Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Westside Investments PLC is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing energy prices, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, wage bills are increasing, technology disruption, increasing commodity prices,
increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, geopolitical disruptions, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Westside Investments PLC
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Westside Investments PLC can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Westside Investments PLC, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Westside Investments 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 Westside Investments PLC can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Westside Investments PLC
2. Improving business portfolio management of Westside Investments PLC
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United Kingdom
4. Making a Recreational Products sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Westside Investments PLC
Strengths of Westside Investments PLC | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Westside Investments PLC are -
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Westside Investments 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Westside Investments PLC comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Recreational Products 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Recreational Products industry
– Westside Investments PLC has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Westside Investments PLC to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Recreational Products industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Westside Investments PLC to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Digital Transformation in Recreational Products industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Westside Investments PLC digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Westside Investments PLC 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.
Organizational Resilience of Westside Investments PLC
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Westside Investments PLC does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
High brand equity
– Westside Investments PLC has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Westside Investments PLC to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Learning organization
- Westside Investments 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 Westside Investments PLC is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Westside Investments PLC emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Westside Investments PLC has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Westside Investments 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Westside Investments PLC has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Recreational Products industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Westside Investments PLC have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Diverse revenue streams
– Westside Investments PLC is present in almost all the verticals within the Recreational Products industry. This has provided Westside Investments 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Westside Investments PLC is one of the leading players in the Recreational Products 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.
Innovation driven organization
– Westside Investments PLC is one of the most innovative firm in Recreational Products sector.
Weaknesses of Westside Investments PLC | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Westside Investments PLC are -
Need for greater diversity
– Westside Investments 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of United Kingdom, Westside Investments PLC needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Westside Investments PLC 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 Recreational Products industry using digital technology.
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 Westside Investments PLC supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Westside Investments PLC is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Westside Investments PLC vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Westside Investments PLC is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Westside Investments PLC to provide better information regarding Recreational Products products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Westside Investments PLC is one of the leading players in the Recreational Products industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Recreational Products industry in last five years.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Westside Investments 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 Recreational Products industry over the last five years. Westside Investments 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.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Westside Investments PLC has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Recreational Products industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Westside Investments PLC is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Recreational Products industry, but Westside Investments PLC needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Westside Investments PLC to focus more on services in the Recreational Products industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Westside Investments PLC has high operating costs in the Recreational Products industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Westside Investments PLC lucrative customers.
Skills based hiring in Recreational Products industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Westside Investments PLC 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.
Westside Investments PLC Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Westside Investments PLC are -
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Westside Investments PLC can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
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. Westside Investments PLC can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Westside Investments 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Westside Investments PLC is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Westside Investments PLC can utilize new technology in the field of Recreational Products industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Recreational Products industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Westside Investments PLC can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Westside Investments PLC 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 Recreational Products industry.
Loyalty marketing
– Westside Investments 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.
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 Westside Investments 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Westside Investments PLC can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Westside Investments PLC operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Recreational Products sector.
Buying journey improvements
– Westside Investments PLC can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Recreational Products 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.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Recreational Products industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Westside Investments PLC in the Recreational Products industry. Now Westside Investments PLC can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Recreational Products industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Westside Investments 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. Westside Investments 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Westside Investments PLC has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Recreational Products industry. This can help Westside Investments PLC to build a more holistic ecosystem for Westside Investments PLC products in the Recreational Products industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Threats Westside Investments PLC External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Westside Investments PLC are -
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Westside Investments 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.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Westside Investments PLC 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 Recreational Products industry.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Recreational Products industry are lowering. It can presents Westside Investments PLC with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Recreational Products 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.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Westside Investments 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 Westside Investments PLC prominent markets.
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 Westside Investments PLC.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Recreational Products industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Westside Investments PLC can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
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. Westside Investments 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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Westside Investments PLC is facing in Recreational Products sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Westside Investments PLC in Recreational Products industry. The Recreational Products 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.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Westside Investments PLC has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Recreational Products industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Westside Investments PLC needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Recreational Products 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
– Westside Investments 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 Recreational Products industry regulations.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Westside Investments 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 Recreational Products sector.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Westside Investments PLC Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Westside Investments 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 Westside Investments 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 Westside Investments 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 Westside Investments 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 Westside Investments PLC needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.