SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Johnan Academic Preparatory (Japan)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Johnan Academic Preparatory is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing energy prices, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, increasing transportation and logistics costs,
increasing commodity prices, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Johnan Academic Preparatory
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Johnan Academic Preparatory can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Johnan Academic Preparatory, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Johnan Academic Preparatory 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 Johnan Academic Preparatory can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Johnan Academic Preparatory
2. Improving business portfolio management of Johnan Academic Preparatory
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 Johnan Academic Preparatory
Strengths of Johnan Academic Preparatory | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Johnan Academic Preparatory are -
Ability to lead change in Schools
– Johnan Academic Preparatory 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 Johnan Academic Preparatory in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Training and development
– Johnan Academic Preparatory has one of the best training and development program in Services 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.
Strong track record of project management in the Schools industry
– Johnan Academic Preparatory is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Johnan Academic Preparatory has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Johnan Academic Preparatory 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Johnan Academic Preparatory in the Services sector have low bargaining power. Johnan Academic Preparatory has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Johnan Academic Preparatory to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Diverse revenue streams
– Johnan Academic Preparatory is present in almost all the verticals within the Schools industry. This has provided Johnan Academic Preparatory 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.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Johnan Academic Preparatory 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.
Analytics focus
– Johnan Academic Preparatory 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 Schools 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.
Organizational Resilience of Johnan Academic Preparatory
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Johnan Academic Preparatory does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Johnan Academic Preparatory is one of the leading players in the Schools 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Schools industry
– Johnan Academic Preparatory has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Johnan Academic Preparatory to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Schools industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Johnan Academic Preparatory to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Johnan Academic Preparatory 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 Johnan Academic Preparatory have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Weaknesses of Johnan Academic Preparatory | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Johnan Academic Preparatory are -
Employees’ less understanding of Johnan Academic Preparatory strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Johnan Academic Preparatory 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Johnan Academic Preparatory is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Schools industry, but Johnan Academic Preparatory needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Johnan Academic Preparatory to focus more on services in the Schools industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Skills based hiring in Schools industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Johnan Academic Preparatory 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.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Johnan Academic Preparatory, 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Schools industry, Johnan Academic Preparatory 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 bargaining power of channel partners in Schools industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in Japan, Johnan Academic Preparatory 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.
Lack of clear differentiation of Johnan Academic Preparatory products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Johnan Academic Preparatory needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Johnan Academic Preparatory has high operating costs in the Schools industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Johnan Academic Preparatory lucrative customers.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Johnan Academic Preparatory has some of the most successful models in the Schools industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Johnan Academic Preparatory should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Johnan Academic Preparatory has not been able to do capital spending to the tune of the competition. This has resulted into fewer innovations and company facing stiff competition from both existing competitors and new entrants who are disrupting the Schools industry using digital technology.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Japan, Johnan Academic Preparatory needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Johnan Academic Preparatory Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Johnan Academic Preparatory are -
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Johnan Academic Preparatory can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Johnan Academic Preparatory operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Schools sector.
Manufacturing automation
– Johnan Academic Preparatory 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Johnan Academic Preparatory 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Johnan Academic Preparatory 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Johnan Academic Preparatory 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Johnan Academic Preparatory has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Schools industry. This can help Johnan Academic Preparatory to build a more holistic ecosystem for Johnan Academic Preparatory products in the Schools industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Developing new processes and practices
– Johnan Academic Preparatory 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 Johnan Academic Preparatory 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Johnan Academic Preparatory 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Johnan Academic Preparatory 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 Johnan Academic Preparatory to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Johnan Academic Preparatory 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Johnan Academic Preparatory to increase its market reach. Johnan Academic Preparatory 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 Johnan Academic Preparatory can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Threats Johnan Academic Preparatory External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Johnan Academic Preparatory are -
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Johnan Academic Preparatory 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.
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.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Johnan Academic Preparatory 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 Johnan Academic Preparatory prominent markets.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Johnan Academic Preparatory 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.
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 Johnan Academic Preparatory.
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. Johnan Academic Preparatory can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
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 Johnan Academic Preparatory in the Schools sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Johnan Academic Preparatory is facing in Schools sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Regulatory challenges
– Johnan Academic Preparatory 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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Schools industry are lowering. It can presents Johnan Academic Preparatory with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Schools sector.
Increasing wage structure of Johnan Academic Preparatory
– 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 Johnan Academic Preparatory.
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. Johnan Academic Preparatory needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Schools industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Johnan Academic Preparatory Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Johnan Academic Preparatory 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 Johnan Academic Preparatory 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 Johnan Academic Preparatory 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 Johnan Academic Preparatory 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 Johnan Academic Preparatory needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.