Swot Analysis of "Elizabeth Parker (B)" written by C. Wickham Skinner, Tiziana Casciaro, David Krackhardt includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Elizabeth Parker facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Elizabeth Parker (B) case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Government, Influence and Leadership & Managing People.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Elizabeth Parker (B) casestudy better are - – central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, technology disruption, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, increasing transportation and logistics costs, increasing commodity prices,
wage bills are increasing, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Elizabeth Parker (B)
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Elizabeth Parker (B) case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Elizabeth Parker, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Elizabeth Parker 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 Elizabeth Parker (B) can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Elizabeth Parker (B) case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Elizabeth Parker
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 Elizabeth Parker
Strengths Elizabeth Parker (B) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Elizabeth Parker in Elizabeth Parker (B) Harvard Business Review case study are -
Ability to lead change in Leadership & Managing People field
– Elizabeth Parker 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 Elizabeth Parker 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)
– Elizabeth Parker 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 Elizabeth Parker (B) - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Training and development
– Elizabeth Parker has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Elizabeth Parker (B) Harvard Business Review case study by analyzing – employees retention, in-house promotion, loyalty, new venture initiation, lack of conflict, and high level of both employees and customer engagement.
Diverse revenue streams
– Elizabeth Parker is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Elizabeth Parker (B) 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Elizabeth Parker is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Elizabeth Parker (B) are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Innovation driven organization
– Elizabeth Parker is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Elizabeth Parker (B) Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Elizabeth Parker (B) Harvard Business Review case study comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the industry, building diversified operations across different geographies so that disruption in one part of the world doesn’t impact the overall performance of the firm, and integrating the various business operations and processes through its digital transformation drive.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Elizabeth Parker 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 Elizabeth Parker (B) HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Analytics focus
– Elizabeth Parker 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 C. Wickham Skinner, Tiziana Casciaro, David Krackhardt 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Elizabeth Parker in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Organizational Resilience of Elizabeth Parker
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Elizabeth Parker does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Elizabeth Parker 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.
Weaknesses Elizabeth Parker (B) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Elizabeth Parker (B) are -
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Elizabeth Parker is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Leadership & Managing People segment. Elizabeth Parker needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Elizabeth Parker to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Elizabeth Parker (B) 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 Elizabeth Parker has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
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 Elizabeth Parker supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes mentioned in the HBR case study - Elizabeth Parker (B), it is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Elizabeth Parker vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Elizabeth Parker (B) 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 Elizabeth Parker (B) can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Elizabeth Parker is planning to shift buying processes online.
Lack of clear differentiation of Elizabeth Parker products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Elizabeth Parker needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, C. Wickham Skinner, Tiziana Casciaro, David Krackhardt suggests that, Elizabeth Parker 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Elizabeth Parker 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.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Elizabeth Parker 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 - Elizabeth Parker (B) should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Elizabeth Parker 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.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study Elizabeth Parker (B), in the dynamic environment Elizabeth Parker has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Elizabeth Parker has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Elizabeth Parker, firm in the HBR case study Elizabeth Parker (B) needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Opportunities Elizabeth Parker (B) | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities highlighted in the Harvard Business Review case study Elizabeth Parker (B) are -
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Elizabeth Parker can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Elizabeth Parker operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Leadership & Managing People sector.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Elizabeth Parker 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Elizabeth Parker in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Leadership & Managing People segment, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Loyalty marketing
– Elizabeth Parker 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.
Manufacturing automation
– Elizabeth Parker can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Leadership & Managing People 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Elizabeth Parker 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.
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. Elizabeth Parker 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. Elizabeth Parker 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 Elizabeth Parker in the consumer business. Now Elizabeth Parker can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Elizabeth Parker 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Elizabeth Parker can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Elizabeth Parker to increase its market reach. Elizabeth Parker 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.
Reconfiguring business model
– The expansion of digital payment system, the bringing down of international transactions costs using Bitcoin and other blockchain based currencies, etc can help Elizabeth Parker to reconfigure its entire business model. For example it can used blockchain based technologies to reduce piracy of its products in the big markets such as China. Secondly it can use the popularity of e-commerce in various developing markets to build a Direct to Customer business model rather than the current Channel Heavy distribution network.
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. Elizabeth Parker can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Threats Elizabeth Parker (B) External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Elizabeth Parker (B) are -
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. Elizabeth Parker needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Leadership & Managing People industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Elizabeth Parker 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 Elizabeth Parker (B) .
Consumer confidence and its impact on Elizabeth Parker 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.
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. Elizabeth Parker 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.
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.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Elizabeth Parker has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Leadership & Managing People industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Elizabeth Parker 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.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Elizabeth Parker 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.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Elizabeth Parker 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.
Regulatory challenges
– Elizabeth Parker 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 Leadership & Managing People industry regulations.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Elizabeth Parker with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
Environmental challenges
– Elizabeth Parker 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. Elizabeth Parker can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Leadership & Managing People industry.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Elizabeth Parker 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.
Increasing wage structure of Elizabeth Parker
– 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 Elizabeth Parker.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Elizabeth Parker (B) Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers in the HBR case study Elizabeth Parker (B) needs to zero down on the relative importance of each factor mentioned in the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants.
We can provide the relative importance to each factor by assigning relative weights. Weighted SWOT analysis process is a three stage process –
First stage for doing weighted SWOT analysis of the case study Elizabeth Parker (B) is to rank the strengths and weaknesses of the organization. This will help you to assess the most important strengths and weaknesses of the firm and which one of the strengths and weaknesses mentioned in the initial lists are marginal and can be left out.
Second stage for conducting weighted SWOT analysis of the Harvard case study Elizabeth Parker (B) is to give probabilities to the external strategic factors thus better understanding the opportunities and threats arising out of macro environment changes and developments.
Third stage of constructing weighted SWOT analysis of Elizabeth Parker (B) is to provide strategic recommendations includes – joining likelihood of external strategic factors such as opportunities and threats to the internal strategic factors – strengths and weaknesses. You should start with external factors as they will provide the direction of the overall industry. Secondly by joining probabilities with internal strategic factors can help the company not only strategic fit but also the most probably strategic trade-off that Elizabeth Parker needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
