are - – geopolitical disruptions, technology disruption, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, there is backlash against globalization, increasing transportation and logistics costs, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, etc



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Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Cardosa's Quest for Certification


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




Strengths Cardosa's Quest for Certification | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The strengths of Learning Cardosa's in Cardosa's Quest for Certification Harvard Business Review case study are -

Ability to lead change in Technology & Operations field

– Learning Cardosa's 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 Learning Cardosa's in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.

Successful track record of launching new products

– Learning Cardosa's has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Learning Cardosa's 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 Learning Cardosa's in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.

Analytics focus

– Learning Cardosa's 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 Amber Gul Rashid 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.

Innovation driven organization

– Learning Cardosa's is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Cardosa's Quest for Certification Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.

Strong track record of project management

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

Operational resilience

– The operational resilience strategy in the Cardosa's Quest for Certification 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.

Training and development

– Learning Cardosa's has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Cardosa's Quest for Certification 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

– Learning Cardosa's is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Cardosa's Quest for Certification are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.

Cross disciplinary teams

– Horizontal connected teams at the Learning Cardosa's 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.

Effective Research and Development (R&D)

– Learning Cardosa's 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 Cardosa's Quest for Certification - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.

Highly skilled collaborators

– Learning Cardosa's 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 Cardosa's Quest for Certification HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.






Weaknesses Cardosa's Quest for Certification | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The weaknesses of Cardosa's Quest for Certification are -

High dependence on star products

– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Cardosa's Quest for Certification 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 Learning Cardosa's has relatively successful track record of launching new products.

High cash cycle compare to competitors

Learning Cardosa's 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.

Interest costs

– Compare to the competition, Learning Cardosa's 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.

Ability to respond to the competition

– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study Cardosa's Quest for Certification, in the dynamic environment Learning Cardosa's has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Learning Cardosa's has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.

Compensation and incentives

– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study Cardosa's Quest for Certification, is just above the industry average. Learning Cardosa's 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.

Slow to strategic competitive environment developments

– As Cardosa's Quest for Certification HBR case study mentions - Learning Cardosa's 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.

Slow decision making process

– As mentioned earlier in the report, Learning Cardosa's has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the industry over the last five years. Learning Cardosa's even though has strong showing on digital transformation primary two stages, it has struggled to capitalize the power of digital transformation in marketing efforts and new venture efforts.

Capital Spending Reduction

– Even during the low interest decade, Learning Cardosa's 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.

No frontier risks strategy

– After analyzing the HBR case study Cardosa's Quest for Certification, it seems that company is thinking about the frontier risks that can impact Technology & Operations 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.

Aligning sales with marketing

– It come across in the case study Cardosa's Quest for Certification 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 Cardosa's Quest for Certification can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Learning Cardosa's is planning to shift buying processes online.

Low market penetration in new markets

– Outside its home market of Learning Cardosa's, firm in the HBR case study Cardosa's Quest for Certification needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.




Opportunities Cardosa's Quest for Certification | 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 Cardosa's Quest for Certification are -

Using analytics as competitive advantage

– Learning Cardosa's 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 Cardosa's Quest for Certification - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Learning Cardosa's to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.

Leveraging digital technologies

– Learning Cardosa's 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, Learning Cardosa's is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Cardosa's Quest for Certification 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.

Loyalty marketing

– Learning Cardosa's 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.

Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions

– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Learning Cardosa's in the consumer business. Now Learning Cardosa's can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.

Reforming the budgeting process

- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Learning Cardosa's can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.

Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains

– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Learning Cardosa's 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, Cardosa's Quest for Certification, 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 Learning Cardosa's has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Learning Cardosa's to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Cardosa's Quest for Certification case study. Learning Cardosa's can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.

Buying journey improvements

– Learning Cardosa's can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Cardosa's Quest for Certification 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.

Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities

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

Manufacturing automation

– Learning Cardosa's can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Technology & Operations 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.

Increase in government spending

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

Better consumer reach

– The expansion of the 5G network will help Learning Cardosa's to increase its market reach. Learning Cardosa's 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.




Threats Cardosa's Quest for Certification External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis


The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Cardosa's Quest for Certification are -

Regulatory challenges

– Learning Cardosa's 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.

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

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.

Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins

– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Learning Cardosa's 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 Cardosa's Quest for Certification .

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 Learning Cardosa's business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.

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 Learning Cardosa's.

Barriers of entry lowering

– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Learning Cardosa's 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 Learning Cardosa's demand

– There is a high probability of declining consumer confidence, given – high inflammation rate, rise of gig economy, lower job stability, increasing cost of living, higher interest rates, and aging demography. All the factors contribute to people saving higher rate of their income, resulting in lower consumer demand in the industry and other sectors.

Technology 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.

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. Learning Cardosa's 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.

Trade war between China and United States

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

Increasing wage structure of Learning Cardosa's

– 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 Learning Cardosa's.

Stagnating economy with rate increase

– Learning Cardosa's 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.




Weighted SWOT Analysis of Cardosa's Quest for Certification 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 Cardosa's Quest for Certification 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 Cardosa's Quest for Certification 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 Cardosa's Quest for Certification 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 Cardosa's Quest for Certification 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 Learning Cardosa's needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.



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