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 - – supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, increasing energy prices, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, wage bills are increasing, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, geopolitical disruptions,
competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, 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 -
Innovation driven organization
– Voice Bomb is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
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.
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.
Organizational Resilience of Voice Bomb
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Voice Bomb does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
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.
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.
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.
Digital Transformation in Leadership & Managing People segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Voice Bomb digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Voice Bomb 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.
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.
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.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Voice Bomb 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 Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
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.
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 -
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.
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.
Lack of clear differentiation of Voice Bomb products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Voice Bomb 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 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.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Voice Bomb 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.
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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Voice Bomb 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.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Voice Bomb has some of the most successful products in the industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. firm in the HBR case study - Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
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.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb?, it seems that the employees of Voice Bomb don’t have comprehensive understanding of the firm’s strategy. This is reflected in number of promotional campaigns over the last few years that had mixed messaging and competing priorities. Some of the strategic activities and services promoted in the promotional campaigns were not consistent with the organization’s strategy.
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.
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 -
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 Voice Bomb 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.
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.
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.
Manufacturing automation
– Voice Bomb 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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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 Voice Bomb in the consumer business. Now Voice Bomb can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Voice Bomb is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Employee Voice: Untapped Resource or Social Media Time Bomb? 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.
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.
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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Voice Bomb can still utilize the low interest rates to borrow money for capital investment. Secondly it can also use the increase of government spending in infrastructure projects to get new business.
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 -
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.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Voice Bomb 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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Voice Bomb 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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
Increasing wage structure of Voice Bomb
– 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 Voice Bomb.
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? .
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.