K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Leadership & Managing People
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A)
Chris Warner led a team of experienced mountain climbers on an expedition to reach the summit of K2-the second-highest in the world. After failing to succeed on their first few attempts, Warner and his team brought together other teams hoping to reach the summit, and representing eight different countries, to work together for success. Their story is a narrative full of examples, where in some instances, a leadership point of view was taken, and other times it was not. The successes and failures of the expedition's approach makes for a story bursting with real-world examples and offers an exciting framework to house theoretical concepts about team-building and leadership. Although grounded in the written cases, the series also includes an optional a multimedia supplement offers compelling photos and video for students and instructors. The A case presents a challenging moment in the climbers' trek: After the tragic death of another team's Sherpa, Warner must decide case whether his team should abandon its summit push or continue forward.
Swot Analysis of "K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A)" written by James G. Clawson, Gerry Yemen includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Summit Climbers facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A) case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Data, Decision making, Leadership, Leading teams, Risk management, Strategic thinking and Leadership & Managing People.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A) casestudy better are - – there is increasing trade war between United States & China, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, there is backlash against globalization, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings,
increasing energy prices, technology disruption, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A)
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A) case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Summit Climbers, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Summit Climbers 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 K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A) can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A) case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Summit Climbers
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 Summit Climbers
Strengths K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Summit Climbers in K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A) Harvard Business Review case study are -
Highly skilled collaborators
– Summit Climbers 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 K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A) HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Analytics focus
– Summit Climbers 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 James G. Clawson, Gerry Yemen 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.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Summit Climbers 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 K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A) - 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 Summit Climbers in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Organizational Resilience of Summit Climbers
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Summit Climbers does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Ability to lead change in Leadership & Managing People field
– Summit Climbers 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 Summit Climbers in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
High brand equity
– Summit Climbers has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Summit Climbers to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Learning organization
- Summit Climbers 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 Summit Climbers is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A) Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Summit Climbers 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
– Summit Climbers is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Diverse revenue streams
– Summit Climbers is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A) 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A) 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.
Weaknesses K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A) are -
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Summit Climbers is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Leadership & Managing People segment. Summit Climbers needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Summit Climbers to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A), in the dynamic environment Summit Climbers has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Summit Climbers has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A), is just above the industry average. Summit Climbers 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.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A) 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 Summit Climbers has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A) 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 K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A) can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Summit Climbers is planning to shift buying processes online.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Summit Climbers is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication mentioned in marketing section of case study K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A) can help to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Lack of clear differentiation of Summit Climbers products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Summit Climbers needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Summit Climbers 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.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Summit Climbers 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. Summit Climbers 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Summit Climbers 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 K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A) HBR case study mentions - Summit Climbers 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.
Opportunities K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A) | 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 K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A) are -
Manufacturing automation
– Summit Climbers 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.
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. Summit Climbers can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Summit Climbers 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. Summit Climbers 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. Summit Climbers 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Summit Climbers to increase its market reach. Summit Climbers 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Summit Climbers can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Summit Climbers 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
– Summit Climbers can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A) 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Summit Climbers 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Summit Climbers has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Summit Climbers to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A) case study. Summit Climbers can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Loyalty marketing
– Summit Climbers 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Summit Climbers 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 Summit Climbers to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
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 Summit Climbers 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.
Threats K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A) External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A) are -
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. Summit Climbers can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Summit Climbers 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 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. Summit Climbers needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Leadership & Managing People industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
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 Summit Climbers in the Leadership & Managing People sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Summit Climbers with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A), Summit Climbers 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 .
Increasing wage structure of Summit Climbers
– 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 Summit Climbers.
Environmental challenges
– Summit Climbers 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. Summit Climbers can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Leadership & Managing People industry.
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 Summit Climbers business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Summit Climbers 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.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Summit Climbers 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.
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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A) 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 K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A) 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 K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A) 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 K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A) 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 K2: Brotherhood of the Rope (A) 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 Summit Climbers needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
