Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
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Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing
Built into a pension fund's calculations was a 7% expected return, but in this world of debt, deficits, and quantitative easing (and negative interest rates!), could such a return be counted on? Or was it necessary to reduce the fund's expected returns assumptions? And whether or not assumptions on expected returns were changed, should the fund's global asset allocation be altered? This case provides an opportunity for students to form, in the context of an analysis of the global macroeconomic environment, five-year expected returns for major asset classes.
Swot Analysis of "Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing" written by Liz Wurster includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Fund's Expected facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Financial markets and Global Business.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing casestudy better are - – digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, increasing energy prices, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, technology disruption, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, geopolitical disruptions,
increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Fund's Expected, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Fund's Expected 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 Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Fund's Expected
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 Fund's Expected
Strengths Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Fund's Expected in Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing Harvard Business Review case study are -
Ability to recruit top talent
– Fund's Expected is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Ability to lead change in Global Business field
– Fund's Expected 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 Fund's Expected in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
High brand equity
– Fund's Expected has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Fund's Expected to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Fund's Expected is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing 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 Global Business segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Fund's Expected digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Fund's Expected 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 Fund's Expected 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.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Fund's Expected 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 Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Organizational Resilience of Fund's Expected
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Fund's Expected does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Fund's Expected 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 Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Innovation driven organization
– Fund's Expected is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Learning organization
- Fund's Expected 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 Fund's Expected is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Weaknesses Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing are -
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Fund's Expected is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Global Business segment. Fund's Expected needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Fund's Expected to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Need for greater diversity
– Fund's Expected 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.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Liz Wurster suggests that, Fund's Expected 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 Fund's Expected 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.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing 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 Fund's Expected has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Fund's Expected 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Fund's Expected 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Fund's Expected needs to come up with a strategy to reduce the workers concern regarding automation. Without a clear strategy, it could lead to disruption and uncertainty within the organization.
High dependence on existing supply chain
– The disruption in the global supply chains because of the Covid-19 pandemic and blockage of the Suez Canal illustrated the fragile nature of Fund's Expected supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes mentioned in the HBR case study - Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing, it is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Fund's Expected vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Fund's Expected 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. Fund's Expected 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Fund's Expected, firm in the HBR case study Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Opportunities Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing | 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 Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing are -
Buying journey improvements
– Fund's Expected can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Fund's Expected 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Fund's Expected 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. Fund's Expected can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Developing new processes and practices
– Fund's Expected can develop new processes and procedures in Global Business industry using technology such as automation using artificial intelligence, real time transportation and products tracking, 3D modeling for concept development and new products pilot testing etc.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Fund's Expected can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Fund's Expected operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Global Business sector.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Fund's Expected to increase its market reach. Fund's Expected 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Fund's Expected can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Loyalty marketing
– Fund's Expected 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Fund's Expected to conduct training and development for its employees across the world. This will result in not only reducing the cost of training but also help employees in different part of the world to integrate with the headquarter work culture, ethos, and standards.
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. Fund's Expected 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. Fund's Expected 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Fund's Expected 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 Fund's Expected to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Fund's Expected 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, Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Threats Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing are -
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. Fund's Expected can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Fund's Expected 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 Fund's Expected with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
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 Fund's Expected.
New competition
– After the dotcom bust of 2001, financial crisis of 2008-09, the business formation in US economy had declined. But in 2020 alone, there are more than 1.5 million new business applications in United States. This can lead to greater competition for Fund's Expected in the Global Business sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
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.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing, Fund's Expected 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 .
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Fund's Expected 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.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Fund's Expected 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 Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing .
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Fund's Expected has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Global Business industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Fund's Expected needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Global Business 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. Fund's Expected needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Global Business industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Fund's Expected is facing in Global Business sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Increasing wage structure of Fund's Expected
– 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 Fund's Expected.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing 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 Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing 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 Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing 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 Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing 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 Global Asset Allocation: Investing in a Time of Debt, Deficits, and Quantitative Easing 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 Fund's Expected needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
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