Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Leadership & Managing People
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries
In analyzing the many stereotypes surrounding Arab Middle Eastern women's employment issues, this article focuses on women's labor participation and their career development in Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries. We first unpack the stereotypes by demonstrating the progress of women's labor participation in the region. We then uncover the critical challenges of a high female unemployment rate during GCC countries' economic transformation in the non-oil sectors. We discuss the factors contributing to low women's labor participation and the difficulty of career advancement for women, including (1) norms and traditions; (2) job opportunities and workplace discrimination; and (3) role models, mentors, and networking. Finally, we provide recommendations on how to improve women's labor participation by involving the public and private sectors, deploying technology, and engaging in multilevel mindset change.
Swot Analysis of "Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries" written by Janet Y. Murray, Yingying Zhang-Zhang includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Women's Participation facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Gender, Innovation, Intellectual property and Leadership & Managing People.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries casestudy better are - – cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, there is backlash against globalization, technology disruption, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, increasing commodity prices, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies,
challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Women's Participation, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Women's Participation 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 Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Women's Participation
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Leadership & Managing People field.
4. Making a Leadership & Managing People topic specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Women's Participation
Strengths Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Women's Participation in Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries Harvard Business Review case study are -
High brand equity
– Women's Participation has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Women's Participation to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Innovation driven organization
– Women's Participation is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Women's Participation 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
– Women's Participation has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Women's Participation 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Leadership & Managing People industry
– Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Women's Participation to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Leadership & Managing People industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Women's Participation to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Women's Participation 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 Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Analytics focus
– Women's Participation 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 Janet Y. Murray, Yingying Zhang-Zhang 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.
Strong track record of project management
– Women's Participation is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Women's Participation are driving operational speed, building greater agility, and keeping the organization nimble to compete with new competitors. It helps are organization to ideate new ideas, and execute them swiftly in the marketplace.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Women's Participation 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 Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Training and development
– Women's Participation has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries 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 Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries are -
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Women's Participation 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.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries HBR case study mentions - Women's Participation 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.
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 Women's Participation supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes mentioned in the HBR case study - Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries, it is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Women's Participation vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Women's Participation 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.
Need for greater diversity
– Women's Participation 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Women's Participation, firm in the HBR case study Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Women's Participation is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Leadership & Managing People segment. Women's Participation needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Women's Participation to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Lack of clear differentiation of Women's Participation products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Women's Participation needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Women's Participation 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.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries 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 Women's Participation has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries 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 Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Women's Participation is planning to shift buying processes online.
Opportunities Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries | 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 Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries are -
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Women's Participation has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in the sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled, as illustrated in the Harvard case study Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Women's Participation to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Developing new processes and practices
– Women's Participation can develop new processes and procedures in Leadership & Managing People industry using technology such as automation using artificial intelligence, real time transportation and products tracking, 3D modeling for concept development and new products pilot testing etc.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Women's Participation can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Women's Participation operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Leadership & Managing People sector.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Women's Participation in the consumer business. Now Women's Participation can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Women's Participation can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Women's Participation has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Women's Participation to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries case study. Women's Participation 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 Leadership & Managing People industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Women's Participation 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. Women's Participation 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Women's Participation 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Leadership & Managing People industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Women's Participation can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Women's Participation 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, Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
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 Women's Participation 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Women's Participation can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries 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.
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. Women's Participation can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Threats Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries are -
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Women's Participation high dependence on third party suppliers can disrupt its processes and delivery mechanism. For example -the current troubles of car makers because of chip shortage is because the chip companies started producing chips for electronic companies rather than car manufacturers.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Women's Participation 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.
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. Women's Participation 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.
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 Women's Participation.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Women's Participation is facing in Leadership & Managing People sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Increasing wage structure of Women's Participation
– 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 Women's Participation.
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. Women's Participation needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Leadership & Managing People industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries, Women's Participation may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Leadership & Managing People .
Regulatory challenges
– Women's Participation 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 Leadership & Managing People industry regulations.
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 Women's Participation business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Women's Participation has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Leadership & Managing People industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Women's Participation needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Leadership & Managing People 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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Women's Participation 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 international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Women's Participation 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 Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries .
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries 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 Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries 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 Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries 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 Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries 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 Insights on Women's Labor Participation in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries 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 Women's Participation needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.