Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Leadership & Managing People
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb?
The venues by which employees can voice satisfaction, dissatisfaction, and their experiences with the organization have traditionally been limited to internal communication systems that are orchestrated and sanctioned by the organization. However, social media such as Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn, as well as blogs and instant messaging, now enable employees to deliver messages to hundreds or even thousands of people with a few keystrokes. . .messages that may or may not be desirable to or sanctioned by the organization. Under these circumstances, employee voice can be an untapped resource for enhancing the organization's public image or a bomb waiting to explode with devastating impact on the firm's reputation. Effective management of employee voice begins with understanding its purposes: contribution to management decision making, demonstration of partnership, articulation of individual dissatisfaction, and expression of collective bargaining. These expressions of voice can be guided and managed to a strategic advantage when organizations provide a proper organizational context along with the appropriate mechanisms for employees.
Authors :: Sandra Jeanquart Miles, W. Glynn Mangold
Swot Analysis of "Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb?" written by Sandra Jeanquart Miles, W. Glynn Mangold includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Voice Bomb facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Motivating people, Social platforms and Leadership & Managing People.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? casestudy better are - – banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, geopolitical disruptions, increasing commodity prices, technology disruption, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google,
central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb?
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Voice Bomb, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Voice Bomb 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 Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Voice Bomb
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 Voice Bomb
Strengths Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Voice Bomb in Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? Harvard Business Review case study are -
Diverse revenue streams
– Voice Bomb is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? 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
– Voice Bomb 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 Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Training and development
– Voice Bomb has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Voice Bomb in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Analytics focus
– Voice Bomb 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 Sandra Jeanquart Miles, W. Glynn Mangold 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Leadership & Managing People industry
– Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Voice Bomb to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Leadership & Managing People industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Voice Bomb to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Voice Bomb has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Voice Bomb 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.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Voice Bomb 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Voice Bomb in the sector have low bargaining power. Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Voice Bomb to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Strong track record of project management
– Voice Bomb is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Voice Bomb is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Learning organization
- Voice Bomb 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 Voice Bomb is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Weaknesses Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? are -
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? HBR case study mentions - Voice Bomb 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.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Voice Bomb 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.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb?, 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.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Voice Bomb 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 harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Voice Bomb is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication mentioned in marketing section of case study Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? can help to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Need for greater diversity
– Voice Bomb 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 Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? 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 Voice Bomb has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Voice Bomb 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. Voice Bomb 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.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? 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 Voice Bomb 's lucrative customers.
High dependence on existing supply chain
– The disruption in the global supply chains because of the Covid-19 pandemic and blockage of the Suez Canal illustrated the fragile nature of Voice Bomb supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes mentioned in the HBR case study - Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb?, it is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Voice Bomb vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? 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 Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Voice Bomb is planning to shift buying processes online.
Opportunities Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? | 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 Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? are -
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Voice Bomb 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, Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb?, 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
– Voice Bomb 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.
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. Voice Bomb 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, Voice Bomb can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Voice Bomb 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 Voice Bomb to increase its market reach. Voice Bomb 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.
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. Voice Bomb 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. Voice Bomb 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Voice Bomb 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Voice Bomb can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Voice Bomb 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Voice Bomb 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 Voice Bomb to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Voice Bomb 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– Voice Bomb 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Voice Bomb 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.
Threats Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? are -
Regulatory challenges
– Voice Bomb needs to prepare for regulatory challenges as consumer protection groups and other pressure groups are vigorously advocating for more regulations on big business - to reduce inequality, to create a level playing field, to product data privacy and consumer privacy, to reduce the influence of big money on democratic institutions, etc. This can lead to significant changes in the Leadership & Managing People industry regulations.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Voice Bomb 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 Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? .
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. Voice Bomb can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Voice Bomb has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Leadership & Managing People industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Voice Bomb 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.
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 Voice Bomb in the Leadership & Managing People sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
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 Voice Bomb business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Voice Bomb is facing in Leadership & Managing People sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Voice Bomb 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 dependence on third party suppliers
– Voice Bomb 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.
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. Voice Bomb needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Leadership & Managing People industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
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.
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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Voice Bomb with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? 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 Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? 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 Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? 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 Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? 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 Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? 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 Voice Bomb needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.