SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Custodian Reit (United Kingdom)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Custodian Reit is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, 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, increasing commodity prices, geopolitical disruptions,
digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, increasing energy prices, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Custodian Reit can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Custodian Reit, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Custodian Reit 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 Custodian Reit can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Custodian Reit
2. Improving business portfolio management of Custodian Reit
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United Kingdom
4. Making a Real Estate Operations sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Custodian Reit
Strengths of Custodian Reit | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Custodian Reit are -
Training and development
– Custodian Reit 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Custodian Reit in the Services sector have low bargaining power. Custodian Reit has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Custodian Reit to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Custodian Reit in Real Estate Operations industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Learning organization
- Custodian Reit 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 Custodian Reit is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Custodian Reit emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Custodian Reit has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Custodian Reit staying ahead in the Real Estate Operations industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
High brand equity
– Custodian Reit has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Custodian Reit to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Real Estate Operations industry
– Custodian Reit has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Custodian Reit to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Real Estate Operations industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Custodian Reit to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Digital Transformation in Real Estate Operations industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Custodian Reit digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Custodian Reit 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Custodian Reit is present in almost all the verticals within the Real Estate Operations industry. This has provided Custodian Reit 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Custodian Reit has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Real Estate Operations industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Custodian Reit have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Strong track record of project management in the Real Estate Operations industry
– Custodian Reit is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Custodian Reit 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.
Weaknesses of Custodian Reit | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Custodian Reit are -
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Custodian Reit needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Real Estate Operations industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Custodian Reit can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Custodian Reit is planning to shift buying processes online.
High dependence on Custodian Reit ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Custodian Reit still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Real Estate Operations industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Custodian Reit has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Custodian Reit has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Real Estate Operations industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Custodian Reit is just above the Real Estate Operations 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Custodian Reit is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Real Estate Operations industry, but Custodian Reit needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Custodian Reit to focus more on services in the Real Estate Operations industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Custodian Reit has borrowed money from the capital market at higher rates. It needs to restructure the interest payment and costs so that it can compete better and improve profitability.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Custodian Reit has high operating costs in the Real Estate Operations industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Custodian Reit lucrative customers.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Custodian Reit is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Custodian Reit to provide better information regarding Real Estate Operations products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Custodian Reit, in the dynamic environment of Real Estate Operations industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Custodian Reit has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Custodian Reit is one of the leading players in the Real Estate Operations industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Real Estate Operations industry in last five years.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Custodian Reit 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 Real Estate Operations industry using digital technology.
Custodian Reit Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Custodian Reit are -
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Custodian Reit 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 Custodian Reit 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
– Custodian Reit 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.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Real Estate Operations industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Custodian Reit in the Real Estate Operations industry. Now Custodian Reit can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Custodian Reit 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Custodian Reit can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Real Estate Operations 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Real Estate Operations industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Custodian Reit can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
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 Custodian Reit 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Custodian Reit 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 Real Estate Operations industry.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Custodian Reit is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Custodian Reit can utilize new technology in the field of Real Estate Operations 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 Custodian Reit 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 Custodian Reit to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Custodian Reit has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Real Estate Operations industry. This can help Custodian Reit to build a more holistic ecosystem for Custodian Reit products in the Real Estate Operations industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Custodian Reit 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Custodian Reit can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Custodian Reit operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Real Estate Operations sector.
Threats Custodian Reit External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Custodian Reit are -
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Custodian Reit in Real Estate Operations industry. The Real Estate Operations 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.
Increasing wage structure of Custodian Reit
– 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 Custodian Reit.
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. Custodian Reit 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.
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. Custodian Reit needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Real Estate Operations industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
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 Custodian Reit.
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.
Regulatory challenges
– Custodian Reit 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 Real Estate Operations industry regulations.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Custodian Reit 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.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Custodian Reit may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Real Estate Operations sector.
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 Custodian Reit 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 Real Estate Operations industry are lowering. It can presents Custodian Reit with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Real Estate Operations sector.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Custodian Reit 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 Custodian Reit prominent markets.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Custodian Reit Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Custodian Reit 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 Custodian Reit 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 Custodian Reit 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 Custodian Reit 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 Custodian Reit needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
