W.H.Ireland (WHI) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Investment Services
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for W.H.Ireland (United Kingdom)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , W.H.Ireland is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, increasing transportation and logistics costs, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, technology disruption, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, wage bills are increasing, geopolitical disruptions,
increasing energy prices, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that W.H.Ireland can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the W.H.Ireland, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which W.H.Ireland 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 W.H.Ireland can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of W.H.Ireland
2. Improving business portfolio management of W.H.Ireland
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United Kingdom
4. Making a Investment Services sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of W.H.Ireland
Strengths of W.H.Ireland | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of W.H.Ireland are -
Successful track record of launching new products
– W.H.Ireland has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. W.H.Ireland 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of W.H.Ireland in the Financial sector have low bargaining power. W.H.Ireland has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps W.H.Ireland to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– W.H.Ireland has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – W.H.Ireland staying ahead in the Investment Services industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Digital Transformation in Investment Services industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For W.H.Ireland digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. W.H.Ireland 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– W.H.Ireland has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Investment Services industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of W.H.Ireland have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of W.H.Ireland comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Investment Services 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.
Organizational Resilience of W.H.Ireland
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing W.H.Ireland does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Innovation driven organization
– W.H.Ireland is one of the most innovative firm in Investment Services sector.
Training and development
– W.H.Ireland has one of the best training and development program in Financial 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– W.H.Ireland is present in almost all the verticals within the Investment Services industry. This has provided W.H.Ireland 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.
Analytics focus
– W.H.Ireland 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 Investment 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
- W.H.Ireland 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 W.H.Ireland is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at W.H.Ireland emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Weaknesses of W.H.Ireland | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of W.H.Ireland are -
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of United Kingdom, W.H.Ireland needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Need for greater diversity
– W.H.Ireland 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.
Skills based hiring in Investment Services industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at W.H.Ireland 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that W.H.Ireland needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Investment Services industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at W.H.Ireland can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as W.H.Ireland is planning to shift buying processes online.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, W.H.Ireland 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 Investment Services industry using digital technology.
Products dominated business model
– Even though W.H.Ireland has some of the most successful models in the Investment Services industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. W.H.Ireland should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Employees’ less understanding of W.H.Ireland strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of W.H.Ireland 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.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at W.H.Ireland, in the dynamic environment of Investment Services industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. W.H.Ireland has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
High dependence on W.H.Ireland ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of W.H.Ireland still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Investment Services industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though W.H.Ireland has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, W.H.Ireland has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Investment Services industry over the last five years. W.H.Ireland 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Investment Services industry, W.H.Ireland needs to come up with a strategy to reduce the workers concern regarding automation. Without a clear strategy, it could lead to disruption and uncertainty within the organization.
W.H.Ireland Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of W.H.Ireland are -
Leveraging digital technologies
– W.H.Ireland 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of W.H.Ireland has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Investment Services industry. This can help W.H.Ireland to build a more holistic ecosystem for W.H.Ireland products in the Investment Services industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for W.H.Ireland 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
– W.H.Ireland can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Investment 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Investment Services industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. W.H.Ireland can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, W.H.Ireland 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 W.H.Ireland 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
– W.H.Ireland 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.
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. W.H.Ireland 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 W.H.Ireland in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Investment Services industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at W.H.Ireland 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 Investment Services industry.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for W.H.Ireland 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 W.H.Ireland to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
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 W.H.Ireland 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, W.H.Ireland 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.
Threats W.H.Ireland External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of W.H.Ireland are -
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 W.H.Ireland.
Regulatory challenges
– W.H.Ireland 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 Investment Services industry regulations.
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. W.H.Ireland needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Investment Services industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Investment Services industry are lowering. It can presents W.H.Ireland with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Investment Services sector.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, W.H.Ireland 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 W.H.Ireland prominent markets.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– W.H.Ireland 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 Investment Services industry.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, W.H.Ireland may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Investment Services sector.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Investment Services industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. W.H.Ireland can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Consumer confidence and its impact on W.H.Ireland 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 Investment Services industry and other sectors.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for W.H.Ireland in Investment Services industry. The Investment 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.
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 W.H.Ireland business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– W.H.Ireland has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Investment Services industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, W.H.Ireland needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Investment 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.
Increasing wage structure of W.H.Ireland
– 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 W.H.Ireland.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of W.H.Ireland Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at W.H.Ireland 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 W.H.Ireland 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 W.H.Ireland 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 W.H.Ireland 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 W.H.Ireland needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.