B&C crossing borders in Russia (A) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Innovation & Entrepreneurship
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of B&C crossing borders in Russia (A)
The three part case discusses managing the dilemma of compliance versus entrepreneurial decisions ("intrapreneurship") in a large corporation and decision-making processes in mature markets (here: US HQ) vs. emerging markets (here: Russia). The case concerns a medical devices company and the life sciences industry; however, market mechanisms are applicable to other industries as well. In Case A, two experienced Russian managers face a tempting business opportunity: founding a professional education center for healthcare personnel in one of the most prosperous regions of Central Asia seems to offer win-win situations for all stakeholders involved. Case B aims at strengthening the student's capabilities for thinking about alternatives and developing the tenacity to pursue entrepreneurial ideas. The case closes in the third section by asking "Was it worth it?"
Swot Analysis of "B&C crossing borders in Russia (A)" written by Katharina Lange includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Russia Win facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in B&C crossing borders in Russia (A) case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, and Innovation & Entrepreneurship.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the B&C crossing borders in Russia (A) casestudy better are - – digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, increasing energy prices, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies,
increasing transportation and logistics costs, technology disruption, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of B&C crossing borders in Russia (A)
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in B&C crossing borders in Russia (A) case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Russia Win, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Russia Win 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 B&C crossing borders in Russia (A) can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in B&C crossing borders in Russia (A) case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Russia Win
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 Russia Win
Strengths B&C crossing borders in Russia (A) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Russia Win in B&C crossing borders in Russia (A) Harvard Business Review case study are -
Analytics focus
– Russia Win 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 Katharina Lange 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.
Training and development
– Russia Win has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in B&C crossing borders in Russia (A) 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry
– B&C crossing borders in Russia (A) firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Russia Win to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Russia Win to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Russia Win 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.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Russia Win 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 B&C crossing borders in Russia (A) - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Learning organization
- Russia Win 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 Russia Win is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in B&C crossing borders in Russia (A) Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Russia Win 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 B&C crossing borders in Russia (A) HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Russia Win 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.
Innovation driven organization
– Russia Win is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in B&C crossing borders in Russia (A) Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Organizational Resilience of Russia Win
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Russia Win does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
High brand equity
– Russia Win has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Russia Win to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Strong track record of project management
– Russia Win is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Weaknesses B&C crossing borders in Russia (A) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of B&C crossing borders in Russia (A) are -
Lack of clear differentiation of Russia Win products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Russia Win needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Russia Win 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. Russia Win 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 star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the B&C crossing borders in Russia (A) 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 Russia Win has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As B&C crossing borders in Russia (A) HBR case study mentions - Russia Win 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Russia Win has not been able to do capital spending to the tune of the competition. This has resulted into fewer innovations and company facing stiff competition from both existing competitors and new entrants who are disrupting the industry using digital technology.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Russia Win 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.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study B&C crossing borders in Russia (A), it seems that the employees of Russia Win 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 bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Katharina Lange suggests that, Russia Win 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 operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study B&C crossing borders in Russia (A) 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 Russia Win 's lucrative customers.
Need for greater diversity
– Russia Win 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.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Russia Win 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.
Opportunities B&C crossing borders in Russia (A) | 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 B&C crossing borders in Russia (A) are -
Developing new processes and practices
– Russia Win can develop new processes and procedures in Innovation & Entrepreneurship 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Russia Win can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. B&C crossing borders in Russia (A) 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Russia Win 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.
Manufacturing automation
– Russia Win can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Innovation & Entrepreneurship 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Russia Win 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 B&C crossing borders in Russia (A) - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Russia Win to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Russia Win can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Russia Win is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. B&C crossing borders in Russia (A) 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.
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 Russia Win 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Russia Win 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Russia Win can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Russia Win operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Innovation & Entrepreneurship sector.
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 Russia Win in the consumer business. Now Russia Win can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Loyalty marketing
– Russia Win 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Russia Win has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Russia Win to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the B&C crossing borders in Russia (A) case study. Russia Win can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Threats B&C crossing borders in Russia (A) External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study B&C crossing borders in Russia (A) are -
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Russia Win 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.
Regulatory challenges
– Russia Win 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.
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 Russia Win.
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 Russia Win in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Technology disruption because of hacks, piracy etc
– The colonial pipeline illustrated, how vulnerable modern organization are to international hackers, miscreants, and disruptors. The cyber security interruption, data leaks, etc can seriously jeopardize the future growth of the organization.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Russia Win in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry. The Innovation & Entrepreneurship 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.
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. Russia Win 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.
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.
Increasing wage structure of Russia Win
– 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 Russia Win.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Russia Win 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.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study B&C crossing borders in Russia (A), Russia Win may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Innovation & Entrepreneurship .
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Russia Win 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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Russia Win with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of B&C crossing borders in Russia (A) 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 B&C crossing borders in Russia (A) 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 B&C crossing borders in Russia (A) 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 B&C crossing borders in Russia (A) 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 B&C crossing borders in Russia (A) 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 Russia Win needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
