SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Kuribayashi Steamship (Japan)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Kuribayashi Steamship is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – there is backlash against globalization, wage bills are increasing, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, increasing energy prices, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings,
increasing commodity prices, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Kuribayashi Steamship
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Kuribayashi Steamship can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Kuribayashi Steamship, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Kuribayashi Steamship 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 Kuribayashi Steamship can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Kuribayashi Steamship
2. Improving business portfolio management of Kuribayashi Steamship
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Japan
4. Making a Water Transportation sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Kuribayashi Steamship
Strengths of Kuribayashi Steamship | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Kuribayashi Steamship are -
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Kuribayashi Steamship in the Transportation sector have low bargaining power. Kuribayashi Steamship has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Kuribayashi Steamship to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Diverse revenue streams
– Kuribayashi Steamship is present in almost all the verticals within the Water Transportation industry. This has provided Kuribayashi Steamship 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.
Digital Transformation in Water Transportation industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Kuribayashi Steamship digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Kuribayashi Steamship 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.
Learning organization
- Kuribayashi Steamship 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 Kuribayashi Steamship is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Kuribayashi Steamship emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Water Transportation industry
– Kuribayashi Steamship has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Kuribayashi Steamship to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Water Transportation industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Kuribayashi Steamship to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Kuribayashi Steamship comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Water Transportation 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.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Kuribayashi Steamship 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Kuribayashi Steamship in Water Transportation industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Analytics focus
– Kuribayashi Steamship 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 Water Transportation industry. The technology infrastructure of Japan 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.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Kuribayashi Steamship 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.
Training and development
– Kuribayashi Steamship has one of the best training and development program in Transportation 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
– Kuribayashi Steamship has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Kuribayashi Steamship 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.
Weaknesses of Kuribayashi Steamship | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Kuribayashi Steamship are -
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Kuribayashi Steamship has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Water Transportation industry over the last five years. Kuribayashi Steamship 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.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Water Transportation industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in Japan, Kuribayashi Steamship 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 Water Transportation industry.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Kuribayashi Steamship needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Water Transportation industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Kuribayashi Steamship can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Kuribayashi Steamship is planning to shift buying processes online.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Kuribayashi Steamship has high operating costs in the Water Transportation industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Kuribayashi Steamship lucrative customers.
Skills based hiring in Water Transportation industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Kuribayashi Steamship 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.
Need for greater diversity
– Kuribayashi Steamship 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 Kuribayashi Steamship strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Kuribayashi Steamship 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 to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Kuribayashi Steamship is one of the leading players in the Water Transportation industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Water Transportation industry in last five years.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Kuribayashi Steamship has some of the most successful models in the Water Transportation industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Kuribayashi Steamship should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Kuribayashi Steamship, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Water Transportation 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Kuribayashi Steamship is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Water Transportation industry, but Kuribayashi Steamship needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Kuribayashi Steamship to focus more on services in the Water Transportation industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Kuribayashi Steamship Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Kuribayashi Steamship are -
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Kuribayashi Steamship has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Water Transportation industry. This can help Kuribayashi Steamship to build a more holistic ecosystem for Kuribayashi Steamship products in the Water Transportation industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Kuribayashi Steamship 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 Water Transportation industry.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Water Transportation industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Kuribayashi Steamship can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Kuribayashi Steamship 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.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Water Transportation industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Kuribayashi Steamship 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. Kuribayashi Steamship 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, Kuribayashi Steamship can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Kuribayashi Steamship operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Water Transportation sector.
Identify volunteer opportunities
– Covid-19 has impacted working population in two ways – it has led to people soul searching about their professional choices, resulting in mass resignation. Secondly it has encouraged people to do things that they are passionate about. This has opened opportunities for businesses to build volunteer oriented socially driven projects. Kuribayashi Steamship can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Kuribayashi Steamship is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Kuribayashi Steamship can utilize new technology in the field of Water Transportation industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Kuribayashi Steamship 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 Kuribayashi Steamship to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Kuribayashi Steamship 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 Kuribayashi Steamship 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
– Kuribayashi Steamship 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Kuribayashi Steamship can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Kuribayashi Steamship has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Water Transportation sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Kuribayashi Steamship to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Kuribayashi Steamship to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Threats Kuribayashi Steamship External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Kuribayashi Steamship are -
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 Kuribayashi Steamship.
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 Kuribayashi Steamship in the Water Transportation sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Water Transportation industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Kuribayashi Steamship can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Kuribayashi Steamship has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Water Transportation industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Kuribayashi Steamship needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Water Transportation 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.
Environmental challenges
– Kuribayashi Steamship 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. Kuribayashi Steamship can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Water Transportation industry.
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. Kuribayashi Steamship needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Water Transportation industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
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 Kuribayashi Steamship business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Kuribayashi Steamship in Water Transportation industry. The Water Transportation 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.
Regulatory challenges
– Kuribayashi Steamship 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 Water Transportation industry regulations.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Kuribayashi Steamship may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Water Transportation 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. Kuribayashi Steamship 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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Kuribayashi Steamship is facing in Water Transportation sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Kuribayashi Steamship 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Kuribayashi Steamship Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Kuribayashi Steamship 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 Kuribayashi Steamship 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 Kuribayashi Steamship 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 Kuribayashi Steamship 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 Kuribayashi Steamship needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.