Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Leadership & Managing People
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability
This is an MIT Sloan Management Review article. In the 2014 Sustainability Report, new research by MIT Sloan Management Review, The Boston Consulting Group and the UN Global Compact, shows that a growing number of companies are turning to collaborations -with suppliers, NGOs, industry alliances, governments, even competitors -to become more sustainable. Our research found that as sustainability issues become increasingly complex, global in nature and pivotal to success, companies are realizing that they can't make the necessary impact acting alone.. Authors: MIT Sloan Management Review, The Boston Consulting Group and the United Nations Global Compact.
Authors :: David Kiron, Nina Kruschwitz, Knut Haanaes, Martin Reeves
Swot Analysis of "Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability" written by David Kiron, Nina Kruschwitz, Knut Haanaes, Martin Reeves includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Sloan Mit facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Leadership, Sustainability and Leadership & Managing People.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability casestudy better are - – there is increasing trade war between United States & China, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, wage bills are increasing, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, technology disruption, there is backlash against globalization,
competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, geopolitical disruptions, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Sloan Mit, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Sloan Mit 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 Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Sloan Mit
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 Sloan Mit
Strengths Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Sloan Mit in Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability Harvard Business Review case study are -
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Leadership & Managing People industry
– Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Sloan Mit to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Leadership & Managing People industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Sloan Mit to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Diverse revenue streams
– Sloan Mit is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability 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.
Digital Transformation in Leadership & Managing People segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Sloan Mit digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Sloan Mit 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.
Training and development
– Sloan Mit has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability 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.
Analytics focus
– Sloan Mit 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 David Kiron, Nina Kruschwitz, Knut Haanaes, Martin Reeves 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Sloan Mit in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Sloan Mit in the sector have low bargaining power. Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Sloan Mit to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
High brand equity
– Sloan Mit has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Sloan Mit to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Sloan Mit has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Sloan Mit 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.
Organizational Resilience of Sloan Mit
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Sloan Mit does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Learning organization
- Sloan Mit 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 Sloan Mit is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Sloan Mit 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 Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Weaknesses Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability are -
Need for greater diversity
– Sloan Mit 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Sloan Mit 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.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Sloan Mit 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.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Sloan Mit 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.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Sloan Mit is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication mentioned in marketing section of case study Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability can help to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Sloan Mit 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.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability, 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 Sloan Mit, firm in the HBR case study Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability, in the dynamic environment Sloan Mit has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Sloan Mit has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Lack of clear differentiation of Sloan Mit products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Sloan Mit needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability 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 Sloan Mit 's lucrative customers.
Opportunities Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability | 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 Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability are -
Developing new processes and practices
– Sloan Mit can develop new processes and procedures in Leadership & Managing People industry using technology such as automation using artificial intelligence, real time transportation and products tracking, 3D modeling for concept development and new products pilot testing etc.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Sloan Mit can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Sloan Mit operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Leadership & Managing People sector.
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. Sloan Mit can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Sloan Mit 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Sloan Mit 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.
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. Sloan Mit can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Sloan Mit is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Sloan Mit 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 Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Sloan Mit to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Sloan Mit has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Sloan Mit to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability case study. Sloan Mit can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Sloan Mit 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.
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 Sloan Mit in the consumer business. Now Sloan Mit can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Sloan Mit 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, Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Buying journey improvements
– Sloan Mit can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability 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.
Threats Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability are -
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Sloan Mit is facing in Leadership & Managing People sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Sloan Mit with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Sloan Mit 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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Sloan Mit 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.
Environmental challenges
– Sloan Mit 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. Sloan Mit can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Leadership & Managing People industry.
Increasing wage structure of Sloan Mit
– 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 Sloan Mit.
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.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Sloan Mit has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Leadership & Managing People industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Sloan Mit needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Leadership & Managing People sector. According to Mckinsey study top managers believe that the adoption of technology in operations, communications is 20-25 times faster than what they planned in the beginning of 2019.
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. Sloan Mit needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Leadership & Managing People industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Regulatory challenges
– Sloan Mit 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.
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. Sloan Mit can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
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. Sloan Mit 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.
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 Sloan Mit.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability 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 Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability 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 Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability 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 Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability 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 Joining Forces: Collaboration and Leadership for Sustainability 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 Sloan Mit needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.