Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Global Business
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements
Of all the issues boards of directors, executives, and managers face, one could argue that unethical corporate activity is one of the most significant in terms of its potential negative impact and also one of the most difficult to properly address. This article argues that three key elements must exist if illegal or unethical activity within and on behalf of organizations is to be minimized through developing and sustaining an ethical corporate culture. The three elements include (1) the existence of a set of core ethical values infused throughout the organization in its policies, processes, and practices; (2) the establishment of a formal ethics program, including a code of ethics, ethics training, an ethics hotline, and an ethics officer; and (3) the continuous presence of ethical leadership-that is, an appropriate 'tone at the top' as reflected by the board of directors, senior executives, and managers. While each of these three elements is distinct, they also overlap, relate to, and reinforce each other. This article discusses each of the three key elements necessary to develop and maintain an ethical corporate culture.
Swot Analysis of "Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements" written by Mark S Schwartz includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Ethics Ethical facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Financial management, Leadership and Global Business.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements casestudy better are - – cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , increasing commodity prices, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, there is backlash against globalization,
wage bills are increasing, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Ethics Ethical, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Ethics Ethical 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 Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Ethics Ethical
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 Ethical
Strengths Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Ethics Ethical in Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements Harvard Business Review case study are -
Innovation driven organization
– Ethics Ethical is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Learning organization
- Ethics Ethical 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 Ethics Ethical is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Analytics focus
– Ethics Ethical 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 Mark S Schwartz 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements 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.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Ethics Ethical 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
– Ethics Ethical is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Ethics Ethical in the sector have low bargaining power. Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Ethics Ethical to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Global Business industry
– Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Ethics Ethical to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Global Business industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Ethics Ethical to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Ethics Ethical 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 Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Ethics Ethical has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Ethics Ethical 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Ethics Ethical is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Organizational Resilience of Ethics Ethical
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Ethics Ethical does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Weaknesses Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements are -
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements 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 Ethics Ethical 's lucrative customers.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Ethics Ethical 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 - Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Lack of clear differentiation of Ethics Ethical products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Ethics Ethical needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Ethics Ethical is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Global Business segment. Ethics Ethical needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Ethics Ethical to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Ethics Ethical 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.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Ethics Ethical is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication mentioned in marketing section of case study Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements can help to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Ethics Ethical 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. Ethics Ethical 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements 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 Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Ethics Ethical is planning to shift buying processes online.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements HBR case study mentions - Ethics Ethical 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 bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Mark S Schwartz suggests that, Ethics Ethical 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.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements 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 Ethics Ethical has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Opportunities Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements | 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 Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements are -
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Ethics Ethical in the consumer business. Now Ethics Ethical can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Ethics Ethical 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Ethics Ethical 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Ethics Ethical has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Ethics Ethical to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements case study. Ethics Ethical can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– Consumer behavior has changed in the Global Business industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Ethics Ethical 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. Ethics Ethical 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Ethics Ethical can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Ethics Ethical operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Global Business sector.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Ethics Ethical 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, Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Buying journey improvements
– Ethics Ethical can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements 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.
Manufacturing automation
– Ethics Ethical 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 Ethical 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Ethics Ethical 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 Ethics Ethical to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Ethics Ethical 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 Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Ethics Ethical to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
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 Ethical can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Threats Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements are -
Regulatory challenges
– Ethics Ethical 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.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Ethics Ethical 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.
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 Ethical 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 Ethics Ethical 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, Ethics Ethical 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 Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements .
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Ethics Ethical high dependence on third party suppliers can disrupt its processes and delivery mechanism. For example -the current troubles of car makers because of chip shortage is because the chip companies started producing chips for electronic companies rather than car manufacturers.
Capital market disruption
– During the Covid-19, Dow Jones has touched record high. The valuations of a number of companies are way beyond their existing business model potential. This can lead to capital market correction which can put a number of suppliers, collaborators, value chain partners in great financial difficulty. It will directly impact the business of Ethics Ethical.
Increasing wage structure of Ethics Ethical
– 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 Ethics Ethical.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Ethics Ethical is facing in Global Business sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
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. Ethics Ethical 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.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements, Ethics Ethical 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 .
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 Ethics Ethical in the Global Business sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Ethics Ethical 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements 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 Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements 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 Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements 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 Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements 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 Developing and Sustaining an Ethical Corporate Culture: The Core Elements 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 Ethical needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.