Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Finance & Accounting
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship
There are many aspects of relationships between the board and management that are determined on a best effort basis. That is, the rules and by-laws of the company cannot pre-specify the detailed workings of the intersecting interests. Our system of capitalism depends on the good faith efforts of all concerned to derive effective working relationships. This case provides for a discussion of these issues in the context of Jack Wright and Mega Corporation.
Swot Analysis of "Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship" written by John L. Colley, Wallace Stettinius includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Wright Jack facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Compensation, Financial management, Labor, Operations management, Regulation and Finance & Accounting.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship casestudy better are - – central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, technology disruption, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, increasing transportation and logistics costs,
increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, wage bills are increasing, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Wright Jack, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Wright Jack 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 Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Wright Jack
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 Wright Jack
Strengths Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Wright Jack in Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship Harvard Business Review case study are -
Ability to lead change in Finance & Accounting field
– Wright Jack 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 Wright Jack in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Training and development
– Wright Jack has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship 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 recruit top talent
– Wright Jack is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Wright Jack 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.
Organizational Resilience of Wright Jack
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Wright Jack does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Wright Jack in the sector have low bargaining power. Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Wright Jack to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Diverse revenue streams
– Wright Jack is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship 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.
Digital Transformation in Finance & Accounting segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Wright Jack digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Wright Jack 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.
Strong track record of project management
– Wright Jack 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)
– Wright Jack 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 Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
High brand equity
– Wright Jack has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Wright Jack to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Wright Jack in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Weaknesses Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship are -
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship 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 Wright Jack has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Wright Jack, firm in the HBR case study Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Wright Jack 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Wright Jack is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Finance & Accounting segment. Wright Jack needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Wright Jack to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship, is just above the industry average. Wright Jack 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.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Wright Jack 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.
Lack of clear differentiation of Wright Jack products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Wright Jack needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Wright Jack 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.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship, it seems that company is thinking about the frontier risks that can impact Finance & Accounting 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.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, John L. Colley, Wallace Stettinius suggests that, Wright Jack 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.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Wright Jack 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.
Opportunities Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship | 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 Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship are -
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 Wright Jack in the consumer business. Now Wright Jack can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Loyalty marketing
– Wright Jack 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Wright Jack 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Wright Jack is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Wright Jack can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Wright Jack to increase its market reach. Wright Jack 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Wright Jack 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, Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Wright Jack has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Wright Jack to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship case study. Wright Jack 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 Finance & Accounting industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Wright Jack 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. Wright Jack 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Wright Jack 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 Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Wright Jack to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Wright Jack can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Wright Jack operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Finance & Accounting sector.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Finance & Accounting industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Wright Jack can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Wright Jack 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.
Threats Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship are -
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Wright Jack has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Finance & Accounting industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Wright Jack 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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Wright Jack is facing in Finance & Accounting sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Wright Jack 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.
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 Wright Jack.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Wright Jack in the Finance & Accounting industry. The Finance & Accounting 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.
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. Wright Jack needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Finance & Accounting industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Wright Jack 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 Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship .
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. Wright Jack 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.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Wright Jack 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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Wright Jack with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Wright Jack 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.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Finance & Accounting field will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Wright Jack can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship, Wright Jack may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Finance & Accounting .
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship 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 Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship 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 Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship 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 Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship 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 Corporate Governance: The Jack Wright Series #7-The Board-Management Relationship 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 Wright Jack needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.