Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (B) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Leadership & Managing People
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (B)
This case shows how Fiona Jenkins, Head of Physiotherapy for South Devon Health Services, reviewed and redesigned the stroke service care pathway. She had just four months to present a proposal and then implement it in accordance with the National Service Framework (NSF) guidelines. These guidelines specified that a stroke specialist should examine all individuals admitted with a diagnosis of stroke. Her challenge was to coordinate the different stakeholders - primary care, secondary care and social services. In addition, she had to do this without any additional funding. The case describes the different options open to her and how she decides on a plan. Some of the players are suspicious, and even threaten to resign if the plan is implemented.
Swot Analysis of "Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (B)" written by Anne-Marie Carrick, D'Aunno Thomas, Mattia J Gilmartin includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Stroke Devon facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (B) case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Leadership, Organizational culture and Leadership & Managing People.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (B) casestudy better are - – digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, increasing transportation and logistics costs, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, geopolitical disruptions,
increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (B)
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (B) case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Stroke Devon, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Stroke Devon 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 Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (B) can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (B) case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Stroke Devon
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 Stroke Devon
Strengths Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (B) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Stroke Devon in Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (B) Harvard Business Review case study are -
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Stroke Devon 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 Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Stroke Devon in the sector have low bargaining power. Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (B) has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Stroke Devon to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Stroke Devon in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Analytics focus
– Stroke Devon 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 Anne-Marie Carrick, D'Aunno Thomas, Mattia J Gilmartin 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Stroke Devon is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (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.
Learning organization
- Stroke Devon 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 Stroke Devon is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (B) Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Ability to lead change in Leadership & Managing People field
– Stroke Devon 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 Stroke Devon in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Organizational Resilience of Stroke Devon
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Stroke Devon does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Diverse revenue streams
– Stroke Devon is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (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.
Strong track record of project management
– Stroke Devon 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
– Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (B) firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Stroke Devon to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Leadership & Managing People industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Stroke Devon to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (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.
Weaknesses Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (B) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (B) are -
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Stroke Devon 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (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 Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (B) can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Stroke Devon is planning to shift buying processes online.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Anne-Marie Carrick, D'Aunno Thomas, Mattia J Gilmartin suggests that, Stroke Devon 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.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (B), it seems that the employees of Stroke Devon 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Stroke Devon 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.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Stroke Devon has borrowed money from the capital market at higher rates. It needs to restructure the interest payment and costs so that it can compete better and improve profitability.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (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 Stroke Devon has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (B), in the dynamic environment Stroke Devon has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Stroke Devon has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Stroke Devon 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 - Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (B) should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Need for greater diversity
– Stroke Devon has taken concrete steps on diversity, equity, and inclusion. But the efforts so far has resulted in limited success. It needs to expand the recruitment and selection process to hire more people from the minorities and underprivileged background.
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 Stroke Devon supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes mentioned in the HBR case study - Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (B), it is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Stroke Devon vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Opportunities Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (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 Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (B) are -
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Stroke Devon 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Stroke Devon 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 Stroke Devon to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
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. Stroke Devon 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. Stroke Devon 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Stroke Devon has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Stroke Devon to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (B) case study. Stroke Devon can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Buying journey improvements
– Stroke Devon can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (B) 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
– Stroke Devon 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Stroke Devon can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Stroke Devon operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Leadership & Managing People sector.
Developing new processes and practices
– Stroke Devon can develop new processes and procedures in Leadership & Managing People 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.
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. Stroke Devon can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Stroke Devon 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Stroke Devon 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 Stroke Devon to increase its market reach. Stroke Devon 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Stroke Devon 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, Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (B), 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 Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (B) External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (B) are -
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 Stroke Devon in the Leadership & Managing People sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
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 Stroke Devon.
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. Stroke Devon needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Leadership & Managing People industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Regulatory challenges
– Stroke Devon 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.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Stroke Devon 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 Stroke Devon
– 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 Stroke Devon.
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. Stroke Devon can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Environmental challenges
– Stroke Devon 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. Stroke Devon can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Leadership & Managing People industry.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Stroke Devon has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Leadership & Managing People industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Stroke Devon 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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Stroke Devon is facing in Leadership & Managing People 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 Stroke Devon with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Stroke Devon 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.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Stroke Devon 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (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 Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (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 Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (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 Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (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 Service Redesign at South Devon NHS Trust (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 Stroke Devon needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
