Swot Analysis of "Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A)" written by William W. George includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Jung Andrea facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A) case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Collaboration, Crisis management, Financial analysis, Financial markets, Leadership development, Sales, Work-life balance and Leadership & Managing People.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A) casestudy better are - – banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, increasing energy prices, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , there is increasing trade war between United States & China, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, increasing transportation and logistics costs,
challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, increasing commodity prices, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A)
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A) case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Jung Andrea, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Jung Andrea 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 Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A) can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A) case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Jung Andrea
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 Jung Andrea
Strengths Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Jung Andrea in Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A) Harvard Business Review case study are -
High brand equity
– Jung Andrea has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Jung Andrea to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Ability to lead change in Leadership & Managing People field
– Jung Andrea is one of the leading players in its industry. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in its segment but also across the whole industry. The ability to lead change has enabled Jung Andrea in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Analytics focus
– Jung Andrea 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 William W. George 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Jung Andrea is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A) are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Jung Andrea 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 Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A) HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A) Harvard Business Review case study comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the industry, building diversified operations across different geographies so that disruption in one part of the world doesn’t impact the overall performance of the firm, and integrating the various business operations and processes through its digital transformation drive.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Leadership & Managing People industry
– Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A) firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Jung Andrea to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Leadership & Managing People industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Jung Andrea to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Strong track record of project management
– Jung Andrea is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Jung Andrea 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 Jung Andrea 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.
Training and development
– Jung Andrea has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A) 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.
Organizational Resilience of Jung Andrea
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Jung Andrea does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Weaknesses Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A) are -
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A) that the firm needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department in the case Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A) can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Jung Andrea is planning to shift buying processes online.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Jung Andrea is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication mentioned in marketing section of case study Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A) can help to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A), is just above the industry average. Jung Andrea needs to redesign the compensation structure and incentives to increase the revenue per employees. Some of the steps that it can take are – hiring more specialists on project basis, etc.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A), it seems that the employees of Jung Andrea 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Jung Andrea 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.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, William W. George suggests that, Jung Andrea 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 to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A) HBR case study mentions - Jung Andrea 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.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Jung Andrea 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 decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Jung Andrea 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. Jung Andrea 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Jung Andrea 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Jung Andrea is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Leadership & Managing People segment. Jung Andrea needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Jung Andrea to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Opportunities Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A) | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities highlighted in the Harvard Business Review case study Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A) are -
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. Jung Andrea 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. Jung Andrea 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Jung Andrea 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Jung Andrea can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Jung Andrea operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Leadership & Managing People sector.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Jung Andrea has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Jung Andrea to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A) case study. Jung Andrea can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Jung Andrea 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Jung Andrea to increase its market reach. Jung Andrea 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Jung Andrea 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 Jung Andrea to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Manufacturing automation
– Jung Andrea 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.
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. Jung Andrea can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Jung Andrea 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Jung Andrea 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 Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A) - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Jung Andrea to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Jung Andrea is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A) 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.
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 Jung Andrea in the consumer business. Now Jung Andrea can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Threats Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A) External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A) are -
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Leadership & Managing People field will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Jung Andrea can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Regulatory challenges
– Jung Andrea 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 Jung Andrea in the Leadership & Managing People sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Jung Andrea 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.
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 Jung Andrea.
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. Jung Andrea needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Leadership & Managing People industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Jung Andrea 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 Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A) .
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Jung Andrea with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Jung Andrea 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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Jung Andrea is facing in Leadership & Managing People sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Increasing wage structure of Jung Andrea
– 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 Jung Andrea.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Jung Andrea 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 Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A) Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers in the HBR case study Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A) needs to zero down on the relative importance of each factor mentioned in the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants.
We can provide the relative importance to each factor by assigning relative weights. Weighted SWOT analysis process is a three stage process –
First stage for doing weighted SWOT analysis of the case study Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A) is to rank the strengths and weaknesses of the organization. This will help you to assess the most important strengths and weaknesses of the firm and which one of the strengths and weaknesses mentioned in the initial lists are marginal and can be left out.
Second stage for conducting weighted SWOT analysis of the Harvard case study Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A) is to give probabilities to the external strategic factors thus better understanding the opportunities and threats arising out of macro environment changes and developments.
Third stage of constructing weighted SWOT analysis of Andrea Jung: Empowering Avon Women (A) is to provide strategic recommendations includes – joining likelihood of external strategic factors such as opportunities and threats to the internal strategic factors – strengths and weaknesses. You should start with external factors as they will provide the direction of the overall industry. Secondly by joining probabilities with internal strategic factors can help the company not only strategic fit but also the most probably strategic trade-off that Jung Andrea needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
