GYG (GYG) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources

Introduction to SWOT Analysis

SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for GYG (United Kingdom)

Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , GYG is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, technology disruption, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, etc

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Introduction to SWOT Analysis of GYG

SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that GYG can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the GYG, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which GYG 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.

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SWOT Objectives / Importance of SWOT Analysis and SWOT Matrix

SWOT analysis of GYG can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of GYG
2. Improving business portfolio management of GYG
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United Kingdom
4. Making a Water Transportation sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of GYG

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Strengths of GYG | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The strengths of GYG are -

High brand equity

– GYG has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled GYG to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.

Superior customer experience

– The customer experience strategy of GYG in Water Transportation industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.

Ability to recruit top talent

– GYG is one of the leading players in the Water Transportation 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.

Analytics focus

– GYG 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 Water Transportation 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

– GYG is present in almost all the verticals within the Water Transportation industry. This has provided GYG 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

– GYG has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Water Transportation industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of GYG have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.

Cross disciplinary teams

– Horizontal connected teams at the GYG 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.

Organizational Resilience of GYG

– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing GYG does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.

High switching costs

– The high switching costs that GYG 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.

Operational resilience

– The operational resilience strategy of GYG comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Water Transportation 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.

Strong track record of project management in the Water Transportation industry

– GYG is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.

Effective Research and Development (R&D)

– GYG has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – GYG staying ahead in the Water Transportation industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.

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Weaknesses of GYG | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The weaknesses of GYG are -

High dependence on existing supply chain

– The disruption in the global supply chains because of the Covid-19 pandemic and blockage of the Suez Canal illustrated the fragile nature of GYG supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, GYG is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left GYG vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.

Low market penetration in new markets

– Outside its home market of United Kingdom, GYG needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.

High dependence on GYG ‘s star products

– The top 2 products and services of GYG still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Water Transportation industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though GYG has relatively successful track record of launching new products.

Increasing silos among functional specialists

– The organizational structure of GYG is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Water Transportation industry, but GYG needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help GYG to focus more on services in the Water Transportation industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.

Lack of clear differentiation of GYG products

– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, GYG needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.

High operating costs

– Compare to the competitors, GYG has high operating costs in the Water Transportation industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract GYG lucrative customers.

High cash cycle compare to competitors

GYG has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Water Transportation industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.

Need for greater diversity

– GYG 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.

High bargaining power of channel partners in Water Transportation industry

– because of the regulatory requirements in United Kingdom, GYG 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 Water Transportation industry.

Slow decision making process

– As mentioned earlier in the report, GYG has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Water Transportation industry over the last five years. GYG 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.

Skills based hiring in Water Transportation industry

– The stress on hiring functional specialists at GYG 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.

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GYG Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The opportunities of GYG are -

Manufacturing automation

– GYG can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Water Transportation 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.

Finding new ways to collaborate

– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Water Transportation industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. GYG can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.

Leveraging digital technologies

– GYG 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 GYG 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.

Building a culture of innovation

– managers at GYG 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 Water Transportation industry.

Lowering marketing communication costs

– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for GYG in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Water Transportation industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.

Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19

– consumer behavior has changed in the Water Transportation industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. GYG 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. GYG 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.

Low interest rates

– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, GYG 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.

Redefining models of collaboration and team work

– As explained in the weaknesses section, GYG is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. GYG can utilize new technology in the field of Water Transportation industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.

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. GYG can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.

Loyalty marketing

– GYG 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.

Increase in government spending

– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, GYG can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that GYG operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Water Transportation sector.

Better consumer reach

– The expansion of the 5G network will help GYG to increase its market reach. GYG 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.

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Threats GYG External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The threats of GYG are -

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 GYG in the Water Transportation sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.

Learning curve for new practices

– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, GYG may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Water Transportation sector.

Environmental challenges

– GYG 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. GYG can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Water Transportation industry.

High dependence on third party suppliers

– GYG 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.

Regulatory challenges

– GYG 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 Water Transportation industry regulations.

Easy access to finance

– Easy access to finance in Water Transportation industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. GYG can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.

Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution

– GYG has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Water Transportation industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, GYG needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Water Transportation 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.

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 GYG business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.

Trade war between China and United States

– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for GYG in Water Transportation industry. The Water Transportation 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 GYG

– 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 GYG.

Barriers of entry lowering

– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Water Transportation industry are lowering. It can presents GYG with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Water Transportation sector.

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.

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.

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Weighted SWOT Analysis of GYG Template, Example

Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at GYG 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 GYG 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 GYG 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 GYG 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 GYG needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.

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