Four Logics of Corporate Strategy SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Strategy & Execution
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Four Logics of Corporate Strategy
This is an MIT Sloan Management Review article. Organizations often struggle with corporate strategy because executives lack clarity on how parts of the business fit together to create and capture economic value. A simple framework can help leaders understand the relationship between corporate and business unit strategies.
Authors :: Donald N. Sull, Stefano Turconi, Charles Sull, James Yoder
Swot Analysis of "Four Logics of Corporate Strategy" written by Donald N. Sull, Stefano Turconi, Charles Sull, James Yoder includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Logics Corporate facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Four Logics of Corporate Strategy case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, and Strategy & Execution.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Four Logics of Corporate Strategy casestudy better are - – increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, technology disruption, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, increasing household debt because of falling income levels,
there is increasing trade war between United States & China, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Four Logics of Corporate Strategy
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Four Logics of Corporate Strategy case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Logics Corporate, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Logics Corporate 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 Four Logics of Corporate Strategy can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Four Logics of Corporate Strategy case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Logics Corporate
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Strategy & Execution field.
4. Making a Strategy & Execution topic specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Logics Corporate
Strengths Four Logics of Corporate Strategy | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Logics Corporate in Four Logics of Corporate Strategy Harvard Business Review case study are -
Strong track record of project management
– Logics Corporate is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Logics Corporate 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 Four Logics of Corporate Strategy - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Diverse revenue streams
– Logics Corporate is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Four Logics of Corporate Strategy 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 Logics Corporate in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Logics Corporate 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.
High brand equity
– Logics Corporate has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Logics Corporate to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Organizational Resilience of Logics Corporate
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Logics Corporate does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Logics Corporate 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 Four Logics of Corporate Strategy HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Training and development
– Logics Corporate has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Four Logics of Corporate Strategy 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 lead change in Strategy & Execution field
– Logics Corporate 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 Logics Corporate in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Digital Transformation in Strategy & Execution segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Logics Corporate digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Logics Corporate 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Four Logics of Corporate Strategy 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.
Weaknesses Four Logics of Corporate Strategy | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Four Logics of Corporate Strategy are -
Products dominated business model
– Even though Logics Corporate 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 - Four Logics of Corporate Strategy should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Lack of clear differentiation of Logics Corporate products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Logics Corporate needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Donald N. Sull, Stefano Turconi, Charles Sull, James Yoder suggests that, Logics Corporate 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Logics Corporate, firm in the HBR case study Four Logics of Corporate Strategy needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study Four Logics of Corporate Strategy has high operating costs in the. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Logics Corporate 's lucrative customers.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Logics Corporate needs to come up with a strategy to reduce the workers concern regarding automation. Without a clear strategy, it could lead to disruption and uncertainty within the organization.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Four Logics of Corporate Strategy 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 Four Logics of Corporate Strategy can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Logics Corporate is planning to shift buying processes online.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Four Logics of Corporate Strategy, it seems that company is thinking about the frontier risks that can impact Strategy & Execution 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 decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Logics Corporate 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. Logics Corporate 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, Logics Corporate 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.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Logics Corporate is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication mentioned in marketing section of case study Four Logics of Corporate Strategy can help to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Opportunities Four Logics of Corporate Strategy | 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 Four Logics of Corporate Strategy are -
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Logics Corporate to increase its market reach. Logics Corporate 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Logics Corporate in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Strategy & Execution segment, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Logics Corporate to conduct training and development for its employees across the world. This will result in not only reducing the cost of training but also help employees in different part of the world to integrate with the headquarter work culture, ethos, and standards.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Logics Corporate has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Logics Corporate to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Four Logics of Corporate Strategy case study. Logics Corporate can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Loyalty marketing
– Logics Corporate 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Logics Corporate 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Logics Corporate is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Four Logics of Corporate Strategy 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Logics Corporate 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 Logics Corporate to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Logics Corporate 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, Four Logics of Corporate Strategy, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Logics Corporate 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.
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. Logics Corporate 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, Logics Corporate can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Logics Corporate operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Strategy & Execution sector.
Buying journey improvements
– Logics Corporate can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Four Logics of Corporate Strategy 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.
Threats Four Logics of Corporate Strategy External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Four Logics of Corporate Strategy are -
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Logics Corporate in the Strategy & Execution industry. The Strategy & Execution 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.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Four Logics of Corporate Strategy, Logics Corporate may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Strategy & Execution .
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 Logics Corporate in the Strategy & Execution sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
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. Logics Corporate needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Strategy & Execution industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
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 Logics Corporate business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Logics Corporate 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.
Environmental challenges
– Logics Corporate 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. Logics Corporate can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Strategy & Execution industry.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Strategy & Execution field will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Logics Corporate can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
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.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Logics Corporate 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 Four Logics of Corporate Strategy .
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Logics Corporate has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Strategy & Execution industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Logics Corporate needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Strategy & Execution 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.
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 Logics Corporate.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Logics Corporate with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Four Logics of Corporate Strategy 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 Four Logics of Corporate Strategy 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 Four Logics of Corporate Strategy 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 Four Logics of Corporate Strategy 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 Four Logics of Corporate Strategy 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 Logics Corporate needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.