The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Global Business
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development
While income inequality between countries has declined significantly over the past 20 years, it has grown markedly within countries. A combination of technological change, global integration, domestic deregulation and immigration has been driving major changes in labour markets in most advanced countries-resulting in pressure on median wages and widespread insecurity. The authors-from the World Economic Forum-describe their 'framework for inclusive growth' and the Inclusive Development Index, which measures countries on three categories of KPIs, including Adjusted Net Savings; Median Household Income; Poverty Rate; and Healthy Life Expectancy.
Authors :: R. Samans, J. Blanke, G. Corrigan, M. Drzeniek Hanouz
Swot Analysis of "The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development" written by R. Samans, J. Blanke, G. Corrigan, M. Drzeniek Hanouz includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Inclusive Median facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Emerging markets, Social responsibility and Global Business.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development casestudy better are - – challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, increasing commodity prices, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, increasing energy prices, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation,
cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, increasing transportation and logistics costs, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Inclusive Median, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Inclusive Median 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 The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Inclusive Median
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Global Business field.
4. Making a Global Business topic specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Inclusive Median
Strengths The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Inclusive Median in The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development Harvard Business Review case study are -
Analytics focus
– Inclusive Median 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 R. Samans, J. Blanke, G. Corrigan, M. Drzeniek Hanouz 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.
Learning organization
- Inclusive Median 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 Inclusive Median is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Digital Transformation in Global Business segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Inclusive Median digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Inclusive Median 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.
Innovation driven organization
– Inclusive Median is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Inclusive Median 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 The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development 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
– Inclusive Median has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development 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.
Organizational Resilience of Inclusive Median
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Inclusive Median does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Inclusive Median in the sector have low bargaining power. The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Inclusive Median to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Inclusive Median in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Inclusive Median has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Inclusive Median 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 Global Business field
– Inclusive Median 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 Inclusive Median in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Weaknesses The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development are -
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Inclusive Median is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Global Business segment. Inclusive Median needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Inclusive Median to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Inclusive Median is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication mentioned in marketing section of case study The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development can help to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Need for greater diversity
– Inclusive Median 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 Inclusive Median 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.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Inclusive Median 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. Inclusive Median 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 The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development, in the dynamic environment Inclusive Median has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Inclusive Median has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Inclusive Median, firm in the HBR case study The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Inclusive Median 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.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development, it seems that the employees of Inclusive Median 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development 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 The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Inclusive Median is planning to shift buying processes online.
Lack of clear differentiation of Inclusive Median products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Inclusive Median needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Opportunities The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development | 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 The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development are -
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Inclusive Median can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Loyalty marketing
– Inclusive Median 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.
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 Inclusive Median 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Inclusive Median 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 Global Business 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. Inclusive Median can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Inclusive Median can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Inclusive Median operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Global Business sector.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Inclusive Median 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, The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– Consumer behavior has changed in the Global Business industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Inclusive Median 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. Inclusive Median 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Inclusive Median in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Global Business segment, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Inclusive Median is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development case study suggests that firm can utilize new technology to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Inclusive Median 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Global Business industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Inclusive Median can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Inclusive Median 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 Inclusive Median to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Threats The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development 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 Inclusive Median business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Increasing wage structure of Inclusive Median
– 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 Inclusive Median.
Environmental challenges
– Inclusive Median 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. Inclusive Median can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Global Business industry.
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. Inclusive Median 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.
Regulatory challenges
– Inclusive Median 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 Global Business industry regulations.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development, Inclusive Median may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Global Business .
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Inclusive Median in the Global Business industry. The Global Business 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.
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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Inclusive Median is facing in Global Business sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
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 Inclusive Median in the Global Business sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Inclusive Median 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 The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development .
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. Inclusive Median needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Global Business industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Inclusive Median 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 The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development 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 The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development 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 The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development 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 The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development 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 The Challenge of the Century: Inclusive Growth and Development 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 Inclusive Median needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
