Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Glory Ltd is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing transportation and logistics costs, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, increasing energy prices,
banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, increasing commodity prices, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Glory Ltd can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Glory Ltd, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Glory Ltd 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 Glory Ltd can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Glory Ltd
2. Improving business portfolio management of Glory Ltd
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Japan
4. Making a Office Equipment sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Glory Ltd
Strengths of Glory Ltd | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Glory Ltd are -
Highly skilled collaborators
– Glory Ltd has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Office Equipment industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Glory Ltd have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Office Equipment industry
– Glory Ltd has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Glory Ltd to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Office Equipment industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Glory Ltd to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Glory Ltd has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Glory Ltd staying ahead in the Office Equipment industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Organizational Resilience of Glory Ltd
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Glory Ltd does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Diverse revenue streams
– Glory Ltd is present in almost all the verticals within the Office Equipment industry. This has provided Glory Ltd 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.
Learning organization
- Glory Ltd 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 Glory Ltd is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Glory Ltd emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Glory Ltd comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Office Equipment 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.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Glory Ltd 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.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Glory Ltd 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.
Innovation driven organization
– Glory Ltd is one of the most innovative firm in Office Equipment sector.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Glory Ltd has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Glory Ltd 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Glory Ltd is one of the leading players in the Office Equipment industry in Japan. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in Japan. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Weaknesses of Glory Ltd | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Glory Ltd are -
Lack of clear differentiation of Glory Ltd products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Glory Ltd needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Glory Ltd has some of the most successful models in the Office Equipment industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Glory Ltd should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Japan, Glory Ltd needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Glory Ltd 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.
Employees’ less understanding of Glory Ltd strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Glory Ltd 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.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Glory Ltd has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Office Equipment industry over the last five years. Glory Ltd 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.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Glory Ltd, in the dynamic environment of Office Equipment industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Glory Ltd has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Glory Ltd needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Office Equipment industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Glory Ltd can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Glory Ltd is planning to shift buying processes online.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Glory Ltd is one of the leading players in the Office Equipment industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Office Equipment industry in last five years.
High dependence on Glory Ltd ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Glory Ltd still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Office Equipment industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Glory Ltd has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Skills based hiring in Office Equipment industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Glory Ltd 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.
Glory Ltd Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Glory Ltd are -
Loyalty marketing
– Glory Ltd 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Glory Ltd is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Glory Ltd can utilize new technology in the field of Office Equipment industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Manufacturing automation
– Glory Ltd can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Office Equipment 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Glory Ltd 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 Glory Ltd to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Glory Ltd 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Glory Ltd in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Office Equipment industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Glory Ltd to increase its market reach. Glory Ltd 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Glory Ltd 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 Office Equipment industry.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Glory Ltd has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Office Equipment sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Glory Ltd to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Glory Ltd to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Glory Ltd can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Glory Ltd operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Office Equipment sector.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Glory Ltd 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Glory Ltd has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Office Equipment industry. This can help Glory Ltd to build a more holistic ecosystem for Glory Ltd products in the Office Equipment industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Office Equipment industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Glory Ltd in the Office Equipment industry. Now Glory Ltd can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Threats Glory Ltd External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Glory Ltd are -
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Glory Ltd in Office Equipment industry. The Office Equipment 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.
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. Glory Ltd needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Office Equipment industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
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 Glory Ltd.
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 Glory Ltd business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Glory Ltd 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.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Glory Ltd 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 Glory Ltd prominent markets.
Environmental challenges
– Glory Ltd 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. Glory Ltd can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Office Equipment industry.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Glory Ltd has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Office Equipment industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Glory Ltd needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Office Equipment 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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Glory Ltd is facing in Office Equipment sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Glory Ltd may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Office Equipment sector.
Increasing wage structure of Glory Ltd
– 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 Glory Ltd.
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 Glory Ltd in the Office Equipment sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
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. Glory Ltd 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Glory Ltd Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Glory Ltd 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 Glory Ltd 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 Glory Ltd 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 Glory Ltd 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 Glory Ltd needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.