Case Study Description of Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C)
The case describes the cross-cultural challenges experienced by a French market researcher engaged to do an investment country report in Mauritania. To gain the trust of the 'gatekeeper' of the information he needs, he has the opportunity to immerse himself in traditional culture by experiencing nomadic life in the desert. Pressured by headquarters, yet needing to be sensitive to local culture, he has to decide how far he is prepared to go to get the job done.
Swot Analysis of "Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C)" written by Henrik Bresman, Gillian Saint Leger includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Camel's Immerse facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C) case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Globalization, Leadership, Negotiations and Leadership & Managing People.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C) casestudy better are - – increasing household debt because of falling income levels, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, increasing transportation and logistics costs, increasing energy prices, increasing commodity prices, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , geopolitical disruptions,
technology disruption, wage bills are increasing, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C)
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C) case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Camel's Immerse, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Camel's Immerse 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 Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C) can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C) case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Camel's Immerse
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 Camel's Immerse
Strengths Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Camel's Immerse in Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C) Harvard Business Review case study are -
Learning organization
- Camel's Immerse 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 Camel's Immerse is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C) Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C) 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Camel's Immerse in the sector have low bargaining power. Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C) has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Camel's Immerse to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Leadership & Managing People industry
– Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C) firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Camel's Immerse to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Leadership & Managing People industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Camel's Immerse to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
High brand equity
– Camel's Immerse has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Camel's Immerse to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Camel's Immerse 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 Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C) HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Organizational Resilience of Camel's Immerse
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Camel's Immerse 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 Camel's Immerse 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.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Camel's Immerse 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 Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C) - 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 lead change in Leadership & Managing People field
– Camel's Immerse 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 Camel's Immerse in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Strong track record of project management
– Camel's Immerse 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 Camel's Immerse 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.
Weaknesses Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C) | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C) are -
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Camel's Immerse 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.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C), it seems that the employees of Camel's Immerse 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.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C), is just above the industry average. Camel's Immerse 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 operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C) 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 Camel's Immerse 's lucrative customers.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Camel's Immerse 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, Camel's Immerse 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. Camel's Immerse 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.
Lack of clear differentiation of Camel's Immerse products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Camel's Immerse needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C), 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Camel's Immerse is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Leadership & Managing People segment. Camel's Immerse needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Camel's Immerse to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Camel's Immerse 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.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Camel's Immerse is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication mentioned in marketing section of case study Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C) can help to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Opportunities Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C) | 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 Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C) are -
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Camel's Immerse 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 Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C) - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Camel's Immerse to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Camel's Immerse 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Camel's Immerse 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Camel's Immerse 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 Camel's Immerse 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Camel's Immerse is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C) 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Camel's Immerse can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C) 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.
Manufacturing automation
– Camel's Immerse 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.
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. Camel's Immerse 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. Camel's Immerse 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Camel's Immerse has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Camel's Immerse to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C) case study. Camel's Immerse can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Camel's Immerse 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 Camel's Immerse to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Camel's Immerse can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Camel's Immerse 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, Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C), to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Threats Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C) External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C) are -
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C), Camel's Immerse 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 .
Environmental challenges
– Camel's Immerse 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. Camel's Immerse can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Leadership & Managing People industry.
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 Camel's Immerse in the Leadership & Managing People sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Camel's Immerse 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 Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C) .
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 Camel's Immerse.
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.
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. Camel's Immerse needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Leadership & Managing People industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
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 Camel's Immerse 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 Camel's Immerse 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.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Camel's Immerse has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Leadership & Managing People industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Camel's Immerse 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
– Camel's Immerse 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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Camel's Immerse with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Camel's Immerse is facing in Leadership & Managing People sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C) 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 Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C) 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 Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C) 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 Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C) 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 Camel's Milk and Lamb's Liver (C) 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 Camel's Immerse needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.