County Coal Ltd (CCJ) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Coal
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for County Coal Ltd (Australia)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , County Coal Ltd is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, geopolitical disruptions, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies,
increasing commodity prices, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that County Coal Ltd can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the County Coal Ltd, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which County Coal Ltd 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 County Coal Ltd can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of County Coal Ltd
2. Improving business portfolio management of County Coal Ltd
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Australia
4. Making a Coal sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of County Coal Ltd
Strengths of County Coal Ltd | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of County Coal Ltd are -
Training and development
– County Coal Ltd has one of the best training and development program in Energy 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.
Learning organization
- County Coal Ltd 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 County Coal Ltd is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at County Coal Ltd emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the County Coal Ltd 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of County Coal Ltd in the Energy sector have low bargaining power. County Coal Ltd has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps County Coal Ltd to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Digital Transformation in Coal industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For County Coal Ltd digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. County Coal Ltd 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of County Coal Ltd comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Coal 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.
Successful track record of launching new products
– County Coal Ltd has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. County Coal Ltd 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.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– County Coal Ltd has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – County Coal Ltd staying ahead in the Coal industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Innovation driven organization
– County Coal Ltd is one of the most innovative firm in Coal sector.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that County Coal Ltd 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– County Coal Ltd has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Coal industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of County Coal Ltd have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Analytics focus
– County Coal Ltd 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 Coal industry. The technology infrastructure of Australia 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.
Weaknesses of County Coal Ltd | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of County Coal Ltd are -
High cash cycle compare to competitors
County Coal Ltd has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Coal industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Skills based hiring in Coal industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at County Coal Ltd 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.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As County Coal Ltd is one of the leading players in the Coal industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Coal industry in last five years.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at County Coal Ltd, in the dynamic environment of Coal industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. County Coal Ltd has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, County Coal Ltd is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help County Coal Ltd to provide better information regarding Coal products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Need for greater diversity
– County Coal Ltd 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 County Coal Ltd strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of County Coal Ltd 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.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of County Coal Ltd is just above the Coal 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.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Coal industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in Australia, County Coal Ltd 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 Coal industry.
Products dominated business model
– Even though County Coal Ltd has some of the most successful models in the Coal industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. County Coal Ltd should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
High dependence on County Coal Ltd ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of County Coal Ltd still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Coal industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though County Coal Ltd has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
County Coal Ltd Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of County Coal Ltd are -
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Coal industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. County Coal Ltd can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, County Coal Ltd 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.
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. County Coal Ltd can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at County Coal Ltd 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 Coal industry.
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 County Coal Ltd 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects County Coal Ltd can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, County Coal Ltd 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 County Coal Ltd to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Leveraging digital technologies
– County Coal Ltd 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help County Coal Ltd to increase its market reach. County Coal Ltd 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.
Buying journey improvements
– County Coal Ltd can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Coal 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of County Coal Ltd has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Coal industry. This can help County Coal Ltd to build a more holistic ecosystem for County Coal Ltd products in the Coal industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Coal industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for County Coal Ltd in the Coal industry. Now County Coal Ltd can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Manufacturing automation
– County Coal Ltd can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Coal 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.
Threats County Coal Ltd External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of County Coal Ltd are -
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
– County Coal Ltd 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 international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, County Coal Ltd 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 County Coal Ltd prominent markets.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Coal industry are lowering. It can presents County Coal Ltd with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Coal sector.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that County Coal Ltd is facing in Coal sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– County Coal Ltd 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 Coal industry.
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 County Coal Ltd in the Coal sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
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 County Coal Ltd.
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. County Coal Ltd needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Coal industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Environmental challenges
– County Coal Ltd 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. County Coal Ltd can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Coal industry.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– County Coal Ltd has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Coal industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, County Coal Ltd needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Coal 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
– County Coal Ltd 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 Coal 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of County Coal Ltd Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at County Coal Ltd 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 County Coal Ltd 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 County Coal Ltd 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 County Coal Ltd 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 County Coal Ltd needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.