What's Next After an MBA? SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Global Business
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of What's Next After an MBA?
In August 2016, Manish Goyal, a student in his second year of the two-year MBA program at XLRI Jamshedpur, India, had to make career-related choices about which industry, company, function, and role to pursue after his MBA. He had limited previous work experience to rely on, but rather than choosing the first job that came his way or trying to join one of the more popular firms among MBA students, Goyal sought a job that best aligned with his own career objectives. Accordingly, he sought advice from three classmates on career options in the investment banking, management consulting, and fast-moving consumer goods industries. He realized that while his friends' input was valuable, ultimately he had to make his own decisions. Atul Arun Pathak is affiliated with XLRI-Xavier School of Management.
Swot Analysis of "What's Next After an MBA?" written by Atul Arun Pathak, Manish Goyal includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Mba Goyal facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in What's Next After an MBA? case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Talent management and Global Business.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the What's Next After an MBA? casestudy better are - – competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, increasing commodity prices, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, there is backlash against globalization, wage bills are increasing, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy,
increasing energy prices, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of What's Next After an MBA?
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in What's Next After an MBA? case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Mba Goyal, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Mba Goyal 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 What's Next After an MBA? can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in What's Next After an MBA? case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Mba Goyal
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Global Business field.
4. Making a Global Business topic specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Mba Goyal
Strengths What's Next After an MBA? | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Mba Goyal in What's Next After an MBA? Harvard Business Review case study are -
Learning organization
- Mba Goyal is a learning organization. It has inculcated three key characters of learning organization in its processes and operations – exploration, creativity, and expansiveness. The work place at Mba Goyal is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in What's Next After an MBA? Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Training and development
– Mba Goyal has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in What's Next After an MBA? 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
– Mba Goyal is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the What's Next After an MBA? are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Analytics focus
– Mba Goyal 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 Atul Arun Pathak, Manish Goyal 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
– Mba Goyal is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in What's Next After an MBA? 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.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Mba Goyal has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Mba Goyal 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Global Business industry
– What's Next After an MBA? firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Mba Goyal to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Global Business industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Mba Goyal to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
High brand equity
– Mba Goyal has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Mba Goyal to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Mba Goyal 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 What's Next After an MBA? HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Mba Goyal 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)
– Mba Goyal 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 What's Next After an MBA? - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Mba Goyal in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Weaknesses What's Next After an MBA? | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of What's Next After an MBA? are -
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Mba Goyal has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the industry over the last five years. Mba Goyal even though has strong showing on digital transformation primary two stages, it has struggled to capitalize the power of digital transformation in marketing efforts and new venture efforts.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Mba Goyal 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.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Mba Goyal 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 - What's Next After an MBA? should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As What's Next After an MBA? HBR case study mentions - Mba Goyal 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 operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study What's Next After an MBA? 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 Mba Goyal 's lucrative customers.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Mba Goyal 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.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Mba Goyal 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.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study What's Next After an MBA?, is just above the industry average. Mba Goyal 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 bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Atul Arun Pathak, Manish Goyal suggests that, Mba Goyal 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.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study What's Next After an MBA?, it seems that company is thinking about the frontier risks that can impact Global Business 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Mba Goyal, firm in the HBR case study What's Next After an MBA? needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Opportunities What's Next After an MBA? | 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 What's Next After an MBA? are -
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Mba Goyal 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, What's Next After an MBA?, 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 Mba Goyal has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Mba Goyal to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the What's Next After an MBA? case study. Mba Goyal can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Mba Goyal in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Global Business segment, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Manufacturing automation
– Mba Goyal can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Global Business 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
– Mba Goyal 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 What's Next After an MBA? - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Mba Goyal to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Buying journey improvements
– Mba Goyal can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. What's Next After an MBA? 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.
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 Mba Goyal 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.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– Consumer behavior has changed in the Global Business industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Mba Goyal 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. Mba Goyal 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Mba Goyal 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 Global Business segment.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Global Business industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Mba Goyal can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
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. Mba Goyal can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Mba Goyal 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Mba Goyal can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Threats What's Next After an MBA? External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study What's Next After an MBA? are -
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Mba Goyal 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 What's Next After an MBA? .
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Mba Goyal with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
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.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Mba Goyal 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.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Global Business field will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Mba Goyal can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
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.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Mba Goyal 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.
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 Mba Goyal.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Mba Goyal in the Global Business industry. The Global Business 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.
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 Mba Goyal business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Mba Goyal is facing in Global Business sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
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. Mba Goyal needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Global Business industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Regulatory challenges
– Mba Goyal 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 Global Business industry regulations.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of What's Next After an MBA? 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 What's Next After an MBA? 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 What's Next After an MBA? 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 What's Next After an MBA? 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 What's Next After an MBA? 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 Mba Goyal needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
