Link and Motivation (2170) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Schools
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Link and Motivation (Japan)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Link and Motivation is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , increasing commodity prices, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, increasing energy prices, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, increasing transportation and logistics costs, wage bills are increasing,
increasing household debt because of falling income levels, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Link and Motivation
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Link and Motivation can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Link and Motivation, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Link and Motivation 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 Link and Motivation can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Link and Motivation
2. Improving business portfolio management of Link and Motivation
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Japan
4. Making a Schools sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Link and Motivation
Strengths of Link and Motivation | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Link and Motivation are -
Learning organization
- Link and Motivation 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 Link and Motivation is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Link and Motivation emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Ability to lead change in Schools
– Link and Motivation is one of the leading players in the Schools industry in Japan. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Schools industry in Japan but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Link and Motivation in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Diverse revenue streams
– Link and Motivation is present in almost all the verticals within the Schools industry. This has provided Link and Motivation 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Schools industry
– Link and Motivation has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Link and Motivation to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Schools industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Link and Motivation to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Link and Motivation has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Schools industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Link and Motivation have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Link and Motivation in Schools industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Link and Motivation in the Services sector have low bargaining power. Link and Motivation has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Link and Motivation to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
High brand equity
– Link and Motivation has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Link and Motivation to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Link and Motivation has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Link and Motivation staying ahead in the Schools industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Strong track record of project management in the Schools industry
– Link and Motivation is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Digital Transformation in Schools industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Link and Motivation digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Link and Motivation 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.
Organizational Resilience of Link and Motivation
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Link and Motivation does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Weaknesses of Link and Motivation | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Link and Motivation are -
High bargaining power of channel partners in Schools industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in Japan, Link and Motivation 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 Schools industry.
Need for greater diversity
– Link and Motivation 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.
Employees’ less understanding of Link and Motivation strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Link and Motivation 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Link and Motivation needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Schools industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Link and Motivation can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Link and Motivation is planning to shift buying processes online.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Japan, Link and Motivation needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Schools industry, Link and Motivation 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Link and Motivation is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Schools industry, but Link and Motivation needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Link and Motivation to focus more on services in the Schools industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Link and Motivation, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Schools 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.
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 Link and Motivation supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Link and Motivation is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Link and Motivation vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Link and Motivation is just above the Schools 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 Link and Motivation products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Link and Motivation needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Link and Motivation Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Link and Motivation are -
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Link and Motivation in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Schools industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Manufacturing automation
– Link and Motivation can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Schools 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Link and Motivation can build a diversified supply chain model across various countries in - South East Asia, India, and other parts of the world. This reconfiguration of global supply chain can help Link and Motivation to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Loyalty marketing
– Link and Motivation 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Link and Motivation can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Link and Motivation operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Schools sector.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Link and Motivation 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 Link and Motivation to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Link and Motivation 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Link and Motivation can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Schools 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Link and Motivation 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Link and Motivation to increase its market reach. Link and Motivation 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Link and Motivation can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Developing new processes and practices
– Link and Motivation can develop new processes and procedures in Schools 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.
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 Link and Motivation 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.
Threats Link and Motivation External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Link and Motivation are -
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Link and Motivation is facing in Schools sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Link and Motivation 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 Schools industry and other sectors.
Increasing wage structure of Link and Motivation
– 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 Link and Motivation.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Link and Motivation 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 Schools industry.
Aging population
– As the populations of most advanced economies are aging, it will lead to high social security costs, higher savings among population, and lower demand for goods and services in the economy. The household savings in US, France, UK, Germany, and Japan are growing faster than predicted because of uncertainty caused by pandemic.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Link and Motivation has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Schools industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Link and Motivation needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Schools 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.
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. Link and Motivation needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Schools industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Regulatory challenges
– Link and Motivation 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 Schools industry regulations.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Schools industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Link and Motivation 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, Link and Motivation may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Schools sector.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Link and Motivation 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 Link and Motivation prominent markets.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Link and Motivation 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.
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. Link and Motivation 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 Link and Motivation Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Link and Motivation 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 Link and Motivation 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 Link and Motivation 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 Link and Motivation 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 Link and Motivation needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
