SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Boustead Plantations (Malaysia)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Boustead Plantations is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, increasing energy prices, increasing transportation and logistics costs, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , geopolitical disruptions,
increasing commodity prices, technology disruption, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Boustead Plantations
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Boustead Plantations can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Boustead Plantations, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Boustead Plantations 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 Boustead Plantations can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Boustead Plantations
2. Improving business portfolio management of Boustead Plantations
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Malaysia
4. Making a Crops sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Boustead Plantations
Strengths of Boustead Plantations | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Boustead Plantations are -
High brand equity
– Boustead Plantations has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Boustead Plantations to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Strong track record of project management in the Crops industry
– Boustead Plantations is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Innovation driven organization
– Boustead Plantations is one of the most innovative firm in Crops sector.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Boustead Plantations has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Boustead Plantations 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Boustead Plantations is present in almost all the verticals within the Crops industry. This has provided Boustead Plantations 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.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Boustead Plantations 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.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Boustead Plantations 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.
Training and development
– Boustead Plantations has one of the best training and development program in Consumer/Non-Cyclical 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.
Ability to lead change in Crops
– Boustead Plantations is one of the leading players in the Crops industry in Malaysia. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Crops industry in Malaysia but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Boustead Plantations in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Boustead Plantations has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Crops industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Boustead Plantations have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Digital Transformation in Crops industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Boustead Plantations digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Boustead Plantations 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.
Learning organization
- Boustead Plantations 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 Boustead Plantations is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Boustead Plantations emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Weaknesses of Boustead Plantations | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Boustead Plantations are -
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Boustead Plantations 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.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Boustead Plantations has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Crops industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Boustead Plantations 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 Crops industry using digital technology.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Boustead Plantations, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Crops industry. But it has very little resources allocation to manage the risks emerging from events such as natural disasters, climate change, melting of permafrost, tacking the rise of artificial intelligence, opportunities and threats emerging from commercialization of space etc.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Boustead Plantations is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Crops industry, but Boustead Plantations needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Boustead Plantations to focus more on services in the Crops industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Boustead Plantations has some of the most successful models in the Crops industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Boustead Plantations should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Boustead Plantations needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Crops industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Boustead Plantations can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Boustead Plantations is planning to shift buying processes online.
Employees’ less understanding of Boustead Plantations strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Boustead Plantations 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 Boustead Plantations, in the dynamic environment of Crops industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Boustead Plantations has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Boustead Plantations is one of the leading players in the Crops industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Crops industry in last five years.
Need for greater diversity
– Boustead Plantations 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.
Boustead Plantations Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Boustead Plantations are -
Buying journey improvements
– Boustead Plantations can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Crops 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.
Manufacturing automation
– Boustead Plantations can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Crops 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Boustead Plantations 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Crops industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Boustead Plantations 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, Boustead Plantations 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 Boustead Plantations to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Boustead Plantations can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Boustead Plantations has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Crops sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Boustead Plantations to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Boustead Plantations to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Boustead Plantations is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Boustead Plantations can utilize new technology in the field of Crops industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, 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 Boustead Plantations 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 Crops industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Boustead Plantations in the Crops industry. Now Boustead Plantations can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Boustead Plantations 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 Crops industry.
Developing new processes and practices
– Boustead Plantations can develop new processes and procedures in Crops industry using technology such as automation using artificial intelligence, real time transportation and products tracking, 3D modeling for concept development and new products pilot testing etc.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Boustead Plantations 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 Boustead Plantations to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Threats Boustead Plantations External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Boustead Plantations are -
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Boustead Plantations is facing in Crops sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Boustead Plantations has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Crops industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Boustead Plantations needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Crops 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.
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 Boustead Plantations in the Crops sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Crops industry are lowering. It can presents Boustead Plantations with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Crops sector.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Boustead Plantations may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Crops sector.
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 Boustead Plantations.
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. Boustead Plantations 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.
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.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Crops industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Boustead Plantations can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Regulatory challenges
– Boustead Plantations 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 Crops industry regulations.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Boustead Plantations in Crops industry. The Crops 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.
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.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Boustead Plantations 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 Crops industry.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Boustead Plantations Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Boustead Plantations 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 Boustead Plantations 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 Boustead Plantations 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 Boustead Plantations 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 Boustead Plantations needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.