Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Innovation & Entrepreneurship
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests
Innovation contests are increasingly used by businesses to identify new ideas for better servicing their customers; yet, the degree to which the innovation contests provide new ideas has been disappointing. We describe the case of a large innovation contest via which we examined the role of three elements of the online discussion context to predict whether innovative ideas are generated during the contest. The three elements are: (1) the discussion thread's amount of variety (i.e., variation of participants' familiarity with the topic or organizational background), (2) the amount of collaborative versus argumentative posts that have been made in the discussion prior to a contributor's innovative post, and (3) whether the discussion includes previous posts from the participant prior to the innovative post. We found three ideal profiles for a person generating innovative ideas: (1) he or she posts after participants who have substantial variation in familiarity with the topic, (2) he/she posts on discussion threads in which participants focus their contributions on adding their own perspectives, not on arguing with others, and (3) he/she has not previously posted. These findings lead to specific implications for managing innovation contests.
Swot Analysis of "Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests" written by Albert Armisen, Ann Majchrzak includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Posts Contests facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Operations management, Social platforms and Innovation & Entrepreneurship.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests casestudy better are - – increasing transportation and logistics costs, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, there is backlash against globalization, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models,
technology disruption, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Posts Contests, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Posts Contests 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 Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Posts Contests
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 Posts Contests
Strengths Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Posts Contests in Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests Harvard Business Review case study are -
Ability to recruit top talent
– Posts Contests is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
High brand equity
– Posts Contests has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Posts Contests to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Posts Contests 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 Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests - 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
– Posts Contests has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests 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 Posts Contests 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.
Learning organization
- Posts Contests 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 Posts Contests is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Analytics focus
– Posts Contests 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 Albert Armisen, Ann Majchrzak 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Posts Contests is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests 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.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Posts Contests 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests 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.
Organizational Resilience of Posts Contests
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Posts Contests does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Posts Contests has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Posts Contests 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.
Weaknesses Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests are -
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Posts Contests is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship segment. Posts Contests needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Posts Contests to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Posts Contests 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.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests 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 Posts Contests has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Need for greater diversity
– Posts Contests 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Posts Contests 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.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Posts Contests 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 - Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Posts Contests, firm in the HBR case study Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests, it seems that the employees of Posts Contests 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.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests, is just above the industry average. Posts Contests needs to redesign the compensation structure and incentives to increase the revenue per employees. Some of the steps that it can take are – hiring more specialists on project basis, etc.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Posts Contests is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication mentioned in marketing section of case study Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests 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 cash cycle compare to competitors
Posts Contests has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Opportunities Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests | 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 Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests are -
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Posts Contests 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 Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Posts Contests to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Posts Contests 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Posts Contests 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Posts Contests 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Posts Contests is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Posts Contests can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Posts Contests 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 Posts Contests to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
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. Posts Contests can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Posts Contests 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Posts Contests can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Posts Contests operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Innovation & Entrepreneurship sector.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Posts Contests can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Developing new processes and practices
– Posts Contests 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Posts Contests 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.
Threats Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests are -
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Posts Contests with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
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 Posts Contests business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
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. Posts Contests 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.
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. Posts Contests needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
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.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Posts Contests 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.
Regulatory challenges
– Posts Contests 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.
Environmental challenges
– Posts Contests 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. Posts Contests can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry.
Increasing wage structure of Posts Contests
– 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 Posts Contests.
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. Posts Contests can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests, Posts Contests 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 .
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Posts Contests is facing in Innovation & Entrepreneurship sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Posts Contests 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests 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 Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests 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 Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests 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 Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests 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 Tapping the innovative business potential of innovation contests 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 Posts Contests needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.