Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Leadership & Managing People
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School
After completing her MBA in 2007, Toby Johnson, a former army pilot with the 18th Airborne Corps Rapid Deployment Force, joined PepsiCo's Leadership Development Program (LDP). For her first assignment with PepsiCo, Johnson accepted a position as a manufacturing-manager at a Frito-Lay plant in Williamsport, PA. The Williamsport plant had 200 employees and 54 million pounds of production per year. The case describes how Johnson took charge of the plant, and her action plan for implementing a new set of changes. During Johnson's tenure at Williamsport, the plant was nominated as a potential site for a company-wide transformative initiative. This initiative would entail major changes in the current team structure and incentive program within Frito-Lay. Johnson needed to think carefully about this change implementation.
Authors :: Boris Groysberg, Leslie Danford, Amy Lodge, Tereh Sayles
Swot Analysis of "Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School" written by Boris Groysberg, Leslie Danford, Amy Lodge, Tereh Sayles includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Williamsport Johnson facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Crisis management, Human resource management, Leadership, Organizational structure, Strategy execution and Leadership & Managing People.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School casestudy better are - – technology disruption, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs,
central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, increasing commodity prices, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Williamsport Johnson, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Williamsport Johnson 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 Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Williamsport Johnson
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Leadership & Managing People field.
4. Making a Leadership & Managing People topic specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Williamsport Johnson
Strengths Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Williamsport Johnson in Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School Harvard Business Review case study are -
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Williamsport Johnson in the sector have low bargaining power. Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Williamsport Johnson to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Learning organization
- Williamsport Johnson 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 Williamsport Johnson is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Williamsport Johnson 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 Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Analytics focus
– Williamsport Johnson 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 Boris Groysberg, Leslie Danford, Amy Lodge, Tereh Sayles 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School 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.
High brand equity
– Williamsport Johnson has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Williamsport Johnson to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Williamsport Johnson 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.
Organizational Resilience of Williamsport Johnson
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Williamsport Johnson does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Ability to lead change in Leadership & Managing People field
– Williamsport Johnson 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 Williamsport Johnson in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Williamsport Johnson 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 Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Strong track record of project management
– Williamsport Johnson is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Leadership & Managing People industry
– Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Williamsport Johnson to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Leadership & Managing People industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Williamsport Johnson to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Weaknesses Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School are -
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School 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 Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Williamsport Johnson is planning to shift buying processes online.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Williamsport Johnson 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 bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Boris Groysberg, Leslie Danford, Amy Lodge, Tereh Sayles suggests that, Williamsport Johnson 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Williamsport Johnson, firm in the HBR case study Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School, is just above the industry average. Williamsport Johnson 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 Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School, in the dynamic environment Williamsport Johnson has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Williamsport Johnson has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Williamsport Johnson 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.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School, it seems that company is thinking about the frontier risks that can impact Leadership & Managing People 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.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Williamsport Johnson 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.
High dependence on existing supply chain
– The disruption in the global supply chains because of the Covid-19 pandemic and blockage of the Suez Canal illustrated the fragile nature of Williamsport Johnson supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes mentioned in the HBR case study - Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School, it is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Williamsport Johnson vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Lack of clear differentiation of Williamsport Johnson products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Williamsport Johnson needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Opportunities Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School | 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 Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School are -
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– Consumer behavior has changed in the Leadership & Managing People industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Williamsport Johnson 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. Williamsport Johnson 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Williamsport Johnson is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Williamsport Johnson 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 Leadership & Managing People segment.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Williamsport Johnson 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Williamsport Johnson to increase its market reach. Williamsport Johnson 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Williamsport Johnson can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Williamsport Johnson 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.
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. Williamsport Johnson can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Leadership & Managing People industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Williamsport Johnson can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Williamsport Johnson can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Williamsport Johnson operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Leadership & Managing People sector.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Williamsport Johnson 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 Williamsport Johnson 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 Williamsport Johnson in the consumer business. Now Williamsport Johnson can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Williamsport Johnson 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.
Threats Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School are -
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.
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 Williamsport Johnson.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Williamsport Johnson 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 Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School .
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School, Williamsport Johnson may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Leadership & Managing People .
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Williamsport Johnson is facing in Leadership & Managing People sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
New competition
– After the dotcom bust of 2001, financial crisis of 2008-09, the business formation in US economy had declined. But in 2020 alone, there are more than 1.5 million new business applications in United States. This can lead to greater competition for Williamsport Johnson in the Leadership & Managing People sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Williamsport Johnson in the Leadership & Managing People industry. The Leadership & Managing People 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.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Leadership & Managing People field will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Williamsport Johnson 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
– Williamsport Johnson has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Leadership & Managing People industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Williamsport Johnson needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Leadership & Managing People 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.
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. Williamsport Johnson 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.
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 Williamsport Johnson business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Environmental challenges
– Williamsport Johnson 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. Williamsport Johnson can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Leadership & Managing People industry.
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. Williamsport Johnson needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Leadership & Managing People industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School 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 Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School 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 Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School 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 Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School 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 Toby Johnson (A): Leading After School 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 Williamsport Johnson needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.