Match Next: Next Generation Middle School? SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Leadership & Managing People
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Match Next: Next Generation Middle School?
This case is set in 2015 as a team at Match Education, a high performing charter middle school in Boston, explores new staffing and technology approaches in their quest to obtain what they term "jaw dropping" results. The team hopes to test and model for other schools solutions to specific educational problems. In 2013, the team began to think about the redesign to create a school model in which students spend significantly more time reading, more individualized attention is provided to students and families, the challenge of finding outstanding teachers is addressed, and to do so in a cost-effective manner. In their redesigned school, Match Next, students receive all of their instruction from inexperienced newly minted college graduates called tutors, who are supervised by one master teacher, called a Director of Curriculum of Instruction (DCI). In addition, the Match Next team infuses technology into instruction (e.g. students watch instructional videos and complete online activities) and operations (e.g. schools keeps track of student assessment results and select activities and problem sets from online databases). After the first year as a full-day program, results on the state test were very strong in math but below expectations in ELA (English Language Arts). The case explores questions related to designing the school model, interpreting early results, and assessing the team's ability to disseminate their model to other schools.
Swot Analysis of "Match Next: Next Generation Middle School?" written by John J-H Kim, Daniel Goldberg includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Instruction Match facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Match Next: Next Generation Middle School? case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Technology and Leadership & Managing People.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Match Next: Next Generation Middle School? casestudy better are - – there is increasing trade war between United States & China, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, wage bills are increasing, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, there is backlash against globalization, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , increasing energy prices,
increasing household debt because of falling income levels, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Match Next: Next Generation Middle School?
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Match Next: Next Generation Middle School? case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Instruction Match, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Instruction Match 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 Match Next: Next Generation Middle School? can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Match Next: Next Generation Middle School? case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Instruction Match
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 Instruction Match
Strengths Match Next: Next Generation Middle School? | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Instruction Match in Match Next: Next Generation Middle School? Harvard Business Review case study are -
Ability to recruit top talent
– Instruction Match is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Match Next: Next Generation Middle School? are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Instruction Match 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
– Match Next: Next Generation Middle School? firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Instruction Match to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Leadership & Managing People industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Instruction Match to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Match Next: Next Generation Middle School? 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Instruction Match in the sector have low bargaining power. Match Next: Next Generation Middle School? has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Instruction Match to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Digital Transformation in Leadership & Managing People segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Instruction Match digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Instruction Match 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.
Strong track record of project management
– Instruction Match is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Instruction Match 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 Match Next: Next Generation Middle School? - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Instruction Match 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 Match Next: Next Generation Middle School? HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Ability to lead change in Leadership & Managing People field
– Instruction Match 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 Instruction Match in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Innovation driven organization
– Instruction Match is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Match Next: Next Generation Middle School? Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Learning organization
- Instruction Match 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 Instruction Match is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Match Next: Next Generation Middle School? Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Weaknesses Match Next: Next Generation Middle School? | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Match Next: Next Generation Middle School? are -
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study Match Next: Next Generation Middle School?, in the dynamic environment Instruction Match has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Instruction Match has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Instruction Match 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 Match Next: Next Generation Middle School?, is just above the industry average. Instruction Match 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Instruction Match 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 to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Match Next: Next Generation Middle School? HBR case study mentions - Instruction Match 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.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, John J-H Kim, Daniel Goldberg suggests that, Instruction Match is facing high bargaining power of the channel partners. So far it has not able to streamline the operations to reduce the bargaining power of the value chain partners in the industry.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Match Next: Next Generation Middle School?, it seems that the employees of Instruction Match 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Instruction Match is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Leadership & Managing People segment. Instruction Match needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Instruction Match to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Instruction Match 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Match Next: Next Generation Middle School? 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 Match Next: Next Generation Middle School? can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Instruction Match is planning to shift buying processes online.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Instruction Match 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. Instruction Match 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 Match Next: Next Generation Middle School? | 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 Match Next: Next Generation Middle School? are -
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. Instruction Match 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. Instruction Match 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 Instruction Match 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. Instruction Match can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Instruction Match is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Match Next: Next Generation Middle School? 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Instruction Match 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Instruction Match 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
– Instruction Match can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Match Next: Next Generation Middle School? 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Instruction Match 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, Match Next: Next Generation Middle School?, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Instruction Match 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 Instruction Match to increase its market reach. Instruction Match 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 Instruction Match in the consumer business. Now Instruction Match can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Instruction Match 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Instruction Match can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Instruction Match operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Leadership & Managing People sector.
Threats Match Next: Next Generation Middle School? External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Match Next: Next Generation Middle School? are -
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. Instruction Match 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.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Match Next: Next Generation Middle School?, Instruction Match 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 .
Consumer confidence and its impact on Instruction Match 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 Instruction Match.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Instruction Match 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 Match Next: Next Generation Middle School? .
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Instruction Match with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Instruction Match 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.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Instruction Match 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.
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 Instruction Match business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Regulatory challenges
– Instruction Match 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.
Environmental challenges
– Instruction Match 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. Instruction Match can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Leadership & Managing People industry.
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.
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. Instruction Match can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Match Next: Next Generation Middle School? 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 Match Next: Next Generation Middle School? 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 Match Next: Next Generation Middle School? 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 Match Next: Next Generation Middle School? 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 Match Next: Next Generation Middle School? 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 Instruction Match needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.