Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Leadership & Managing People
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C)
This case traces the development of eBay Germany, eBay Inc., and the career of eBay Germany's first country manager, Philipp Justus. The case covers from 2000 through the fall of 2007. This case details how eBay Germany, once a small start-up, became one of eBay's most successful locations. The case reveals how Justus added seasoned leaders and structure to the group, while allowing for improvisation. The case also traces Justus's career, as he moved to running eBay Europe and ultimately, the auctions group, which took him to headquarters. Like eBay Germany, eBay itself grew tremendously, in part from acquisitions like PayPal and Skype. But, growth in core areas, like auctions, had slowed. This case explains how eBay Inc. and eBay Germany tried to keep their "secret sauce."
Swot Analysis of "Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C)" written by Linda A. Hill, Emily A. Stecker includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Ebay Justus facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C) case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, International business, Internet, Leadership and Leadership & Managing People.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C) casestudy better are - – increasing household debt because of falling income levels, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, increasing energy prices, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, increasing transportation and logistics costs, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy,
geopolitical disruptions, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C)
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C) case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Ebay Justus, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Ebay Justus 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 Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C) can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C) case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Ebay Justus
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 Ebay Justus
Strengths Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Ebay Justus in Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C) Harvard Business Review case study are -
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Ebay Justus are driving operational speed, building greater agility, and keeping the organization nimble to compete with new competitors. It helps are organization to ideate new ideas, and execute them swiftly in the marketplace.
Strong track record of project management
– Ebay Justus is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
High brand equity
– Ebay Justus has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Ebay Justus to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Learning organization
- Ebay Justus 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 Ebay Justus is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C) Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Ebay Justus has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Ebay Justus 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Ebay Justus in the sector have low bargaining power. Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C) has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Ebay Justus to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Ability to lead change in Leadership & Managing People field
– Ebay Justus 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 Ebay Justus in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Analytics focus
– Ebay Justus 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 Linda A. Hill, Emily A. Stecker 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Ebay Justus 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 Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C) HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Diverse revenue streams
– Ebay Justus is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C) 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.
Training and development
– Ebay Justus has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C) 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Leadership & Managing People industry
– Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C) firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Ebay Justus to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Leadership & Managing People industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Ebay Justus to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Weaknesses Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C) are -
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Ebay Justus 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.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C) HBR case study mentions - Ebay Justus 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Ebay Justus is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Leadership & Managing People segment. Ebay Justus needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Ebay Justus to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C), 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.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C), is just above the industry average. Ebay Justus 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.
Lack of clear differentiation of Ebay Justus products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Ebay Justus needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Ebay Justus, firm in the HBR case study Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C) needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C), it seems that the employees of Ebay Justus 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.
Need for greater diversity
– Ebay Justus 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.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C) 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 Ebay Justus has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Linda A. Hill, Emily A. Stecker suggests that, Ebay Justus 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.
Opportunities Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C) | 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 Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C) are -
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. Ebay Justus can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Ebay Justus can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Ebay Justus operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Leadership & Managing People sector.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Ebay Justus to increase its market reach. Ebay Justus 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Ebay Justus is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C) 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Ebay Justus 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, Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C), 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
– Ebay Justus 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.
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. Ebay Justus can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Ebay Justus 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 Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C) - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Ebay Justus to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
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 Ebay Justus 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Ebay Justus 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
– Ebay Justus 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Ebay Justus can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
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 Ebay Justus in the consumer business. Now Ebay Justus can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Threats Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C) External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C) 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. Ebay Justus 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.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Ebay Justus 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.
Increasing wage structure of Ebay Justus
– 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 Ebay Justus.
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 Ebay Justus business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Ebay Justus 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 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.
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. Ebay Justus needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Leadership & Managing People industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Ebay Justus is facing in Leadership & Managing People sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Ebay Justus 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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Ebay Justus 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.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Ebay Justus 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 Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C) .
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 Ebay Justus in the Leadership & Managing People sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C) 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 Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C) 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 Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C) 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 Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C) 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 Philipp Justus at eBay Germany (C) 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 Ebay Justus needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
