Case Study Description of Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership
Companies regularly face difficulties, but sometimes they have to face a "life threatening" crisis. Such events challenge leadership, not least because of their complexity - technological puzzles, loyalty and political maneuvering, branding and communication issues, to name a few. But they can also be are powerful integrative moments, and when "well navigated" they can become opportunities for wider company reforms.
Swot Analysis of "Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership" written by D. Charles Galunic, Philippe Ombregt includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Octapharma Maneuvering facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Crisis management, Government, Growth strategy, Influence, Leadership, Strategy execution and Leadership & Managing People.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership casestudy better are - – increasing transportation and logistics costs, increasing commodity prices, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, there is backlash against globalization, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%,
increasing energy prices, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Octapharma Maneuvering, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Octapharma Maneuvering 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 Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Octapharma Maneuvering
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 Octapharma Maneuvering
Strengths Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Octapharma Maneuvering in Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership Harvard Business Review case study are -
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Octapharma Maneuvering 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 Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Octapharma Maneuvering in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Diverse revenue streams
– Octapharma Maneuvering is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Octapharma Maneuvering in the sector have low bargaining power. Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Octapharma Maneuvering to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Innovation driven organization
– Octapharma Maneuvering is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Strong track record of project management
– Octapharma Maneuvering is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Octapharma Maneuvering is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership 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.
Learning organization
- Octapharma Maneuvering 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 Octapharma Maneuvering is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Organizational Resilience of Octapharma Maneuvering
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Octapharma Maneuvering does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Analytics focus
– Octapharma Maneuvering 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 D. Charles Galunic, Philippe Ombregt 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.
Training and development
– Octapharma Maneuvering has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership 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.
Weaknesses Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership are -
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership 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 Octapharma Maneuvering 's lucrative customers.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Octapharma Maneuvering 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. Octapharma Maneuvering 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.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Octapharma Maneuvering 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.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership, it seems that the employees of Octapharma Maneuvering 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Octapharma Maneuvering 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.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Octapharma Maneuvering 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Octapharma Maneuvering, firm in the HBR case study Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership 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 Octapharma Maneuvering has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership HBR case study mentions - Octapharma Maneuvering takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the industry in last five years.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership 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 Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Octapharma Maneuvering is planning to shift buying processes online.
Lack of clear differentiation of Octapharma Maneuvering products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Octapharma Maneuvering needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Opportunities Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership | 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 Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership are -
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Octapharma Maneuvering 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 Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Octapharma Maneuvering to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Octapharma Maneuvering 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Octapharma Maneuvering 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 Octapharma Maneuvering can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Octapharma Maneuvering 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, Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
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 Octapharma Maneuvering 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.
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. Octapharma Maneuvering can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Octapharma Maneuvering 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.
Manufacturing automation
– Octapharma Maneuvering 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Octapharma Maneuvering 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Octapharma Maneuvering can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership 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 Octapharma Maneuvering has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Octapharma Maneuvering to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership case study. Octapharma Maneuvering can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, 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 Octapharma Maneuvering in the consumer business. Now Octapharma Maneuvering can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Threats Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership are -
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Octapharma Maneuvering 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.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Octapharma Maneuvering has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Leadership & Managing People industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Octapharma Maneuvering 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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Octapharma Maneuvering with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
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 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.
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 Octapharma Maneuvering in the Leadership & Managing People sector and impact the bottomline 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. Octapharma Maneuvering 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.
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 Octapharma Maneuvering.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Octapharma Maneuvering 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.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership, Octapharma Maneuvering may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Leadership & Managing People .
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Octapharma Maneuvering is facing in Leadership & Managing People sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Octapharma Maneuvering 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 Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership .
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Octapharma Maneuvering 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership 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 Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership 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 Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership 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 Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership 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 Octapharma (B): Crisis and Leadership 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 Octapharma Maneuvering needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
