Case Study Description of Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A)
In late 1994, Mr. Her, president of Joong-Ang Development Co., was concerned with the level of service quality at Yongin Farmland, the company's theme park located just south of Seoul, South Korea. Despite the service-quality program he initiated when he assumed his present position 14 months ago, the park's service quality seemed to be less than that of its competitors. He wondered if he had made the right moves, how Farmland could achieve international service quality standards, whether it would be worth doing, and if it would really provide a sustainable competitive advantage. Intended for use in a service-quality module of a service management course.
Authors :: John S. Haywood-Farmer, Charles Dhanaraj
Swot Analysis of "Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A)" written by John S. Haywood-Farmer, Charles Dhanaraj includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Quality Service facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A) case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Organizational culture, Supply chain and Technology & Operations.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A) casestudy better are - – geopolitical disruptions, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, technology disruption, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, increasing energy prices, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, increasing household debt because of falling income levels,
increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, increasing transportation and logistics costs, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A)
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A) case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Quality Service, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Quality Service 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 Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A) can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A) case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Quality Service
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 Quality Service
Strengths Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Quality Service in Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A) Harvard Business Review case study are -
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Quality Service in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Quality Service in the sector have low bargaining power. Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A) has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Quality Service to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
High brand equity
– Quality Service has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Quality Service to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Quality Service 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 Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A) HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Organizational Resilience of Quality Service
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Quality Service does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Quality Service 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.
Innovation driven organization
– Quality Service is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A) Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Learning organization
- Quality Service 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 Quality Service is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A) Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Strong track record of project management
– Quality Service is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Technology & Operations industry
– Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A) firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Quality Service to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Technology & Operations industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Quality Service to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Quality Service is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A) 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 Quality Service 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.
Weaknesses Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A) are -
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Quality Service 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. Quality Service 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.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A), in the dynamic environment Quality Service has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Quality Service has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A) HBR case study mentions - Quality Service 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, Quality Service 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.
Lack of clear differentiation of Quality Service products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Quality Service needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A), it seems that the employees of Quality Service don’t have comprehensive understanding of the firm’s strategy. This is reflected in number of promotional campaigns over the last few years that had mixed messaging and competing priorities. Some of the strategic activities and services promoted in the promotional campaigns were not consistent with the organization’s strategy.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A), 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.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Quality Service 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 - Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A) should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A) 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 Quality Service has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Quality Service 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Quality Service has not been able to do capital spending to the tune of the competition. This has resulted into fewer innovations and company facing stiff competition from both existing competitors and new entrants who are disrupting the industry using digital technology.
Opportunities Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A) | 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 Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A) are -
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. Quality Service can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
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 Quality Service 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Quality Service has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Quality Service to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A) case study. Quality Service can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, 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. Quality Service 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. Quality Service 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 Quality Service to increase its market reach. Quality Service 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Quality Service can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A) 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Quality Service 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.
Manufacturing automation
– Quality Service 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Quality Service 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Quality Service 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Quality Service can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
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. Quality Service can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Quality Service 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 Quality Service to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Threats Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A) External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A) 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 Quality Service 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 Quality Service.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Quality Service has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Technology & Operations industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Quality Service 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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Quality Service is facing in Technology & Operations sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A), Quality Service may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Technology & Operations .
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. Quality Service needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Technology & Operations industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Quality Service 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 Quality Service 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.
Increasing wage structure of Quality Service
– 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 Quality Service.
Environmental challenges
– Quality Service 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. Quality Service can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Technology & Operations industry.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Quality Service 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.
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.
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. Quality Service can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A) 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 Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A) 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 Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A) 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 Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A) 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 Samsung Everland: Managing Service Quality (A) 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 Quality Service needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.