Case Study Description of Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence
Georgie Yam went to Shanghai in 2001 as consultant for a German hair-care product line. Being a massage enthusiast, he quickly spotted a gap in the city's spa market for a value-for-money relaxation product. One discussion with his colleague and soon-to-be business partner, Eve Zhou, cemented the decision to begin drafting plans for a Western-style spa with a mystical oriental touch. Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats was launched in 2003. Within the first two years of operations, the partners had successfully opened three shops and had no plans of stopping there. By March 2009, Dragonfly operated a network of 20 local branches and three branches overseas. The question now was how to manage rapid expansion without compromising the brand and its high standards.
Swot Analysis of "Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence" written by Gilbert Wong, Po Chung, Josephine Lau includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Dragonfly Retreats facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Competitive strategy, Cross-cultural management, Design, Entrepreneurship, Operations management, Organizational structure and Innovation & Entrepreneurship.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence casestudy better are - – challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, increasing energy prices, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models,
geopolitical disruptions, wage bills are increasing, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Dragonfly Retreats, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Dragonfly Retreats 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 Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Dragonfly Retreats
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 Dragonfly Retreats
Strengths Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Dragonfly Retreats in Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence Harvard Business Review case study are -
Digital Transformation in Innovation & Entrepreneurship segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Dragonfly Retreats digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Dragonfly Retreats 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Dragonfly Retreats 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 Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Strong track record of project management
– Dragonfly Retreats 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 Dragonfly Retreats 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
– Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Dragonfly Retreats to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Dragonfly Retreats to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Dragonfly Retreats in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Dragonfly Retreats 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.
Analytics focus
– Dragonfly Retreats 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 Gilbert Wong, Po Chung, Josephine Lau 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.
Organizational Resilience of Dragonfly Retreats
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Dragonfly Retreats does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Learning organization
- Dragonfly Retreats 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 Dragonfly Retreats is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Ability to lead change in Innovation & Entrepreneurship field
– Dragonfly Retreats 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 Dragonfly Retreats in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Dragonfly Retreats is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Weaknesses Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence are -
Lack of clear differentiation of Dragonfly Retreats products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Dragonfly Retreats needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence, in the dynamic environment Dragonfly Retreats has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Dragonfly Retreats has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence 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 Dragonfly Retreats has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence 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 Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Dragonfly Retreats is planning to shift buying processes online.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence, is just above the industry average. Dragonfly Retreats 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.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Dragonfly Retreats 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Dragonfly Retreats, firm in the HBR case study Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Dragonfly Retreats 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.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Dragonfly Retreats 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 - Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Dragonfly Retreats 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.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence, it seems that the employees of Dragonfly Retreats 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 Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence | 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 Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence are -
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Dragonfly Retreats to increase its market reach. Dragonfly Retreats 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Dragonfly Retreats 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Dragonfly Retreats has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Dragonfly Retreats to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence case study. Dragonfly Retreats can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Dragonfly Retreats is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence 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. Dragonfly Retreats can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Dragonfly Retreats 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 Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Dragonfly Retreats to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Dragonfly Retreats 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, Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Dragonfly Retreats 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 Dragonfly Retreats to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
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. Dragonfly Retreats 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. Dragonfly Retreats 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.
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 Dragonfly Retreats in the consumer business. Now Dragonfly Retreats can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Buying journey improvements
– Dragonfly Retreats can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– Dragonfly Retreats 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.
Manufacturing automation
– Dragonfly Retreats 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.
Threats Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence are -
Environmental challenges
– Dragonfly Retreats 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. Dragonfly Retreats can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Dragonfly Retreats 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.
Regulatory challenges
– Dragonfly Retreats 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.
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 Dragonfly Retreats in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Dragonfly Retreats is facing in Innovation & Entrepreneurship sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Dragonfly Retreats 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.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Dragonfly Retreats 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 Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence .
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Dragonfly Retreats with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
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.
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. Dragonfly Retreats 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 Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence, Dragonfly Retreats 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 .
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Dragonfly Retreats 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 dependence on third party suppliers
– Dragonfly Retreats 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 Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence 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 Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence 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 Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence 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 Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence 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 Dragonfly Therapeutic Retreats: Creating an Affordable Indulgence 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 Dragonfly Retreats needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.