Essay: Waste Management, Inc analysis

According to industry data, Waste Management, Inc, is the world’s largest waste-handling company with more than 15 million customers and collection rates topping 110 million tons of waste per year. WMI has laid its foundation in one of the most historically stable markets in the world. However, modern social trends are beginning to interfere with WMI’s market stability. Individuals, environmental activist groups, and corporate leaders are making the pledge to reduce waste emissions and increasing the recyclability of their products. Although these social trends are proving beneficial to the Earth’s ecosystems, they are also creating an unavoidable threat to WMi’s future growth (revenues) and usability of landfills in a more eco-friendly environment.
For a big portion of Waste Management Inc.’s history, the company has been operating in a stable business environment; as long as individuals and companies alike continued to produce waste, WMI’s market only increased. However, the popularity surrounding the “Green Movement” has turned this once stable market upside down and created an entirely new subset of dynamics going forward in regards to future stakeholders; WMI’s general and task environments are changing at a newly rapid pace. For example, two of the largest customers within WMI’s portfolio, Subaru and Wal-Mart, announced long-term objectives to continuously reduce waste production until their operating centers are eliminating landfill waste entirely. Although many of the customers within WMI’s portfolio are still dependent on the company’s service of landfill disposal, WMI could face an increasing amount of uncertainty if they continue to lose market share as a result of the increasing popularity of “Green Movement” social trends.
In addition to the current “Green Movement” social trends, advocacy groups, such as the Sierra Club, have grown in protest against WMI’s current landfill disposal techniques, deeming their practices to be unethical and irresponsible. As a result, advocacy groups as well as an increasing majority of WMI’s customer base have expressed their desire for WMI to recycle and sort all reusable materials sent to landfills. Although this idea is more than doable in theory, the higher cost due to collecting and sorting the material would cause harm towards WMI’s bottom line as they would be losing money throughout the entire process, thus, it would be unsustainable.
As a result of environmental scanning, managers are able to develop a more acute sense of contextual intelligence as they search for social trends that could impact the future of their business. As we have already seen within WMI’s external environment, there is a clear trend towards environmentally friendly waste management and it is gaining traction at an alarming rate. These environmentally conscious individuals are current stakeholders of WMI which means they are not only able to influence, but be influenced by the compeletion of WMI’s goals as well. If WMI had initially been more proactive with its environmental scanning process, it is possible that WMI could’ve preemptively addressed this cause for concern before it became an issue. Not only would preemptive action have allowed WMI to potentially avoid an expanding public backlash, but it would’ve also helped them better understand their stakeholders. What it boils down to is that WMI did not effectively manage the growing concerns of their stakeholders or have any understanding of the contextual intelligence. If these social trends should continue to grow in popularity, there will not only be further social backlash but economic as well.
Before a plan of action can be developed for WMI, it is of the upmost importance that we analyze the company’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats in order to select only the most effective recommendations in regards to strategy going forward. In terms of core strengths, this would include its current status as the world’s largest waste-handling company. At WMI’s current size, the company already has a developed portfolio of assets and infrastructure which include landfills being number one, recycling facilities, and waste-to-energy plants which can be converted if the company chooses to change its strategies. However, the company’s weaknesses would include its internal environment’s inability to accept the current social trends as well as the fact that 75% of WMI’s annual profit comes from its 273 landfills. Having more than over 75% of a company’s profits coming from a single client is already a risky avenue, but when that same exact sector of the company is reporting decreased revenues year over year in addition to a c-suite resistant to change, this mild concern could grow into a cancer for the company.
In addition to the SWOT analysis, one of the company’s greatest assets is only a possibility due to one of its greatest threats. As aforementioned, many advocacy groups have placed WMi within their crosshairs because of its poor landfill practices; if these concerns are not dealt with, then the public image and trust of WTI will suffer as a result. But if WMI is able to battle these public outcries through use of progressive operating action, then the world would be at the company’s feet unveiling a plethora of opportunity. WMI would be able to repair its public image through utilizing a stakeholder view and listening to the demands of society in addition could also use this new found propulsion to pivot the company’s strategies in order to better handle the future views of their stakeholders.
In summation, If WMI is to improve their current situation and re-spark the continued growth and success of a past time, then it is imperative that the company must acknowledge the growing discrepancies between its external and internal environments. Because the world is constantly changing, a company will not be able to survive its internal environment develops an inability to change in regards to the growing societal pressures. Yet, WMI’s available assets/capital in addition to its current industry positioning afford the company many pivotal opportunities going forward in order to appease the growing societal concerns. Changing the internal environment of the company will not be the easiest task in the world, however, if WMI is to succeed in the world we live today, it must learn to adjust the company’s culture.
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