SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Blina Minerals NL (Australia)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Blina Minerals NL is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, wage bills are increasing, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , there is backlash against globalization,
cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Blina Minerals NL
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Blina Minerals NL can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Blina Minerals NL, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Blina Minerals NL 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 Blina Minerals NL can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Blina Minerals NL
2. Improving business portfolio management of Blina Minerals NL
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Australia
4. Making a Non-Metallic Mining sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Blina Minerals NL
Strengths of Blina Minerals NL | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Blina Minerals NL are -
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Blina Minerals NL 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Blina Minerals NL comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Non-Metallic Mining 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 Blina Minerals NL 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
– Blina Minerals NL is one of the most innovative firm in Non-Metallic Mining sector.
Strong track record of project management in the Non-Metallic Mining industry
– Blina Minerals NL is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Blina Minerals NL in the Basic Materials sector have low bargaining power. Blina Minerals NL has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Blina Minerals NL to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Organizational Resilience of Blina Minerals NL
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Blina Minerals NL does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Blina Minerals NL has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Non-Metallic Mining industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Blina Minerals NL have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Diverse revenue streams
– Blina Minerals NL is present in almost all the verticals within the Non-Metallic Mining industry. This has provided Blina Minerals NL 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Blina Minerals NL is one of the leading players in the Non-Metallic Mining industry in Australia. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in Australia. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Ability to lead change in Non-Metallic Mining
– Blina Minerals NL is one of the leading players in the Non-Metallic Mining industry in Australia. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Non-Metallic Mining industry in Australia but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Blina Minerals NL in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Non-Metallic Mining industry
– Blina Minerals NL has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Blina Minerals NL to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Non-Metallic Mining industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Blina Minerals NL to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Weaknesses of Blina Minerals NL | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Blina Minerals NL are -
Skills based hiring in Non-Metallic Mining industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Blina Minerals NL 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Blina Minerals NL is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Non-Metallic Mining industry, but Blina Minerals NL needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Blina Minerals NL to focus more on services in the Non-Metallic Mining industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Blina Minerals NL needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Non-Metallic Mining industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Blina Minerals NL can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Blina Minerals NL is planning to shift buying processes online.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Blina Minerals NL 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 Non-Metallic Mining industry using digital technology.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Blina Minerals NL has some of the most successful models in the Non-Metallic Mining industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Blina Minerals NL 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 Australia, Blina Minerals NL needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Blina Minerals NL, in the dynamic environment of Non-Metallic Mining industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Blina Minerals NL has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Blina Minerals NL is just above the Non-Metallic Mining 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.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Blina Minerals NL is one of the leading players in the Non-Metallic Mining industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Non-Metallic Mining industry in last five years.
High dependence on Blina Minerals NL ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Blina Minerals NL still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Non-Metallic Mining industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Blina Minerals NL has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
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 Blina Minerals NL supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Blina Minerals NL is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Blina Minerals NL vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Blina Minerals NL Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Blina Minerals NL are -
Buying journey improvements
– Blina Minerals NL can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Non-Metallic Mining 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Blina Minerals NL 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.
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 Blina Minerals NL 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Blina Minerals NL 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Non-Metallic Mining industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Blina Minerals NL can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Blina Minerals NL can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Blina Minerals NL operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Non-Metallic Mining sector.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Blina Minerals NL has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Non-Metallic Mining industry. This can help Blina Minerals NL to build a more holistic ecosystem for Blina Minerals NL products in the Non-Metallic Mining industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Blina Minerals NL has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Non-Metallic Mining sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Blina Minerals NL to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Blina Minerals NL to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Blina Minerals NL in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Non-Metallic Mining industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Blina Minerals NL 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 Blina Minerals NL to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Blina Minerals NL to increase its market reach. Blina Minerals NL 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Blina Minerals NL 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– Blina Minerals NL can develop new processes and procedures in Non-Metallic Mining 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.
Threats Blina Minerals NL External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Blina Minerals NL are -
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. Blina Minerals NL 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.
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 Blina Minerals NL business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Non-Metallic Mining industry are lowering. It can presents Blina Minerals NL with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Non-Metallic Mining sector.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Blina Minerals NL has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Non-Metallic Mining industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Blina Minerals NL needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Non-Metallic Mining 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.
Regulatory challenges
– Blina Minerals NL 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 Non-Metallic Mining industry regulations.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Blina Minerals NL is facing in Non-Metallic Mining sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Blina Minerals NL 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 Non-Metallic Mining industry.
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.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Blina Minerals NL 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 wage structure of Blina Minerals NL
– 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 Blina Minerals NL.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Blina Minerals NL 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 Blina Minerals NL prominent markets.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Blina Minerals NL may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Non-Metallic Mining sector.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Blina Minerals NL 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 Non-Metallic Mining industry and other sectors.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Blina Minerals NL Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Blina Minerals NL 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 Blina Minerals NL 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 Blina Minerals NL 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 Blina Minerals NL 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 Blina Minerals NL needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
