Swot Analysis of "Sarah Vickers-Willis: Career Decisions (B)" written by Myra M. Hart, Lynda M. Applegate, Susan Saltrick, Sarah Harden includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Vickers Willis facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Sarah Vickers-Willis: Career Decisions (B) case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Entrepreneurship, Gender, Internet, Leadership, Organizational culture, Social responsibility and Innovation & Entrepreneurship.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Sarah Vickers-Willis: Career Decisions (B) casestudy better are - – increasing household debt because of falling income levels, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, increasing commodity prices, increasing energy prices, geopolitical disruptions, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies,
talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, there is backlash against globalization, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Sarah Vickers-Willis: Career Decisions (B)
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Sarah Vickers-Willis: Career Decisions (B) case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Vickers Willis, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Vickers Willis 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 Sarah Vickers-Willis: Career Decisions (B) can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Sarah Vickers-Willis: Career Decisions (B) case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Vickers Willis
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 Vickers Willis
Strengths Sarah Vickers-Willis: Career Decisions (B) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Vickers Willis in Sarah Vickers-Willis: Career Decisions (B) Harvard Business Review case study are -
High brand equity
– Vickers Willis has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Vickers Willis to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Ability to lead change in Innovation & Entrepreneurship field
– Vickers Willis 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 Vickers Willis in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Analytics focus
– Vickers Willis 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 Myra M. Hart, Lynda M. Applegate, Susan Saltrick, Sarah Harden 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Vickers Willis 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 Sarah Vickers-Willis: Career Decisions (B) HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Vickers Willis 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 Sarah Vickers-Willis: Career Decisions (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.
Training and development
– Vickers Willis has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Sarah Vickers-Willis: Career Decisions (B) 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
– Sarah Vickers-Willis: Career Decisions (B) firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Vickers Willis to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Vickers Willis to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Digital Transformation in Innovation & Entrepreneurship segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Vickers Willis digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Vickers Willis 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.
Organizational Resilience of Vickers Willis
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Vickers Willis does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Sarah Vickers-Willis: Career Decisions (B) 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Vickers Willis is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Sarah Vickers-Willis: Career Decisions (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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Vickers Willis in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Weaknesses Sarah Vickers-Willis: Career Decisions (B) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Sarah Vickers-Willis: Career Decisions (B) are -
Lack of clear differentiation of Vickers Willis products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Vickers Willis needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Vickers Willis 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Vickers Willis 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Vickers Willis is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship segment. Vickers Willis needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Vickers Willis to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Vickers Willis 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.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study Sarah Vickers-Willis: Career Decisions (B) 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 Vickers Willis 's lucrative customers.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Myra M. Hart, Lynda M. Applegate, Susan Saltrick, Sarah Harden suggests that, Vickers Willis 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.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Vickers Willis 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. Vickers Willis 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Vickers Willis, firm in the HBR case study Sarah Vickers-Willis: Career Decisions (B) needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Sarah Vickers-Willis: Career Decisions (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.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study Sarah Vickers-Willis: Career Decisions (B), in the dynamic environment Vickers Willis has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Vickers Willis has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Opportunities Sarah Vickers-Willis: Career Decisions (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 Sarah Vickers-Willis: Career Decisions (B) are -
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Vickers Willis 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Vickers Willis can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Vickers Willis operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Innovation & Entrepreneurship sector.
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. Vickers Willis can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Developing new processes and practices
– Vickers Willis 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Vickers Willis 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Vickers Willis 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 Vickers Willis to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
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 Vickers Willis in the consumer business. Now Vickers Willis can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
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. Vickers Willis 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. Vickers Willis 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Vickers Willis 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 Vickers Willis has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Vickers Willis to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Sarah Vickers-Willis: Career Decisions (B) case study. Vickers Willis can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Manufacturing automation
– Vickers Willis 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.
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. Vickers Willis can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Vickers Willis 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.
Threats Sarah Vickers-Willis: Career Decisions (B) External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Sarah Vickers-Willis: Career Decisions (B) are -
Increasing wage structure of Vickers Willis
– 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 Vickers Willis.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Vickers Willis 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.
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 Vickers Willis business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Vickers Willis is facing in Innovation & Entrepreneurship sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
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.
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. Vickers Willis needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Vickers Willis high dependence on third party suppliers can disrupt its processes and delivery mechanism. For example -the current troubles of car makers because of chip shortage is because the chip companies started producing chips for electronic companies rather than car manufacturers.
Capital market disruption
– During the Covid-19, Dow Jones has touched record high. The valuations of a number of companies are way beyond their existing business model potential. This can lead to capital market correction which can put a number of suppliers, collaborators, value chain partners in great financial difficulty. It will directly impact the business of Vickers Willis.
Regulatory challenges
– Vickers Willis 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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Vickers Willis 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.
Environmental challenges
– Vickers Willis 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. Vickers Willis can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship 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.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Vickers Willis 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 Sarah Vickers-Willis: Career Decisions (B) .
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Sarah Vickers-Willis: Career Decisions (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 Sarah Vickers-Willis: Career Decisions (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 Sarah Vickers-Willis: Career Decisions (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 Sarah Vickers-Willis: Career Decisions (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 Sarah Vickers-Willis: Career Decisions (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 Vickers Willis needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.