HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Leadership & Managing People
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker)
How can you transform yourself from a good manager into an extraordinary leader? We've combed through hundreds of Harvard Business Review articles on leadership and selected the most important ones to help you maximize your own and your organization's performance. This collection includes these best-selling HBR articles: featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive" by Peter F. Drucker, "What Makes a Leader?" "What Leaders Really Do," "The Work of Leadership," "Why Should Anyone Be Led by You?" "Crucibles of Leadership," "Level 5 Leadership: The Triumph of Humility and Fierce Resolve," "Seven Transformations of Leadership," "Discovering Your Authentic Leadership," and "In Praise of the Incomplete Leader."
Authors :: Harvard Business Review, Peter F. Drucker, Daniel Goleman, William W. George
Swot Analysis of "HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker)" written by Harvard Business Review, Peter F. Drucker, Daniel Goleman, William W. George includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Leadership Drucker facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Communication, Emotional intelligence, Influence, Leadership, Leadership development, Managing people and Leadership & Managing People.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) casestudy better are - – increasing transportation and logistics costs, wage bills are increasing, geopolitical disruptions, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic ,
central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker)
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Leadership Drucker, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Leadership Drucker 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 HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Leadership Drucker
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 Leadership Drucker
Strengths HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Leadership Drucker in HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) Harvard Business Review case study are -
Diverse revenue streams
– Leadership Drucker is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) 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 Leadership Drucker
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Leadership Drucker does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Strong track record of project management
– Leadership Drucker is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Innovation driven organization
– Leadership Drucker is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Learning organization
- Leadership Drucker 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 Leadership Drucker is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Leadership Drucker 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 HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Leadership Drucker in the sector have low bargaining power. HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Leadership Drucker to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Leadership Drucker 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.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Leadership Drucker has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Leadership Drucker 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.
Training and development
– Leadership Drucker has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) 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.
Digital Transformation in Leadership & Managing People segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Leadership Drucker digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Leadership Drucker 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.
Weaknesses HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) are -
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker), 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.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Leadership Drucker is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication mentioned in marketing section of case study HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) can help to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) 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 Leadership Drucker 's lucrative customers.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker), in the dynamic environment Leadership Drucker has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Leadership Drucker has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Leadership Drucker is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Leadership & Managing People segment. Leadership Drucker needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Leadership Drucker to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) 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 HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Leadership Drucker is planning to shift buying processes online.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Leadership Drucker 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.
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 Leadership Drucker supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes mentioned in the HBR case study - HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker), it is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Leadership Drucker vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Leadership Drucker 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.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker), is just above the industry average. Leadership Drucker 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.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) 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 Leadership Drucker has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Opportunities HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) | 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 HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) are -
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Leadership Drucker to increase its market reach. Leadership Drucker 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Leadership Drucker 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, HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker), to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Buying journey improvements
– Leadership Drucker can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) 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.
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. Leadership Drucker can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Leadership Drucker 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 HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Leadership Drucker to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Leadership Drucker 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Leadership Drucker has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Leadership Drucker to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) case study. Leadership Drucker 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
– Leadership Drucker 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.
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. Leadership Drucker 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. Leadership Drucker 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Leadership Drucker 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.
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. Leadership Drucker can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Leadership Drucker 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, Leadership Drucker can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Leadership Drucker operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Leadership & Managing People sector.
Threats HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) are -
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Leadership Drucker 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.
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.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker), Leadership Drucker may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Leadership & Managing People .
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 Leadership Drucker.
Regulatory challenges
– Leadership Drucker 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
– Leadership Drucker 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.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Leadership Drucker 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 Leadership Drucker is facing in Leadership & Managing People sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Leadership Drucker 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 HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) .
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. Leadership Drucker can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Leadership Drucker with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
Environmental challenges
– Leadership Drucker 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. Leadership Drucker can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Leadership & Managing People industry.
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 HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) 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 HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) 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 HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) 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 HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) 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 HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker) 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 Leadership Drucker needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
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You can download Excel Template of Case Study Solution & Analysis of HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (with featured article "What Makes an Effective Executive," by Peter F. Drucker)
