Handelsbanken: In-depth Analysis of Growth, Strategy, and Culture

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of Handelsbanken, starting with its historical background and growth since its establishment in 1871. It explores the bank's vision and mission, focusing on meeting the financial needs of its customers. The report delves into Handelsbanken's resources and capabilities, highlighting its cost-consciousness and decentralized structure. An industry analysis using Porter's Five Forces assesses the competitive landscape. The company's cost leadership strategy and internal efficiency are examined. Finally, the report analyzes Handelsbanken's strong organizational culture and its importance in adapting to different environments and fostering cohesion among its diverse workforce. The report uses multiple references to support the analysis and provides a well-rounded view of the company's operations and strategies.

Running head: HANDELSBANKEN
Handelsbanken
Name of the Student:
Name of the University:
Author note:

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1. Growth and History of the company
The history of Handelsbanken dates back to the year 1871 when several number of
leading Stockholm residents and corporations founded the Stockholms Handelsbanken (Van
der Zande 2018). The formation of this bank was the outcome of a personal conflict that took
place in the Stockholms Enskilda Bank that culminated in the year 1871 in the month of
April. At present it is operating in more than 20 different countries. It has developed several
branch networks in 6 different nations- UK, Finland, Sweden, Norway, Denmark and
Netherlands (Alexey 2015). To these nations, it classes as the “home markets”. A large piece
of the success of this bank in recent years could be credited to the floatability of its operations
in UK, which comprise of 5 regional banks that offer the banking services in a total of 187
different branches all around the nation and also in the asset management organisation named
Heartwood. The banks shift into the market of UK has helped in minimising the effect of the
negative rates of interest in Sweden. For four consecutive years, the bank has been awarded
with first prize for its best services within the banking sector in Sweden from the
ServiceScore. With the same, in 2015, it won the award of the Business Bank of the Year and
“Sweden’s Small Enterprise Bank”.
2. Vision and Mission of the company
Handelsbanken is aimed at meeting all the needs of its both corporate and personal
customers in regards to financial services along with the highest possible level of satisfaction.
3. Resources and Capabilities of the company
Handelsbanken is widely popular for its cost-consciousness. The branch managers at
different branches under this organisation are very eager to keep all their costs low so as to
get success in internal benchmarking with the other branches of the company (Mayes 2017).
With the same, it is much more decentralised than its competitors. With the same, in this

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organisation, there is a tendency to follow the trends within the industry as early as possible,
especially is these are not in the line with the culture of Handelsbanken.
4. Industry Analysis using Porter’s Five Forces
Threat of
substitutes
Threat of new
competitors
Bargaining power
of the customers
Bargaining
power of the
suppliers
Industry
Rivalry
1. Low
2. High cost
of
switching
to the
substitutes
3. There is
very
limited
number of
substitutes
in the
industry
4. Substantia
l product
differentia
tion
1. There is a
very high
capital
requiremen
ts
2. Very
strong
requiremen
t of
distribution
network
3. Strong
brand
name is
very
important
to survive
4. High
requiremen
t of
advanced
technologie
s
1. Very low
2. The buyers
need special
type of
customisation
3. The price
sensitivity for
buyers is very
low
4. Dependency
on the
distributors is
low
5. Product is
very
important for
the customers
1. High
competitio
n among
the
suppliers
2. Low
concentrati
on of the
suppliers
(Terpend
and Krause
2015)
3. Large
number of
substitute
inputs
4. Diverse
channel of
distribution
5. Low cost
of
switching
the
suppliers
1. Relatively
less
competitor
s
2. Low
storage
costs
3. Exit
barriers
are low
4. Rate of
industry
growth
rate is very
fast
5. Corporate and Business level strategies
Handelsbanken make use of cost leadership strategy in order to operate its business. In
terms of commodity products, there are several producers who try to lessen the cost structure
and transfer the value to the consumers in context of low prices (Nilsson and Stockenstrand
2015). It is dependent on having an internal efficiency for having above average margins so
as to be sustainable in the future. The bank builds a state of art facility that have a very low
operational as well as R&D cost along with overhead expenses etc.

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6. Leadership and Culture of the company
Handelsbanken remains a very strong and our long-term goals stand firm. It has a well-
established organization culture, which can not only adapt to different outside environment
but also bring solidarities in organizations. It creates a cohesive organizational culture. The
workers of the bank come from several different nations. Sometimes, their own national
culture might have some sort of conflicts with the organizational culture. Hence, the extent of
the organizational culture is very vital to lessen the conflicts and Handelsbanken have that.
The organizational culture of this bank is strong and the employees follow it to do the job
involuntarily as this organizational culture suppress the national culture for increasing the
conflicts and then lead the working behaviours of the employees in a way that fit the
organizational culture. Its workers share and accept all the important values, and hence, the
culture of this bank is very strong and notable.

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References:
Alexey, K., 2015. The Baltics in the geography of the largest transnational corporations of
Europe. Baltic Region, (1 (23)).
Mayes, D.G., 2017. Top-down restructuring of markets and institutions: the Nordic banking
crises. Journal of Banking Regulation, 18(3), pp.213-232.
Nilsson, F. and Stockenstrand, A.K., 2015. The Objectives of Financial Accounting and
Management Control. In Financial Accounting and Management Control (pp. 1-16).
Springer, Cham.
Terpend, R. and Krause, D.R., 2015. Competition or cooperation? Promoting supplier
performance with incentives under varying conditions of dependence. Journal of Supply
Chain Management, 51(4), pp.29-53.
van der Zande, J., 2018. 17 Banks and digitalization. THE RISE AND DEVELOPMENT OF
FINTECH, p.327.