Case Study Description of Sensible Life Products (B)
This supplement to Sensible Life Products (A), product #907M57, introduces a fifth opportunity in the form of a joint venture with a major product development firm. The deal involves Sensible Life Products cooperating in further developing the Benefect product into a consumer focused hand sanitizer product.
Swot Analysis of "Sensible Life Products (B)" written by Charlene Zietsma, Brent McKnight includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Life 907m57 facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Sensible Life Products (B) case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Social enterprise, Strategy and Innovation & Entrepreneurship.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Sensible Life Products (B) casestudy better are - – increasing commodity prices, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, wage bills are increasing, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, increasing transportation and logistics costs,
increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, increasing energy prices, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Sensible Life Products (B)
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Sensible Life Products (B) case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Life 907m57, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Life 907m57 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 Sensible Life Products (B) can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Sensible Life Products (B) case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Life 907m57
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 Life 907m57
Strengths Sensible Life Products (B) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Life 907m57 in Sensible Life Products (B) Harvard Business Review case study are -
Ability to lead change in Innovation & Entrepreneurship field
– Life 907m57 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 Life 907m57 in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Analytics focus
– Life 907m57 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 Charlene Zietsma, Brent McKnight 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.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Life 907m57 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry
– Sensible Life Products (B) firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Life 907m57 to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Life 907m57 to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Life 907m57 is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Sensible Life Products (B) are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Strong track record of project management
– Life 907m57 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 Life 907m57 in the sector have low bargaining power. Sensible Life Products (B) has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Life 907m57 to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Life 907m57 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 Sensible Life Products (B) - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Diverse revenue streams
– Life 907m57 is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Sensible Life Products (B) 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Life 907m57 in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Life 907m57 has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Life 907m57 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Life 907m57 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 Sensible Life Products (B) HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Weaknesses Sensible Life Products (B) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Sensible Life Products (B) are -
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Life 907m57 is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship segment. Life 907m57 needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Life 907m57 to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Sensible Life Products (B), 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.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Sensible Life Products (B), it seems that the employees of Life 907m57 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 star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Sensible Life Products (B) 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 Life 907m57 has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Life 907m57 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. Life 907m57 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.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Life 907m57 is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication mentioned in marketing section of case study Sensible Life Products (B) can help to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
High 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 Life 907m57 supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes mentioned in the HBR case study - Sensible Life Products (B), it is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Life 907m57 vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Life 907m57 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Life 907m57, firm in the HBR case study Sensible Life Products (B) needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Life 907m57 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Sensible Life Products (B) 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 Sensible Life Products (B) can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Life 907m57 is planning to shift buying processes online.
Opportunities Sensible Life Products (B) | 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 Sensible Life Products (B) are -
Manufacturing automation
– Life 907m57 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Life 907m57 to increase its market reach. Life 907m57 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, Life 907m57 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, Sensible Life Products (B), to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Life 907m57 can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Life 907m57 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 Life 907m57 to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Buying journey improvements
– Life 907m57 can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Sensible Life Products (B) 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Life 907m57 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 Innovation & Entrepreneurship segment.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Life 907m57 can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Life 907m57 operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Innovation & Entrepreneurship sector.
Loyalty marketing
– Life 907m57 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Life 907m57 in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship segment, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
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 Life 907m57 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.
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. Life 907m57 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. Life 907m57 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Life 907m57 can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Threats Sensible Life Products (B) External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Sensible Life Products (B) are -
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Life 907m57 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.
Environmental challenges
– Life 907m57 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. Life 907m57 can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Life 907m57 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.
High level of anxiety and lack of motivation
– the Great Resignation in United States is the sign of broader dissatisfaction among the workforce in United States. Life 907m57 needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Life 907m57 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 Sensible Life Products (B) .
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. Life 907m57 can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Life 907m57 is facing in Innovation & Entrepreneurship sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
New competition
– After the dotcom bust of 2001, financial crisis of 2008-09, the business formation in US economy had declined. But in 2020 alone, there are more than 1.5 million new business applications in United States. This can lead to greater competition for Life 907m57 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.
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 Life 907m57.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Sensible Life Products (B), Life 907m57 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 .
Increasing wage structure of Life 907m57
– 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 Life 907m57.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Life 907m57 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 Sensible Life Products (B) 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 Sensible Life Products (B) 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 Sensible Life Products (B) 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 Sensible Life Products (B) 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 Sensible Life Products (B) 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 Life 907m57 needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.