How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Global Business
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee
In mid-2013, the Lee family, which owned the Hong Kong-based food and health product giant Lee Kum Kee (LKK), struggled with how best to increase involvement of the fifth generation (G5), the children of the company's current fourth-generation (G4) senior executives and governance leaders. Only two of the fourteen G5 members had joined the company, and few had expressed interest in further involvement, including in the multiple learning and development programs the business offered, such as a mentoring program. Many of the G5 cousins had expressed little interest in business careers in general, and none of them currently was serving as an LKK intern. G4 members observed that their children were busy with family obligations, hobbies, and emerging careers outside the business. G5's lack of interest in business and governance roles was part of a growing pattern of low family engagement in general, exhibited by the cancellation of recent family retreats (once an annual tradition) because of apathy and some underlying conflict. A history of splits among past generations of the Lee family regarding business leadership made the engagement issue even more meaningful and critical. Students will consider the challenge from the point of view of G4 family members David Lee, chairman of the family's Family Office, and his sister, Elizabeth Mok, who ran the Family Learning and Development Center. They and their three siblings saw engaging the next generation as a top priority, one related to key concepts including family-business continuity, generational engagement and empowerment, succession, emotional ownership, and intrinsic/extrinsic motivation.
Authors :: John L. Ward, Carol Adler Zsolnay, Sachin Waikar
Swot Analysis of "How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee" written by John L. Ward, Carol Adler Zsolnay, Sachin Waikar includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that G5 Family facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Motivating people, Organizational culture, Succession planning and Global Business.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee casestudy better are - – cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, increasing energy prices, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, increasing commodity prices, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, wage bills are increasing,
digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the G5 Family, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which G5 Family 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 How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of G5 Family
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 G5 Family
Strengths How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of G5 Family in How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee Harvard Business Review case study are -
Highly skilled collaborators
– G5 Family 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 How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Training and development
– G5 Family has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee 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.
Learning organization
- G5 Family 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 G5 Family is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the G5 Family 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.
Strong track record of project management
– G5 Family is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Successful track record of launching new products
– G5 Family has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. G5 Family 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.
Organizational Resilience of G5 Family
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that G5 Family 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 G5 Family in the sector have low bargaining power. How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps G5 Family to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Global Business industry
– How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled G5 Family to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Global Business industry. The sustainable margins have also helped G5 Family to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Diverse revenue streams
– G5 Family is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee 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.
Innovation driven organization
– G5 Family is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of G5 Family in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Weaknesses How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee are -
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 G5 Family supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes mentioned in the HBR case study - How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee, it is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left G5 Family vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, G5 Family is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication mentioned in marketing section of case study How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee can help to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
G5 Family 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.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, John L. Ward, Carol Adler Zsolnay, Sachin Waikar suggests that, G5 Family 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.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee, in the dynamic environment G5 Family has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. G5 Family has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee 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 How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as G5 Family is planning to shift buying processes online.
Lack of clear differentiation of G5 Family products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, G5 Family needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee, is just above the industry average. G5 Family 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.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee, 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.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee 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 G5 Family 's lucrative customers.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at G5 Family 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 How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee | 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 How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee are -
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help G5 Family to increase its market reach. G5 Family 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, G5 Family 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, How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Manufacturing automation
– G5 Family 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for G5 Family 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.
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. G5 Family 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. G5 Family 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– G5 Family 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, G5 Family is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at G5 Family 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, G5 Family 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, G5 Family can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that G5 Family operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Global Business sector.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects G5 Family can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
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 G5 Family in the consumer business. Now G5 Family can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Loyalty marketing
– G5 Family 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.
Threats How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee are -
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee, G5 Family 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 G5 Family 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 wage structure of G5 Family
– 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 G5 Family.
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. G5 Family can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Consumer confidence and its impact on G5 Family 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.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, G5 Family 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 How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee .
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 G5 Family business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that G5 Family is facing in Global Business sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
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 G5 Family in the Global Business sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– G5 Family 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 G5 Family with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– G5 Family 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.
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. G5 Family 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee 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 How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee 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 How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee 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 How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee 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 How to Motivate the Fifth Generation? Balancing Engagement and Entitlement at Lee Kum Kee 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 G5 Family needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
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