Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Leadership & Managing People
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program
In the late 1990s, home-based hospital care started to be introduced in the United States and worldwide. This initiative seemed to lower costs, improve quality of care, and have a generally positive impact on patients. In early March 2014, the director of performance improvement at a major U.S. hospital was asked to develop a proposal, including a business case and an outline of a pilot program, for a version of home-based hospital care for the hospital's patients. The director was expected to present his proposal at the monthly session of the health system leadership team on April 30, 2014. He knew that his proposal would have to take into account various factors such as location, medical condition coverage, patient eligibility, the critical data that needed to be collected, the appropriate means of data collection, and the length that the pilot study would need to last. He also knew that his proposal would have to include projected costs and the potential benefits of such a program -- the program had to make financial sense. Laura Erskine is affiliated with UCLA - Fielding School of Public Health.
Swot Analysis of "Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program" written by Laura Erskine includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Proposal Hospital facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Developing employees, Financial management, Innovation, Operations management, Personnel policies, Strategy and Leadership & Managing People.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program casestudy better are - – geopolitical disruptions, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, increasing transportation and logistics costs, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models,
technology disruption, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Proposal Hospital, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Proposal Hospital 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 Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Proposal Hospital
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 Proposal Hospital
Strengths Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Proposal Hospital in Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program Harvard Business Review case study are -
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Leadership & Managing People industry
– Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Proposal Hospital to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Leadership & Managing People industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Proposal Hospital to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Proposal Hospital is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Proposal Hospital 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.
Training and development
– Proposal Hospital has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program 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
– Proposal Hospital is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Proposal Hospital 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 Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program 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
– Proposal Hospital 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 Proposal Hospital in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Learning organization
- Proposal Hospital 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 Proposal Hospital is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
High brand equity
– Proposal Hospital has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Proposal Hospital to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Organizational Resilience of Proposal Hospital
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Proposal Hospital does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Strong track record of project management
– Proposal Hospital 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)
– Proposal Hospital 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 Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Weaknesses Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program are -
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Proposal Hospital 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.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Proposal Hospital has borrowed money from the capital market at higher rates. It needs to restructure the interest payment and costs so that it can compete better and improve profitability.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program 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 Proposal Hospital 's lucrative customers.
Need for greater diversity
– Proposal Hospital 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 to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program HBR case study mentions - Proposal Hospital 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 cash cycle compare to competitors
Proposal Hospital 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 Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program 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 Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Proposal Hospital is planning to shift buying processes online.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program, 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Proposal Hospital, firm in the HBR case study Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
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 Proposal Hospital supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes mentioned in the HBR case study - Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program, it is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Proposal Hospital vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Proposal Hospital 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.
Opportunities Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program | 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 Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program are -
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Proposal Hospital 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.
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. Proposal Hospital can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Loyalty marketing
– Proposal Hospital 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Proposal Hospital to increase its market reach. Proposal Hospital 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
– Proposal Hospital 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Proposal Hospital can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Proposal Hospital 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 Proposal Hospital to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Proposal Hospital 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 Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Proposal Hospital to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
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. Proposal Hospital can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Proposal Hospital has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Proposal Hospital to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program case study. Proposal Hospital can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Proposal Hospital 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Proposal Hospital 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.
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. Proposal Hospital 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. Proposal Hospital 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.
Threats Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program are -
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Proposal Hospital 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.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Proposal Hospital 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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Proposal Hospital 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.
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.
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. Proposal Hospital can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Increasing wage structure of Proposal Hospital
– Post Covid-19 there is a sharp increase in the wages especially in the jobs that require interaction with people. The increasing wages can put downward pressure on the margins of Proposal Hospital.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program, Proposal Hospital 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 .
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. Proposal Hospital 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.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Proposal Hospital 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.
Regulatory challenges
– Proposal Hospital 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.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Proposal Hospital 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 Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program .
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.
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 Proposal Hospital.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program 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 Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program 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 Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program 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 Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program 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 Pleasant Bluffs: Launching a Home-Based Hospital Program 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 Proposal Hospital needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.