Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Global Business
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility
This technical note highlights the most useful resources for gathering data on particular companies or industries, including information relevant to ethics, accountability, and responsibility.
Authors :: Jared Harris, Jenny Mead, Mike Lenox, Susan Norrissey
Swot Analysis of "Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility" written by Jared Harris, Jenny Mead, Mike Lenox, Susan Norrissey includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Ethics Responsibility facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Decision making, Ethics, IT, Market research and Global Business.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility casestudy better are - – supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, there is backlash against globalization, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings,
wage bills are increasing, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Ethics Responsibility, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Ethics Responsibility 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 Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Ethics Responsibility
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 Ethics Responsibility
Strengths Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Ethics Responsibility in Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility Harvard Business Review case study are -
Strong track record of project management
– Ethics Responsibility is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Digital Transformation in Global Business segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Ethics Responsibility digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Ethics Responsibility 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Ethics Responsibility 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 Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Ethics Responsibility in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Ethics Responsibility is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Ethics Responsibility 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 Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Diverse revenue streams
– Ethics Responsibility is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility 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.
Organizational Resilience of Ethics Responsibility
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Ethics Responsibility 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 Ethics Responsibility in the sector have low bargaining power. Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Ethics Responsibility to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Ethics Responsibility 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.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Ethics Responsibility 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 Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility are -
Need for greater diversity
– Ethics Responsibility 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Ethics Responsibility 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility that the firm needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department in the case Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Ethics Responsibility is planning to shift buying processes online.
Lack of clear differentiation of Ethics Responsibility products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Ethics Responsibility needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Ethics Responsibility 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Ethics Responsibility 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.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility, it seems that the employees of Ethics Responsibility 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.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Ethics Responsibility 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 Ethics Responsibility is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Global Business segment. Ethics Responsibility needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Ethics Responsibility to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility, 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 Ethics Responsibility, firm in the HBR case study Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Opportunities Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility | 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 Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility are -
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Ethics Responsibility can still utilize the low interest rates to borrow money for capital investment. Secondly it can also use the increase of government spending in infrastructure projects to get new business.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Global Business industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Ethics Responsibility can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Ethics Responsibility 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.
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 Ethics Responsibility 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Ethics Responsibility is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility 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.
Manufacturing automation
– Ethics Responsibility 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Ethics Responsibility 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Ethics Responsibility has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Ethics Responsibility to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility case study. Ethics Responsibility can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Ethics Responsibility 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Ethics Responsibility to increase its market reach. Ethics Responsibility 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, Ethics Responsibility 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, Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
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 Ethics Responsibility in the consumer business. Now Ethics Responsibility can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
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. Ethics Responsibility can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Threats Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility are -
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Ethics Responsibility 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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Ethics Responsibility 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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Ethics Responsibility 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.
Environmental challenges
– Ethics Responsibility 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. Ethics Responsibility can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Global Business industry.
Regulatory challenges
– Ethics Responsibility 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.
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. Ethics Responsibility can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Ethics Responsibility 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 Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility .
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. Ethics Responsibility needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Global Business industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
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.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Ethics Responsibility 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.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Ethics Responsibility 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.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility, Ethics Responsibility may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Global Business .
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility 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 Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility 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 Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility 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 Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility 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 Conducting Research in Ethics and Corporate Responsibility 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 Ethics Responsibility needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.