Swot Analysis of "Enman Oil, Inc. (D)" written by David F. Hawkins includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Enman Debt facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Enman Oil, Inc. (D) case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Business law, Financial management and Finance & Accounting.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Enman Oil, Inc. (D) casestudy better are - – talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, there is backlash against globalization, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, increasing energy prices, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, wage bills are increasing, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion,
challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Enman Oil, Inc. (D)
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Enman Oil, Inc. (D) case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Enman Debt, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Enman Debt 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 Enman Oil, Inc. (D) can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Enman Oil, Inc. (D) case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Enman Debt
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Finance & Accounting field.
4. Making a Finance & Accounting topic specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Enman Debt
Strengths Enman Oil, Inc. (D) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Enman Debt in Enman Oil, Inc. (D) Harvard Business Review case study are -
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Enman Debt in the sector have low bargaining power. Enman Oil, Inc. (D) has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Enman Debt to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Training and development
– Enman Debt has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Enman Oil, Inc. (D) 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 Enman Debt
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Enman Debt does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
High brand equity
– Enman Debt has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Enman Debt to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Enman Debt 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)
– Enman Debt 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 Enman Oil, Inc. (D) - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Analytics focus
– Enman Debt 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 David F. Hawkins 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Enman Oil, Inc. (D) Harvard Business Review case study comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the industry, building diversified operations across different geographies so that disruption in one part of the world doesn’t impact the overall performance of the firm, and integrating the various business operations and processes through its digital transformation drive.
Innovation driven organization
– Enman Debt is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Enman Oil, Inc. (D) Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Enman Debt has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Enman Debt 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.
Digital Transformation in Finance & Accounting segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Enman Debt digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Enman Debt 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.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Enman Debt 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.
Weaknesses Enman Oil, Inc. (D) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Enman Oil, Inc. (D) are -
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Enman Debt 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Enman Debt 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.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Enman Debt 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 - Enman Oil, Inc. (D) should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Enman Debt 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Enman Debt, firm in the HBR case study Enman Oil, Inc. (D) needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Enman Oil, Inc. (D) HBR case study mentions - Enman Debt 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.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Enman Debt 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.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study Enman Oil, Inc. (D), is just above the industry average. Enman Debt 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.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Enman Oil, Inc. (D), it seems that the employees of Enman Debt 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.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Enman Oil, Inc. (D) 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 Enman Debt has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study Enman Oil, Inc. (D) 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 Enman Debt 's lucrative customers.
Opportunities Enman Oil, Inc. (D) | 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 Enman Oil, Inc. (D) are -
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Enman Debt 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Enman Debt has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Enman Debt to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Enman Oil, Inc. (D) case study. Enman Debt can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, 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 Enman Debt 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Enman Debt 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Enman Debt is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Enman Oil, Inc. (D) 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Enman Debt in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Finance & Accounting segment, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Enman Debt 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, Enman Oil, Inc. (D), to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
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. Enman Debt can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Enman Debt 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 Enman Debt to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Enman Debt can make experimentation a productive activity and build a culture of innovation using approaches such as – mining transaction data, A/B testing of websites and selling platforms, engaging potential customers over various needs, and building on small ideas in the Finance & Accounting segment.
Loyalty marketing
– Enman Debt 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.
Manufacturing automation
– Enman Debt can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Finance & Accounting segment. It can use CAD and 3D printing to build a quick prototype and pilot testing products. It can leverage automation using machine learning and artificial intelligence to do faster production at lowers costs, and it can leverage the growth in satellite and tracking technologies to improve inventory management, transportation, and shipping.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Enman Debt 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 Enman Oil, Inc. (D) - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Enman Debt to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Threats Enman Oil, Inc. (D) External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Enman Oil, Inc. (D) are -
Increasing wage structure of Enman Debt
– 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 Enman Debt.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Enman Debt has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Finance & Accounting industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Enman Debt needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Finance & Accounting sector. According to Mckinsey study top managers believe that the adoption of technology in operations, communications is 20-25 times faster than what they planned in the beginning of 2019.
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. Enman Debt needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Finance & Accounting industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Enman Debt 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 Enman Debt.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Enman Debt 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. Enman Debt 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.
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 Enman Debt business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Environmental challenges
– Enman Debt 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. Enman Debt can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Finance & Accounting industry.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Enman Debt 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.
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.
Regulatory challenges
– Enman Debt needs to prepare for regulatory challenges as consumer protection groups and other pressure groups are vigorously advocating for more regulations on big business - to reduce inequality, to create a level playing field, to product data privacy and consumer privacy, to reduce the influence of big money on democratic institutions, etc. This can lead to significant changes in the Finance & Accounting industry regulations.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Enman Debt 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 Enman Oil, Inc. (D) 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 Enman Oil, Inc. (D) 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 Enman Oil, Inc. (D) 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 Enman Oil, Inc. (D) 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 Enman Oil, Inc. (D) 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 Enman Debt needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.