Golden Plantation (GOLL) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Crops
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Golden Plantation (Indonesia)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Golden Plantation is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, increasing transportation and logistics costs, geopolitical disruptions, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings,
supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Golden Plantation
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Golden Plantation can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Golden Plantation, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Golden Plantation 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 Golden Plantation can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Golden Plantation
2. Improving business portfolio management of Golden Plantation
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Indonesia
4. Making a Crops sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Golden Plantation
Strengths of Golden Plantation | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Golden Plantation are -
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Golden Plantation in the Consumer/Non-Cyclical sector have low bargaining power. Golden Plantation has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Golden Plantation to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Analytics focus
– Golden Plantation is putting a lot of focus on utilizing the power of analytics in business decision making. This has put it among the leading players in the Crops industry. The technology infrastructure of Indonesia is also helping it to harness the power of analytics for – marketing optimization, demand forecasting, customer relationship management, inventory management, information sharing across the value chain etc.
Ability to lead change in Crops
– Golden Plantation is one of the leading players in the Crops industry in Indonesia. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Crops industry in Indonesia but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Golden Plantation in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Training and development
– Golden Plantation has one of the best training and development program in Consumer/Non-Cyclical 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.
Innovation driven organization
– Golden Plantation is one of the most innovative firm in Crops sector.
Digital Transformation in Crops industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Golden Plantation digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Golden Plantation 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.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Golden Plantation 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Golden Plantation comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Crops 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.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Golden Plantation has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Golden Plantation 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.
High brand equity
– Golden Plantation has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Golden Plantation to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Golden Plantation 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.
Strong track record of project management in the Crops industry
– Golden Plantation is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Weaknesses of Golden Plantation | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Golden Plantation are -
High dependence on Golden Plantation ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Golden Plantation still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Crops industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Golden Plantation has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Golden Plantation is just above the Crops 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.
High dependence on existing supply chain
– The disruption in the global supply chains because of the Covid-19 pandemic and blockage of the Suez Canal illustrated the fragile nature of Golden Plantation supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Golden Plantation is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Golden Plantation vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Crops industry, Golden Plantation 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.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Golden Plantation has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Crops industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Golden Plantation, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Crops industry. 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.
Lack of clear differentiation of Golden Plantation products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Golden Plantation needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Golden Plantation has some of the most successful models in the Crops industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Golden Plantation should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Crops industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in Indonesia, Golden Plantation 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 Crops industry.
Skills based hiring in Crops industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Golden Plantation 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.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Golden Plantation, in the dynamic environment of Crops industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Golden Plantation has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Golden Plantation Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Golden Plantation are -
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Golden Plantation to increase its market reach. Golden Plantation 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Golden Plantation 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 Golden Plantation 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 Golden Plantation can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Golden Plantation 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 Crops industry.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Golden Plantation 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.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Crops industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Golden Plantation in the Crops industry. Now Golden Plantation can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Loyalty marketing
– Golden Plantation 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.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Crops industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Golden Plantation 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. Golden Plantation 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, Golden Plantation can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Golden Plantation operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Crops sector.
Developing new processes and practices
– Golden Plantation can develop new processes and procedures in Crops 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Golden Plantation 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Golden Plantation can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Crops industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. It 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
– Golden Plantation can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Crops 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.
Threats Golden Plantation External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Golden Plantation are -
Environmental challenges
– Golden Plantation 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. Golden Plantation can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Crops industry.
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 Golden Plantation business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Golden Plantation 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 Crops industry.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Crops industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Golden Plantation can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Golden Plantation may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Crops sector.
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. Golden Plantation 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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Golden Plantation 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 Crops industry and other sectors.
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 Golden Plantation in the Crops sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Golden Plantation has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Crops industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Golden Plantation needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Crops 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.
Increasing wage structure of Golden Plantation
– 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 Golden Plantation.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Golden Plantation 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 Golden Plantation prominent markets.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Golden Plantation is facing in Crops sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Golden Plantation Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Golden Plantation 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 Golden Plantation 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 Golden Plantation 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 Golden Plantation 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 Golden Plantation needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
