New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Innovation & Entrepreneurship
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue
A technical consultant is travelling to New York Bakery, and eastern U.S. confectionery company that is under bankruptcy protection. The consultant's task is to assess New York Bakery's readiness for the installation of a new payroll system, which will help it move through the bankruptcy process. By his first week on the job, the consultant realizes that his task is greater than he imagined. In trying to help the organization prepare for the changeover, he faces a series of tough decisions that require his immediate attention. The objective of this case series is to expose students to leadership dilemmas that have to be decided upon in real-time. Collectively, the series of choices the consultant has to make will determine whether or not the project stays on track or is derailed. The series consists of cases A to J, product numbers C1023A to C1023J.
Swot Analysis of "New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue" written by David Loree, Ken Mark includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Consultant York facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Financial management, Leadership, Operations management and Innovation & Entrepreneurship.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue casestudy better are - – increasing commodity prices, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, there is backlash against globalization, wage bills are increasing, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy,
technology disruption, geopolitical disruptions, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Consultant York, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Consultant York 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 New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Consultant York
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Innovation & Entrepreneurship field.
4. Making a Innovation & Entrepreneurship topic specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Consultant York
Strengths New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Consultant York in New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue Harvard Business Review case study are -
Successful track record of launching new products
– Consultant York has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Consultant York 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.
Innovation driven organization
– Consultant York is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Strong track record of project management
– Consultant York is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Organizational Resilience of Consultant York
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Consultant York does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Consultant York 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 New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Training and development
– Consultant York has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue 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.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Consultant York 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue 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.
Digital Transformation in Innovation & Entrepreneurship segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Consultant York digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Consultant York 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Consultant York is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Consultant York in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Consultant York 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 New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Weaknesses New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue are -
Need for greater diversity
– Consultant York 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.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Consultant York 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 - New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Consultant York 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. Consultant York 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.
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 Consultant York supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes mentioned in the HBR case study - New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue, it is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Consultant York vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Consultant York 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Consultant York 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.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue, it seems that company is thinking about the frontier risks that can impact Innovation & Entrepreneurship 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Consultant York 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.
Lack of clear differentiation of Consultant York products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Consultant York needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue 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 Consultant York has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue, it seems that the employees of Consultant York 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.
Opportunities New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue | 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 New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue are -
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Consultant York 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 Consultant York to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Buying journey improvements
– Consultant York can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Consultant York 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 Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Consultant York 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. Consultant York 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Consultant York 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Consultant York to increase its market reach. Consultant York 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 Consultant York can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Consultant York 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Consultant York 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 New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Consultant York to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Loyalty marketing
– Consultant York 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Consultant York 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, New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Consultant York in the consumer business. Now Consultant York can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Identify volunteer opportunities
– Covid-19 has impacted working population in two ways – it has led to people soul searching about their professional choices, resulting in mass resignation. Secondly it has encouraged people to do things that they are passionate about. This has opened opportunities for businesses to build volunteer oriented socially driven projects. Consultant York can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Threats New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue are -
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Consultant York is facing in Innovation & Entrepreneurship sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Consultant York 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.
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. Consultant York 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.
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 Consultant York business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Increasing wage structure of Consultant York
– 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 Consultant York.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Consultant York with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
Regulatory challenges
– Consultant York 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 Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry regulations.
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.
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.
Environmental challenges
– Consultant York 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. Consultant York can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Consultant York 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.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Consultant York 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.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Innovation & Entrepreneurship field will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Consultant York can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue 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 New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue 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 New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue 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 New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue 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 New York Bakery (E): Elevating an Issue 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 Consultant York needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
