Swot Analysis of "General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution" written by Christopher A. Bartlett, Ashish Nanda includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Renewing Manager's facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Leadership development, Organizational structure and Leadership & Managing People.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution casestudy better are - – digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, increasing commodity prices, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , wage bills are increasing, geopolitical disruptions, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models,
increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Renewing Manager's, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Renewing Manager's 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 General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Renewing Manager's
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 Renewing Manager's
Strengths General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Renewing Manager's in General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution Harvard Business Review case study are -
Diverse revenue streams
– Renewing Manager's is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution 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.
High brand equity
– Renewing Manager's has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Renewing Manager's to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Innovation driven organization
– Renewing Manager's is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Renewing Manager's is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Renewing Manager's in the sector have low bargaining power. General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Renewing Manager's to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Digital Transformation in Leadership & Managing People segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Renewing Manager's digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Renewing Manager's 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.
Organizational Resilience of Renewing Manager's
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Renewing Manager's does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Renewing Manager's 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Leadership & Managing People industry
– General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Renewing Manager's to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Leadership & Managing People industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Renewing Manager's to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Ability to lead change in Leadership & Managing People field
– Renewing Manager's 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 Renewing Manager's in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Renewing Manager's in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Renewing Manager's has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Renewing Manager's 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.
Weaknesses General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution are -
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Renewing Manager's 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.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Christopher A. Bartlett, Ashish Nanda suggests that, Renewing Manager's 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.
Lack of clear differentiation of Renewing Manager's products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Renewing Manager's needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Renewing Manager's 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.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution, in the dynamic environment Renewing Manager's has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Renewing Manager's has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Renewing Manager's is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication mentioned in marketing section of case study General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution can help to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution 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 General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Renewing Manager's is planning to shift buying processes online.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Renewing Manager's 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.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution, is just above the industry average. Renewing Manager's 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 General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution 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 Renewing Manager's has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Renewing Manager's, firm in the HBR case study General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Opportunities General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution | 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 General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution are -
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Renewing Manager's 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, General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Renewing Manager's 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.
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. Renewing Manager's 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. Renewing Manager's 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Renewing Manager's 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 Renewing Manager's to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Developing new processes and practices
– Renewing Manager's 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Renewing Manager's 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Renewing Manager's has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Renewing Manager's to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution case study. Renewing Manager's can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Renewing Manager's can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Buying journey improvements
– Renewing Manager's can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution 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.
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. Renewing Manager's can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Loyalty marketing
– Renewing Manager's 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.
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 Renewing Manager's 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Renewing Manager's to increase its market reach. Renewing Manager's 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.
Threats General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution are -
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 Renewing Manager's in the Leadership & Managing People sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Instability in the European markets
– European Union markets are facing three big challenges post Covid – expanded balance sheets, Brexit related business disruption, and aggressive Russia looking to distract the existing security mechanism. Renewing Manager's will face different problems in different parts of Europe. For example it will face inflationary pressures in UK, France, and Germany, balance sheet expansion and demand challenges in Southern European countries, and geopolitical instability in the Eastern Europe.
Regulatory challenges
– Renewing Manager's 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 wage structure of Renewing Manager's
– 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 Renewing Manager's.
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 Renewing Manager's.
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. Renewing Manager's needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Leadership & Managing People industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution, Renewing Manager's 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 .
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Renewing Manager's has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Leadership & Managing People industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Renewing Manager's 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.
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.
Environmental challenges
– Renewing Manager's 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. Renewing Manager's can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Leadership & Managing People industry.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Renewing Manager's 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.
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 Renewing Manager's business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Renewing Manager's 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution 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 General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution 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 General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution 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 General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution 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 General Manager's Leadership Challenge: Building a Self-Renewing Institution 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 Renewing Manager's needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.