Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Leadership & Managing People
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector
By the late 2000s, the law firm Duane Morris had transformed itself from a growing U.S. law firm to a significant global player. The firm's uniquely collaborative organizational culture, which featured a transparent, data-driven compensation system, practice-group integration across multiple offices, and rewards for attorneys who shared responsibility, had contributed to the firm's success as it had expanded into new U.S. and international offices. Yet, amid a shaky world economy and an increasingly cutthroat legal profession, Duane Morris attorneys began to wonder-could collaboration survive as a firm value? Would the firm's culture help it continue to grow in the years ahead and bring in more sophisticated legal work, or would its lawyers inevitably start to keep work to themselves as the firm navigated an ever-more competitive environment?
Swot Analysis of "Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector" written by Heidi K. Gardner, Annelena Lobb includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Duane Morris facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Collaboration, Competition, Executive compensation, Growth strategy, Joint ventures, Leading teams, Managing uncertainty, Marketing, Organizational culture, Organizational structure, Personnel policies, Risk management, Social responsibility, Strategy execution and Leadership & Managing People.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector casestudy better are - – increasing energy prices, increasing commodity prices, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models,
talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Duane Morris, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Duane Morris 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 Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Duane Morris
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 Duane Morris
Strengths Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Duane Morris in Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector Harvard Business Review case study are -
Learning organization
- Duane Morris 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 Duane Morris is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Leadership & Managing People industry
– Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Duane Morris to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Leadership & Managing People industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Duane Morris to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Training and development
– Duane Morris has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector 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.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Duane Morris 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
– Duane Morris is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Diverse revenue streams
– Duane Morris is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector 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.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Duane Morris 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector 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 recruit top talent
– Duane Morris is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Duane Morris in the sector have low bargaining power. Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Duane Morris to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Ability to lead change in Leadership & Managing People field
– Duane Morris 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 Duane Morris in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Organizational Resilience of Duane Morris
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Duane Morris does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Weaknesses Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector are -
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Duane Morris 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.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector, in the dynamic environment Duane Morris has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Duane Morris has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Need for greater diversity
– Duane Morris 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.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Duane Morris has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the industry over the last five years. Duane Morris even though has strong showing on digital transformation primary two stages, it has struggled to capitalize the power of digital transformation in marketing efforts and new venture efforts.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector, 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.
Lack of clear differentiation of Duane Morris products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Duane Morris needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector has high operating costs in the. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Duane Morris 's lucrative customers.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector, is just above the industry average. Duane Morris 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector 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 Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Duane Morris is planning to shift buying processes online.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Heidi K. Gardner, Annelena Lobb suggests that, Duane Morris 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.
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 Duane Morris supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes mentioned in the HBR case study - Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector, it is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Duane Morris vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Opportunities Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector | 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 Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector are -
Manufacturing automation
– Duane Morris 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Duane Morris 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 Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Duane Morris to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Duane Morris 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Duane Morris can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector 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 Duane Morris has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Duane Morris to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector case study. Duane Morris can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, 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, Duane Morris can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Duane Morris operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Leadership & Managing People sector.
Loyalty marketing
– Duane Morris 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Duane Morris 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Duane Morris to increase its market reach. Duane Morris 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Duane Morris 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 Duane Morris in the consumer business. Now Duane Morris can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
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. Duane Morris 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. Duane Morris 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Duane Morris can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Threats Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector are -
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Duane Morris 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.
Technology disruption because of hacks, piracy etc
– The colonial pipeline illustrated, how vulnerable modern organization are to international hackers, miscreants, and disruptors. The cyber security interruption, data leaks, etc can seriously jeopardize the future growth of the organization.
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. Duane Morris 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 Duane Morris business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Duane Morris 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 international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Duane Morris 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 Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector .
Consumer confidence and its impact on Duane Morris 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.
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. Duane Morris needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Leadership & Managing People industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector, Duane Morris 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 .
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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Duane Morris is facing in Leadership & Managing People sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Environmental challenges
– Duane Morris 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. Duane Morris can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Leadership & Managing People industry.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Duane Morris with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector 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 Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector 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 Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector 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 Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector 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 Collaborating for Growth: Duane Morris in a Turbulent Legal Sector 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 Duane Morris needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
