Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Gateley Holdings PLC is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – geopolitical disruptions, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, technology disruption, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs,
challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, increasing energy prices, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Gateley Holdings PLC
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Gateley Holdings PLC can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Gateley Holdings PLC, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Gateley Holdings PLC 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 Gateley Holdings PLC can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Gateley Holdings PLC
2. Improving business portfolio management of Gateley Holdings PLC
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United Kingdom
4. Making a Business Services sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Gateley Holdings PLC
Strengths of Gateley Holdings PLC | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Gateley Holdings PLC are -
Organizational Resilience of Gateley Holdings PLC
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Gateley Holdings PLC does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Gateley Holdings PLC has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Gateley Holdings PLC 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.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Gateley Holdings PLC 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Gateley Holdings PLC in Business Services industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Gateley Holdings PLC is one of the leading players in the Business 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 Business Services industry
– Gateley Holdings PLC has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Gateley Holdings PLC to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Business Services industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Gateley Holdings PLC to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Ability to lead change in Business Services
– Gateley Holdings PLC is one of the leading players in the Business Services industry in United Kingdom. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Business Services industry in United Kingdom but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Gateley Holdings PLC in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Training and development
– Gateley Holdings PLC 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.
Analytics focus
– Gateley Holdings PLC 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 Business 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.
Learning organization
- Gateley Holdings PLC 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 Gateley Holdings PLC is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Gateley Holdings PLC emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Diverse revenue streams
– Gateley Holdings PLC is present in almost all the verticals within the Business Services industry. This has provided Gateley Holdings PLC 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 Gateley Holdings PLC 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 Gateley Holdings PLC | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Gateley Holdings PLC are -
High dependence on Gateley Holdings PLC ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Gateley Holdings PLC still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Business Services industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Gateley Holdings PLC has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Gateley Holdings PLC has high operating costs in the Business Services industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Gateley Holdings PLC lucrative customers.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Gateley Holdings PLC is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Gateley Holdings PLC to provide better information regarding Business Services products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Lack of clear differentiation of Gateley Holdings PLC products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Gateley Holdings PLC needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Gateley Holdings PLC has some of the most successful models in the Business Services industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Gateley Holdings PLC should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Gateley Holdings PLC 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Gateley Holdings PLC needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Business Services industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Gateley Holdings PLC can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Gateley Holdings PLC is planning to shift buying processes online.
Employees’ less understanding of Gateley Holdings PLC strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Gateley Holdings PLC 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.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Business Services industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in United Kingdom, Gateley Holdings PLC 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 Business Services industry.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Gateley Holdings PLC has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Business Services industry over the last five years. Gateley Holdings PLC 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.
Need for greater diversity
– Gateley Holdings PLC 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.
Gateley Holdings PLC Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Gateley Holdings PLC are -
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Gateley Holdings PLC has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Business Services industry. This can help Gateley Holdings PLC to build a more holistic ecosystem for Gateley Holdings PLC products in the Business Services industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Gateley Holdings PLC can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Gateley Holdings PLC operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Business Services sector.
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 Gateley Holdings PLC 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.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Business Services industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Gateley Holdings PLC in the Business Services industry. Now Gateley Holdings PLC can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Manufacturing automation
– Gateley Holdings PLC can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Business 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Gateley Holdings PLC in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Business Services industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Gateley Holdings PLC has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Business Services sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Gateley Holdings PLC to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Gateley Holdings PLC to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Gateley Holdings PLC 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Gateley Holdings PLC 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Gateley Holdings PLC can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Business Services 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.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Business Services industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Gateley Holdings PLC 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. Gateley Holdings PLC 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Gateley Holdings PLC 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Gateley Holdings PLC 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 Gateley Holdings PLC to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Threats Gateley Holdings PLC External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Gateley Holdings PLC are -
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Gateley Holdings PLC in Business Services industry. The Business 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.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Gateley Holdings PLC 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 Gateley Holdings PLC prominent markets.
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 Gateley Holdings PLC business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Gateley Holdings PLC may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Business Services sector.
Regulatory challenges
– Gateley Holdings PLC 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 Business Services industry regulations.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Gateley Holdings PLC has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Business Services industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Gateley Holdings PLC needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Business Services 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.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Gateley Holdings PLC 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.
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. Gateley Holdings PLC 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.
Environmental challenges
– Gateley Holdings PLC 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. Gateley Holdings PLC can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Business Services industry.
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.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Business Services industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Gateley Holdings PLC can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Gateley Holdings PLC is facing in Business Services sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Gateley Holdings PLC 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 Business Services industry and other sectors.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Gateley Holdings PLC Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Gateley Holdings PLC 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 Gateley Holdings PLC 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 Gateley Holdings PLC 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 Gateley Holdings PLC 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 Gateley Holdings PLC needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.