Swot Analysis of "Dr. John's Products Ltd." written by William A. Sahlman includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that John's Toothbrush facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Dr. John's Products Ltd. case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Financial management, Innovation, Intellectual property, Joint ventures and Innovation & Entrepreneurship.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Dr. John's Products Ltd. casestudy better are - – increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, increasing commodity prices, technology disruption, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, geopolitical disruptions,
challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Dr. John's Products Ltd.
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Dr. John's Products Ltd. case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the John's Toothbrush, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which John's Toothbrush 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 Dr. John's Products Ltd. can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Dr. John's Products Ltd. case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of John's Toothbrush
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 John's Toothbrush
Strengths Dr. John's Products Ltd. | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of John's Toothbrush in Dr. John's Products Ltd. Harvard Business Review case study are -
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that John's Toothbrush 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.
Digital Transformation in Innovation & Entrepreneurship segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For John's Toothbrush digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. John's Toothbrush has successfully integrated the four key components of digital transformation – digital integration in processes, digital integration in marketing and customer relationship management, digital integration into the value chain, and using technology to explore new products and market opportunities.
Ability to lead change in Innovation & Entrepreneurship field
– John's Toothbrush 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 John's Toothbrush in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
High brand equity
– John's Toothbrush has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled John's Toothbrush to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Strong track record of project management
– John's Toothbrush is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the John's Toothbrush 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of John's Toothbrush in the sector have low bargaining power. Dr. John's Products Ltd. has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps John's Toothbrush to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Highly skilled collaborators
– John's Toothbrush 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 Dr. John's Products Ltd. HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Learning organization
- John's Toothbrush 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 John's Toothbrush is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Dr. John's Products Ltd. Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Organizational Resilience of John's Toothbrush
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that John's Toothbrush does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry
– Dr. John's Products Ltd. firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled John's Toothbrush to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry. The sustainable margins have also helped John's Toothbrush to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Analytics focus
– John's Toothbrush 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 William A. Sahlman 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.
Weaknesses Dr. John's Products Ltd. | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Dr. John's Products Ltd. are -
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Dr. John's Products Ltd. 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 John's Toothbrush has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, John's Toothbrush is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication mentioned in marketing section of case study Dr. John's Products Ltd. can help to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at John's Toothbrush 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.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Dr. John's Products Ltd. HBR case study mentions - John's Toothbrush 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.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study Dr. John's Products Ltd., is just above the industry average. John's Toothbrush 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.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study Dr. John's Products Ltd., in the dynamic environment John's Toothbrush has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. John's Toothbrush has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Dr. John's Products Ltd., 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.
Products dominated business model
– Even though John's Toothbrush 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 - Dr. John's Products Ltd. should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, John's Toothbrush 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.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study Dr. John's Products Ltd. 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 John's Toothbrush 's lucrative customers.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Dr. John's Products Ltd., it seems that the employees of John's Toothbrush don’t have comprehensive understanding of the firm’s strategy. This is reflected in number of promotional campaigns over the last few years that had mixed messaging and competing priorities. Some of the strategic activities and services promoted in the promotional campaigns were not consistent with the organization’s strategy.
Opportunities Dr. John's Products Ltd. | 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 Dr. John's Products Ltd. are -
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for John's Toothbrush 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for John's Toothbrush 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at John's Toothbrush 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, John's Toothbrush is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Dr. John's Products Ltd. 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.
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. John's Toothbrush can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Buying journey improvements
– John's Toothbrush can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Dr. John's Products Ltd. 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 John's Toothbrush 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 John's Toothbrush to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help John's Toothbrush to increase its market reach. John's Toothbrush 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.
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. John's Toothbrush can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Manufacturing automation
– John's Toothbrush 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
– John's Toothbrush 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 Dr. John's Products Ltd. - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help John's Toothbrush to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Developing new processes and practices
– John's Toothbrush 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, John's Toothbrush 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, Dr. John's Products Ltd., to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Threats Dr. John's Products Ltd. External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Dr. John's Products Ltd. are -
Regulatory challenges
– John's Toothbrush 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.
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.
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 John's Toothbrush in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship sector and impact the bottomline 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. John's Toothbrush needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Dr. John's Products Ltd., John's Toothbrush 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 John's Toothbrush is facing in Innovation & Entrepreneurship sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents John's Toothbrush with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– John's Toothbrush 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.
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 John's Toothbrush business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
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. John's Toothbrush can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– John's Toothbrush has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, John's Toothbrush needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship sector. According to Mckinsey study top managers believe that the adoption of technology in operations, communications is 20-25 times faster than what they planned in the beginning of 2019.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– John's Toothbrush 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.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for John's Toothbrush 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Dr. John's Products Ltd. 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 Dr. John's Products Ltd. 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 Dr. John's Products Ltd. 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 Dr. John's Products Ltd. 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 Dr. John's Products Ltd. 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 John's Toothbrush needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
