SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Clime Investment Management (Australia)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Clime Investment Management is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing commodity prices, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , there is increasing trade war between United States & China, technology disruption, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, there is backlash against globalization, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models,
banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Clime Investment Management
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Clime Investment Management can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Clime Investment Management, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Clime Investment Management 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 Clime Investment Management can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Clime Investment Management
2. Improving business portfolio management of Clime Investment Management
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Australia
4. Making a Investment Services sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Clime Investment Management
Strengths of Clime Investment Management | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Clime Investment Management are -
Learning organization
- Clime Investment Management 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 Clime Investment Management is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Clime Investment Management emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Clime Investment Management 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Clime Investment Management in Investment Services industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Training and development
– Clime Investment Management has one of the best training and development program in Financial industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in – employees retention, in-house promotion, loyalty, new venture initiation, lack of conflict, and high level of both employees and customer engagement.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Clime Investment Management has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Clime Investment Management 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Clime Investment Management is present in almost all the verticals within the Investment Services industry. This has provided Clime Investment Management 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.
Strong track record of project management in the Investment Services industry
– Clime Investment Management is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Clime Investment Management has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Investment Services industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Clime Investment Management have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
High brand equity
– Clime Investment Management has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Clime Investment Management to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Innovation driven organization
– Clime Investment Management is one of the most innovative firm in Investment Services sector.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Clime Investment Management in the Financial sector have low bargaining power. Clime Investment Management has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Clime Investment Management to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Clime Investment Management has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Clime Investment Management staying ahead in the Investment Services industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Weaknesses of Clime Investment Management | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Clime Investment Management are -
Skills based hiring in Investment Services industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Clime Investment Management 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 Clime Investment Management ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Clime Investment Management still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Investment Services industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Clime Investment Management has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Clime Investment Management needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Investment Services industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Clime Investment Management can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Clime Investment Management is planning to shift buying processes online.
Need for greater diversity
– Clime Investment Management has taken concrete steps on diversity, equity, and inclusion. But the efforts so far has resulted in limited success. It needs to expand the recruitment and selection process to hire more people from the minorities and underprivileged background.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Clime Investment Management has high operating costs in the Investment Services industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Clime Investment Management lucrative customers.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Investment Services industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in Australia, Clime Investment Management 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 Investment Services industry.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Clime Investment Management 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Australia, Clime Investment Management needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Clime Investment Management is just above the Investment Services industry average. It 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.
Lack of clear differentiation of Clime Investment Management products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Clime Investment Management needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Clime Investment Management is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Investment Services industry, but Clime Investment Management needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Clime Investment Management to focus more on services in the Investment Services industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Clime Investment Management Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Clime Investment Management are -
Manufacturing automation
– Clime Investment Management can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Investment Services sector. 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Clime Investment Management can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Clime Investment Management has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Investment Services industry. This can help Clime Investment Management to build a more holistic ecosystem for Clime Investment Management products in the Investment Services industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Clime Investment Management to increase its market reach. Clime Investment Management 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Clime Investment Management is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Clime Investment Management can utilize new technology in the field of Investment Services industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Investment Services industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Clime Investment Management can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Clime Investment Management in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Investment Services industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Clime Investment Management 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 Clime Investment Management to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
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 Clime Investment Management 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.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Investment Services industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Clime Investment Management 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. Clime Investment Management 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Clime Investment Management can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Clime Investment Management operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Investment Services sector.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Clime Investment Management has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Investment Services sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Clime Investment Management to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Clime Investment Management to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Clime Investment Management 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.
Threats Clime Investment Management External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Clime Investment Management are -
Environmental challenges
– Clime Investment Management 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. Clime Investment Management can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Investment Services industry.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Clime Investment Management in Investment Services industry. The Investment Services 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.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Clime Investment Management may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Investment Services sector.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Clime Investment Management 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 Investment Services 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 Clime Investment Management in the Investment Services sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Clime Investment Management is facing in Investment Services sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Regulatory challenges
– Clime Investment Management 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 Investment Services industry regulations.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Clime Investment Management 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.
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.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Investment Services industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Clime Investment Management can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
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. Clime Investment Management needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Investment Services industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Clime Investment Management 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 Clime Investment Management prominent markets.
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 Clime Investment Management.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Clime Investment Management Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Clime Investment Management 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 Clime Investment Management 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 Clime Investment Management 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 Clime Investment Management 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 Clime Investment Management needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.