SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Boskalis Westminster (United Kingdom)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Boskalis Westminster is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, increasing energy prices, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, wage bills are increasing, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy,
competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, there is backlash against globalization, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Boskalis Westminster
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Boskalis Westminster can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Boskalis Westminster, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Boskalis Westminster 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 Boskalis Westminster can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Boskalis Westminster
2. Improving business portfolio management of Boskalis Westminster
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United Kingdom
4. Making a Construction Services sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Boskalis Westminster
Strengths of Boskalis Westminster | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Boskalis Westminster are -
Training and development
– Boskalis Westminster has one of the best training and development program in Capital Goods 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.
High brand equity
– Boskalis Westminster has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Boskalis Westminster to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Boskalis Westminster has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Construction Services industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Boskalis Westminster have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Boskalis Westminster in the Capital Goods sector have low bargaining power. Boskalis Westminster has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Boskalis Westminster to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Analytics focus
– Boskalis Westminster 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 Construction Services industry. The technology infrastructure of United Kingdom 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Boskalis Westminster is present in almost all the verticals within the Construction Services industry. This has provided Boskalis Westminster 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Boskalis Westminster in Construction Services industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Innovation driven organization
– Boskalis Westminster is one of the most innovative firm in Construction Services sector.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Boskalis Westminster has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Boskalis Westminster staying ahead in the Construction Services industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Boskalis Westminster is one of the leading players in the Construction Services industry in United Kingdom. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in United Kingdom. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Construction Services industry
– Boskalis Westminster has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Boskalis Westminster to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Construction Services industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Boskalis Westminster to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Ability to lead change in Construction Services
– Boskalis Westminster is one of the leading players in the Construction Services industry in United Kingdom. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Construction Services industry in United Kingdom but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Boskalis Westminster in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Weaknesses of Boskalis Westminster | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Boskalis Westminster are -
Products dominated business model
– Even though Boskalis Westminster has some of the most successful models in the Construction Services industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Boskalis Westminster should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Boskalis Westminster is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Construction Services industry, but Boskalis Westminster needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Boskalis Westminster to focus more on services in the Construction Services industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Lack of clear differentiation of Boskalis Westminster products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Boskalis Westminster needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Construction Services industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in United Kingdom, Boskalis Westminster 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 Construction Services industry.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Boskalis Westminster 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 Construction Services industry using digital technology.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Boskalis Westminster has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Construction Services industry over the last five years. Boskalis Westminster 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 dependence on Boskalis Westminster ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Boskalis Westminster still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Construction Services industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Boskalis Westminster has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Skills based hiring in Construction Services industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Boskalis Westminster 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of United Kingdom, Boskalis Westminster needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Boskalis Westminster needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Construction Services industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Boskalis Westminster can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Boskalis Westminster is planning to shift buying processes online.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Boskalis Westminster is one of the leading players in the Construction Services industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Construction Services industry in last five years.
Boskalis Westminster Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Boskalis Westminster are -
Manufacturing automation
– Boskalis Westminster can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Construction Services 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Boskalis Westminster 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Boskalis Westminster can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Boskalis Westminster operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Construction Services sector.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Construction Services industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Boskalis Westminster 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. Boskalis Westminster 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Boskalis Westminster 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 Boskalis Westminster to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Loyalty marketing
– Boskalis Westminster 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 Boskalis Westminster can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Boskalis Westminster 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 Construction Services industry.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Boskalis Westminster is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Boskalis Westminster can utilize new technology in the field of Construction Services industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Boskalis Westminster 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 Boskalis Westminster to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Boskalis Westminster has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Construction Services sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Boskalis Westminster to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Boskalis Westminster to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
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. Boskalis Westminster can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Boskalis Westminster in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Construction Services industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Threats Boskalis Westminster External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Boskalis Westminster are -
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Boskalis Westminster may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Construction Services sector.
Regulatory challenges
– Boskalis Westminster 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 Construction Services industry regulations.
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.
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. Boskalis Westminster 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.
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 Boskalis Westminster.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Boskalis Westminster is facing in Construction Services sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Environmental challenges
– Boskalis Westminster 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. Boskalis Westminster can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Construction Services industry.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Boskalis Westminster 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.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Construction Services industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Boskalis Westminster can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
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 Boskalis Westminster business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
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. Boskalis Westminster needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Construction Services industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Increasing wage structure of Boskalis Westminster
– 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 Boskalis Westminster.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Boskalis Westminster in Construction Services industry. The Construction Services 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Boskalis Westminster Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Boskalis Westminster 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 Boskalis Westminster 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 Boskalis Westminster 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 Boskalis Westminster 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 Boskalis Westminster needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.