Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Leadership & Managing People
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather
This case is used in Darden's EMBA and Global EMBA programs. It works well in any course covering short- and long-term strategic issues for a privately held firm experiencing strong growth. In 2011, sales at Chick-fil-A (CFA)surpassed $4 billion; however due to ownership's aversion to debt, the pace of expansion was significantly slower than the fast-food-segment average. Also, the biggest differences between CFA and other fast-food chains were its private, family-controlled ownership structure and its management philosophy. This case explores the relationship between an enterprise's philosophy and its long-term viability.
Authors :: Paul J Simko, Paul W. Farris, Virginia Weiler, Peter Gerardo
Swot Analysis of "Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather" written by Paul J Simko, Paul W. Farris, Virginia Weiler, Peter Gerardo includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Cfa Fil facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, and Leadership & Managing People.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather casestudy better are - – customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, increasing transportation and logistics costs, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, wage bills are increasing, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , technology disruption,
there is backlash against globalization, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Cfa Fil, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Cfa Fil 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 Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Cfa Fil
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 Cfa Fil
Strengths Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Cfa Fil in Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather Harvard Business Review case study are -
Highly skilled collaborators
– Cfa Fil 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 Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Innovation driven organization
– Cfa Fil is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Cfa Fil 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
– Cfa Fil 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 Paul J Simko, Paul W. Farris, Virginia Weiler, Peter Gerardo 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.
High brand equity
– Cfa Fil has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Cfa Fil to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Cfa Fil 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.
Strong track record of project management
– Cfa Fil is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Cfa Fil in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather 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.
Ability to lead change in Leadership & Managing People field
– Cfa Fil 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 Cfa Fil 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
– Cfa Fil is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Cfa Fil 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 Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Weaknesses Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather are -
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather, 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 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 Cfa Fil supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes mentioned in the HBR case study - Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather, it is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Cfa Fil vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Cfa Fil is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication mentioned in marketing section of case study Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather can help to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Cfa Fil is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Leadership & Managing People segment. Cfa Fil needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Cfa Fil to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Cfa Fil, firm in the HBR case study Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather, it seems that the employees of Cfa Fil 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.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Cfa Fil 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 star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather 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 Cfa Fil has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Cfa Fil 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.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather, is just above the industry average. Cfa Fil 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.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Paul J Simko, Paul W. Farris, Virginia Weiler, Peter Gerardo suggests that, Cfa Fil 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.
Opportunities Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather | 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 Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather are -
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Cfa Fil 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Cfa Fil 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 Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Cfa Fil to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
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. Cfa Fil 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. Cfa Fil 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.
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 Cfa Fil 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Cfa Fil 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Cfa Fil can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
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. Cfa Fil can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Cfa Fil is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Cfa Fil can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Cfa Fil has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Cfa Fil to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather case study. Cfa Fil can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, 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. Cfa Fil can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Cfa Fil 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.
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 Cfa Fil in the consumer business. Now Cfa Fil can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Threats Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather are -
Regulatory challenges
– Cfa Fil 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.
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. Cfa Fil can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
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 Cfa Fil in the Leadership & Managing People sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Cfa Fil has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Leadership & Managing People industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Cfa Fil 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.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Cfa Fil 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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Cfa Fil 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.
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 Cfa Fil.
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. Cfa Fil 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 Cfa Fil business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Environmental challenges
– Cfa Fil 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. Cfa Fil can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Leadership & Managing People industry.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Cfa Fil 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.
Increasing wage structure of Cfa Fil
– 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 Cfa Fil.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Cfa Fil is facing in Leadership & Managing People sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather 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 Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather 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 Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather 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 Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather 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 Chick-fil-A: A Bird of a Different Feather 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 Cfa Fil needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.