Hassina Sherjan was born in Afghanistan but grew up and was educated in the United States. A trip to Afghanistan when she was an adult inspired her to move back to her home country with two missions. The first was to educate young women through a non-profit organization she started called Aid Afghanistan for Education and a for-profit company, Boumi, that manufactures and distributes products for the home such as curtains, cushion covers, tea cozies, coasters, bedclothes, and bathroom accessories. The mission of Boumi is to create jobs in Afghanistan, especially for women, based on traditional Afghani designs and using only locally grown cotton. Sherjan wants to grow Boumi so that it can be a substantial, if not major, funding source for Aid Afghanistan for Education. In order to grow Boumi, Sherjan must confront a number of challenges including funding, finding and managing skilled workers, and getting distribution for Boumi products in major markets such as Europe and the United States.
Authors :: Robert G. Eccles, George Serafeim, Philippa Eccles
Topics :: Leadership & Managing People
Tags :: Entrepreneurship, Gender, Innovation, International business, Leadership, Social responsibility, Sustainability, SWOT Analysis, SWOT Matrix, TOWS, Weighted SWOT Analysis
Swot Analysis of "Hassina Sherjan" written by Robert G. Eccles, George Serafeim, Philippa Eccles includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Boumi Sherjan facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Hassina Sherjan case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Entrepreneurship, Gender, Innovation, International business, Leadership, Social responsibility, Sustainability and Leadership & Managing People.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Hassina Sherjan casestudy better are - – competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , there is increasing trade war between United States & China, wage bills are increasing,
increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Hassina Sherjan case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Boumi Sherjan, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Boumi Sherjan 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 Hassina Sherjan can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Hassina Sherjan case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Boumi Sherjan
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 Boumi Sherjan
Strengths Hassina Sherjan | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Boumi Sherjan in Hassina Sherjan Harvard Business Review case study are -
Organizational Resilience of Boumi Sherjan
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Boumi Sherjan does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Boumi Sherjan in the sector have low bargaining power. Hassina Sherjan has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Boumi Sherjan to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Strong track record of project management
– Boumi Sherjan is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Digital Transformation in Leadership & Managing People segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Boumi Sherjan digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Boumi Sherjan has successfully integrated the four key components of digital transformation – digital integration in processes, digital integration in marketing and customer relationship management, digital integration into the value chain, and using technology to explore new products and market opportunities.
Innovation driven organization
– Boumi Sherjan is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Hassina Sherjan Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Training and development
– Boumi Sherjan has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Hassina Sherjan Harvard Business Review case study by analyzing – employees retention, in-house promotion, loyalty, new venture initiation, lack of conflict, and high level of both employees and customer engagement.
Diverse revenue streams
– Boumi Sherjan is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Hassina Sherjan 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.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Boumi Sherjan 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.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Boumi Sherjan has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Boumi Sherjan has effective processes in place that helps in exploring new product needs, doing quick pilot testing, and then launching the products quickly using its extensive distribution network.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Boumi Sherjan 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 Hassina Sherjan - 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 Boumi Sherjan in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Leadership & Managing People industry
– Hassina Sherjan firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Boumi Sherjan to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Leadership & Managing People industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Boumi Sherjan to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Weaknesses Hassina Sherjan | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Hassina Sherjan are -
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Boumi Sherjan 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Boumi Sherjan, firm in the HBR case study Hassina Sherjan needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Boumi Sherjan 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Hassina Sherjan 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 Hassina Sherjan can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Boumi Sherjan is planning to shift buying processes online.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study Hassina Sherjan 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 Boumi Sherjan 's lucrative customers.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Hassina Sherjan, 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.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study Hassina Sherjan, in the dynamic environment Boumi Sherjan has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Boumi Sherjan has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Boumi Sherjan is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Leadership & Managing People segment. Boumi Sherjan needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Boumi Sherjan to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Hassina Sherjan 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 Boumi Sherjan has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Boumi Sherjan 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.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Boumi Sherjan 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. Boumi Sherjan 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.
Opportunities Hassina Sherjan | 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 Hassina Sherjan are -
Manufacturing automation
– Boumi Sherjan 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Boumi Sherjan 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, Hassina Sherjan, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Loyalty marketing
– Boumi Sherjan 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Boumi Sherjan 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 Hassina Sherjan - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Boumi Sherjan 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 Boumi Sherjan 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.
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. Boumi Sherjan can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
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. Boumi Sherjan 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. Boumi Sherjan 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.
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. Boumi Sherjan can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Boumi Sherjan 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 Boumi Sherjan to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Boumi Sherjan to increase its market reach. Boumi Sherjan 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.
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 Boumi Sherjan in the consumer business. Now Boumi Sherjan can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Boumi Sherjan 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– Boumi Sherjan 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.
Threats Hassina Sherjan External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Hassina Sherjan are -
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Boumi Sherjan 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.
Environmental challenges
– Boumi Sherjan 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. Boumi Sherjan can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Leadership & Managing People industry.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Hassina Sherjan, Boumi Sherjan 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 .
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. Boumi Sherjan needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Leadership & Managing People industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Boumi Sherjan has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Leadership & Managing People industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Boumi Sherjan 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.
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 Boumi Sherjan in the Leadership & Managing People sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Boumi Sherjan 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 Hassina Sherjan .
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. Boumi Sherjan can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Boumi Sherjan 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.
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 Boumi Sherjan business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
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 Boumi Sherjan.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Boumi Sherjan 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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Boumi Sherjan 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 Hassina Sherjan 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 Hassina Sherjan 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 Hassina Sherjan 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 Hassina Sherjan 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 Hassina Sherjan 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 Boumi Sherjan needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
