Case Study Description of Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround Strategy
Earlham College in Richmond, Indiana, is in the heart of basketball country. Yet its record for the 2013/2014 basketball season was a dismal 5-20. The school recruited Jason Polykoff from the University of Pennsylvania's coaching staff to reinvent the program. By summer, Polykoff learned that only three players would be returning. That left him with a major decision: scramble to recruit enough players to fill the roster and play the 2014/2015 season, or forfeit the season and devote time to building the 2015/2016 roster. Each option would have a major detrimental impact in his ability to recruit in the future.
Swot Analysis of "Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround Strategy" written by Juan Alcacer, Anne Marie Knott includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Earlham Polykoff facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround Strategy case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Human resource management, Strategy and Innovation & Entrepreneurship.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround Strategy casestudy better are - – supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , increasing transportation and logistics costs, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, increasing energy prices, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models,
banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, wage bills are increasing, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround Strategy
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround Strategy case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Earlham Polykoff, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Earlham Polykoff 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 Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround Strategy can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround Strategy case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Earlham Polykoff
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Innovation & Entrepreneurship field.
4. Making a Innovation & Entrepreneurship topic specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Earlham Polykoff
Strengths Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround Strategy | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Earlham Polykoff in Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround Strategy Harvard Business Review case study are -
Strong track record of project management
– Earlham Polykoff 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
– Earlham Polykoff has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Earlham Polykoff 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 Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround Strategy HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry
– Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround Strategy firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Earlham Polykoff to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Earlham Polykoff to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Analytics focus
– Earlham Polykoff 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 Juan Alcacer, Anne Marie Knott 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Earlham Polykoff is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Earlham Polykoff in the sector have low bargaining power. Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround Strategy has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Earlham Polykoff to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
High brand equity
– Earlham Polykoff has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Earlham Polykoff to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Earlham Polykoff has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Earlham Polykoff 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.
Innovation driven organization
– Earlham Polykoff is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround Strategy Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Earlham Polykoff 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.
Ability to lead change in Innovation & Entrepreneurship field
– Earlham Polykoff 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 Earlham Polykoff in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Weaknesses Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround Strategy | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround Strategy are -
Need for greater diversity
– Earlham Polykoff 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.
Lack of clear differentiation of Earlham Polykoff products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Earlham Polykoff needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Earlham Polykoff, firm in the HBR case study Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround 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 Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround 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 Earlham Polykoff 's lucrative customers.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround Strategy, is just above the industry average. Earlham Polykoff 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Earlham Polykoff 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.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Earlham Polykoff 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Earlham Polykoff 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.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Earlham Polykoff has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround Strategy 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 Earlham Polykoff has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Juan Alcacer, Anne Marie Knott suggests that, Earlham Polykoff 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.
Opportunities Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround 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 Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround Strategy are -
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Earlham Polykoff to increase its market reach. Earlham Polykoff 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Earlham Polykoff 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Earlham Polykoff can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Earlham Polykoff 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, Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Earlham Polykoff can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– Consumer behavior has changed in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Earlham Polykoff 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. Earlham Polykoff 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Earlham Polykoff can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Earlham Polykoff can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Earlham Polykoff operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Innovation & Entrepreneurship sector.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Earlham Polykoff 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Earlham Polykoff 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Earlham Polykoff 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 Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround Strategy - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Earlham Polykoff to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Earlham Polykoff 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 Innovation & Entrepreneurship segment.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Earlham Polykoff is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround 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.
Threats Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround Strategy External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround Strategy are -
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Earlham Polykoff 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 Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround Strategy .
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Earlham Polykoff 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.
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.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Earlham Polykoff 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.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Earlham Polykoff in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry. The Innovation & Entrepreneurship 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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Earlham Polykoff 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.
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 Earlham Polykoff.
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 Earlham Polykoff in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
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 Earlham Polykoff business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Aging population
– As the populations of most advanced economies are aging, it will lead to high social security costs, higher savings among population, and lower demand for goods and services in the economy. The household savings in US, France, UK, Germany, and Japan are growing faster than predicted because of uncertainty caused by pandemic.
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. Earlham Polykoff 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
– Earlham Polykoff 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 Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry regulations.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Earlham Polykoff 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 Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround 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 Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround 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 Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround 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 Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround 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 Earlham College Basketball: Turnaround 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 Earlham Polykoff needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
