Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Global Business
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses
This case comprises four scenarios that exemplify some of the benefits of a very brief, very inexpensive educational program, El Gran Proyecto Salta (The Big Leap Project). Salta was designed to assist female micro-entrepreneurs in developing countries by teaching them basic business knowledge so that they might make the leap to the next level of success. Salta instruction was provided free of cost to more than 100,000 Peruvian women in very brief stand-alone sessions (three hours per session) at exceptionally low cost to sponsors ($38 per participant). Four women who participated in Salta are featured in this case. Each of these micro-entrepreneurs' stories includes their personal backgrounds, their adaptations of Salta lessons and experiences, and the benefits derived for their businesses, families, communities, and for themselves.
Swot Analysis of "Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses" written by Christine Pearson includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Salta Leap facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Entrepreneurship, Innovation, Work-life balance and Global Business.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses casestudy better are - – digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, wage bills are increasing, there is backlash against globalization, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies,
there is increasing trade war between United States & China, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Salta Leap, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Salta Leap 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 Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Salta Leap
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 Salta Leap
Strengths Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Salta Leap in Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses Harvard Business Review case study are -
Digital Transformation in Global Business segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Salta Leap digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Salta Leap 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.
Learning organization
- Salta Leap 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 Salta Leap is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Ability to lead change in Global Business field
– Salta Leap 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 Salta Leap in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Salta Leap 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Salta Leap is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses 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.
Strong track record of project management
– Salta Leap is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Salta Leap in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Training and development
– Salta Leap has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses 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.
Analytics focus
– Salta Leap 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 Christine Pearson 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.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Salta Leap has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Salta Leap has effective processes in place that helps in exploring new product needs, doing quick pilot testing, and then launching the products quickly using its extensive distribution network.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Global Business industry
– Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Salta Leap to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Global Business industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Salta Leap to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Salta Leap is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Weaknesses Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses are -
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Salta Leap 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.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Salta Leap 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.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses, 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.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Salta Leap 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, Salta Leap is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication mentioned in marketing section of case study Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses can help to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses, it seems that the employees of Salta Leap 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.
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 Salta Leap supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes mentioned in the HBR case study - Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses, it is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Salta Leap vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Salta Leap 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 cash cycle compare to competitors
Salta Leap 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Salta Leap, firm in the HBR case study Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Lack of clear differentiation of Salta Leap products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Salta Leap needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Opportunities Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses | 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 Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses are -
Leveraging digital technologies
– Salta Leap can leverage digital technologies such as artificial intelligence and machine learning to automate the production process, customer analytics to get better insights into consumer behavior, realtime digital dashboards to get better sales tracking, logistics and transportation, product tracking, etc.
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 Salta Leap in the consumer business. Now Salta Leap can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Salta Leap to increase its market reach. Salta Leap 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, Salta Leap 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, Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Salta Leap 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Salta Leap 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 Salta Leap to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Salta Leap 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Salta Leap can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses 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.
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. Salta Leap can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
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 Salta Leap 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, Salta Leap is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses 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
– Salta Leap 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.
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. Salta Leap can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Threats Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses are -
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Salta Leap 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.
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.
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 Salta Leap.
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 Salta Leap business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Salta Leap is facing in Global Business sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Environmental challenges
– Salta Leap 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. Salta Leap can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Global Business industry.
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.
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 Salta Leap in the Global Business sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Salta Leap 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.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Salta Leap 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 Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses .
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. Salta Leap can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Salta Leap has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Global Business industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Salta Leap 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.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses, Salta Leap 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 Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses 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 Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses 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 Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses 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 Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses 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 Educating Female Micro-entrepreneurs; Making the Leap to Improve Their Businesses 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 Salta Leap needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
