Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Finance & Accounting
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal
This technical note provides hands-on instructions for searching, classifying, and obtaining documents from the U.S. Security and Exchange Commission's (SEC) official document repository, EDGAR. It helps students become familiar with the different types and classifications of SEC filings available for public companies registered with the SEC.
Swot Analysis of "Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal" written by Justin J. Hopkins, Andy Chen includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Sec Edgar facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, IT and Finance & Accounting.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal casestudy better are - – banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, technology disruption, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, increasing commodity prices, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, wage bills are increasing,
talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, increasing energy prices, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Sec Edgar, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Sec Edgar 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 Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Sec Edgar
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Finance & Accounting field.
4. Making a Finance & Accounting topic specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Sec Edgar
Strengths Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Sec Edgar in Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal Harvard Business Review case study are -
Successful track record of launching new products
– Sec Edgar has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Sec Edgar 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.
Ability to lead change in Finance & Accounting field
– Sec Edgar 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 Sec Edgar in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal 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.
Innovation driven organization
– Sec Edgar is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Sec Edgar 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Sec Edgar is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Sec Edgar in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Sec Edgar 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.
Digital Transformation in Finance & Accounting segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Sec Edgar digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Sec Edgar 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.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Sec Edgar 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 Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Strong track record of project management
– Sec Edgar is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Training and development
– Sec Edgar has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal 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.
Weaknesses Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal are -
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal, is just above the industry average. Sec Edgar 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, Justin J. Hopkins, Andy Chen suggests that, Sec Edgar 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.
Need for greater diversity
– Sec Edgar 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.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Sec Edgar 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 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 Sec Edgar supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes mentioned in the HBR case study - Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal, it is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Sec Edgar vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal, it seems that company is thinking about the frontier risks that can impact Finance & Accounting 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.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal HBR case study mentions - Sec Edgar 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Sec Edgar, firm in the HBR case study Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Sec Edgar 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.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal, it seems that the employees of Sec Edgar 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.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Sec Edgar 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.
Opportunities Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal | 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 Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal are -
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Sec Edgar 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 Finance & Accounting segment.
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. Sec Edgar can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Sec Edgar is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Finance & Accounting industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Sec Edgar can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Sec Edgar can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– Consumer behavior has changed in the Finance & Accounting industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Sec Edgar 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. Sec Edgar 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Sec Edgar can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Sec Edgar operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Finance & Accounting sector.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Sec Edgar 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Sec Edgar can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Sec Edgar 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.
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 Sec Edgar 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Sec Edgar 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Sec Edgar 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 Sec Edgar to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Threats Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal are -
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Sec Edgar in the Finance & Accounting industry. The Finance & Accounting 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 Sec Edgar
– 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 Sec Edgar.
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 Sec Edgar business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Sec Edgar has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Finance & Accounting industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Sec Edgar needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Finance & Accounting 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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Sec Edgar with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
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. Sec Edgar 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
– Sec Edgar 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.
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 Sec Edgar.
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.
Regulatory challenges
– Sec Edgar 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 Finance & Accounting industry regulations.
Environmental challenges
– Sec Edgar 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. Sec Edgar can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Finance & Accounting industry.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Finance & Accounting field will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Sec Edgar can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Sec Edgar 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 Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal .
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal 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 Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal 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 Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal 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 Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal 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 Using the SEC's EDGAR Portal 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 Sec Edgar needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
