Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Leadership & Managing People
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment
Statistics about women's presence as CEOs, directors, and board members show relative stagnation over the last few years. Many theories exist to explain this problem, but there is a paucity of specific suggestions targeted at individuals seeking to rise to the top of their organizations. In this article we propose that changing the way women talk about accomplishments can improve leadership presence and aid in promotion. We analyzed video interviews of 20 men and 20 women in leadership roles at Fortune 50 companies. Since leaders will inevitably confront this when interviewing for promotions, we chose to focus on the question: ''In your career, what are the accomplishments you are most proud of?'' We analyzed content, syntax, gestures, and facial expressions, and identified significant differences in the way men and women talked about accomplishment. Based upon our research, we identify six communication essentials that can help women project confidence: (1) starting strong, (2) staying succinct, (3) dimensionalizing content, (4) owning voice, (5) controlling movement, and (6) projecting warmth.
Swot Analysis of "Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment" written by Anett D. Grant, Amanda Taylor includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Women Essentials facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Gender, Hiring, Leadership and Leadership & Managing People.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment casestudy better are - – talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, increasing transportation and logistics costs, increasing energy prices,
digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, geopolitical disruptions, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Women Essentials, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Women Essentials 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 Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Women Essentials
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 Women Essentials
Strengths Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Women Essentials in Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment Harvard Business Review case study are -
Successful track record of launching new products
– Women Essentials has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Women Essentials 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.
High brand equity
– Women Essentials has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Women Essentials to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Women Essentials in the sector have low bargaining power. Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Women Essentials to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Women Essentials is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment 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.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Women Essentials 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.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Women Essentials 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.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Women Essentials 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 Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Organizational Resilience of Women Essentials
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Women Essentials does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Strong track record of project management
– Women Essentials 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
– Women Essentials is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment 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
– Women Essentials 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 Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Weaknesses Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment are -
Lack of clear differentiation of Women Essentials products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Women Essentials needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Women Essentials 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.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment HBR case study mentions - Women Essentials 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.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment, in the dynamic environment Women Essentials has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Women Essentials has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Anett D. Grant, Amanda Taylor suggests that, Women Essentials 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.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Women Essentials 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. Women Essentials 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, Women Essentials 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Women Essentials is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Leadership & Managing People segment. Women Essentials needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Women Essentials to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Need for greater diversity
– Women Essentials 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.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment, 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Women Essentials 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.
Opportunities Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment | 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 Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment are -
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 Women Essentials 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Women Essentials can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Women Essentials to increase its market reach. Women Essentials 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.
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. Women Essentials can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Women Essentials 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, Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Manufacturing automation
– Women Essentials 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.
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 Women Essentials in the consumer business. Now Women Essentials can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Women Essentials 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Women Essentials to conduct training and development for its employees across the world. This will result in not only reducing the cost of training but also help employees in different part of the world to integrate with the headquarter work culture, ethos, and standards.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Women Essentials has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Women Essentials to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment case study. Women Essentials can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Developing new processes and practices
– Women Essentials 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Women Essentials can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Women Essentials is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment 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.
Threats Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment are -
Consumer confidence and its impact on Women Essentials 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.
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. Women Essentials 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 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. Women Essentials needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Leadership & Managing People industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Women Essentials with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Women Essentials is facing in Leadership & Managing People sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Women Essentials has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Leadership & Managing People industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Women Essentials 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.
Regulatory challenges
– Women Essentials 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.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Women Essentials 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 international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Women Essentials 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 Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment .
Environmental challenges
– Women Essentials 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. Women Essentials can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Leadership & Managing People industry.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Women Essentials 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.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Women Essentials 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment 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 Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment 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 Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment 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 Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment 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 Communication Essentials for Female Executives to Develop Leadership Presence: Getting Beyond the Barriers of Understating Accomplishment 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 Women Essentials needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
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