SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for SHL Consolidated (Malaysia)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , SHL Consolidated is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, technology disruption, increasing transportation and logistics costs, wage bills are increasing,
central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, increasing commodity prices, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that SHL Consolidated can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the SHL Consolidated, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which SHL Consolidated 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 SHL Consolidated can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of SHL Consolidated
2. Improving business portfolio management of SHL Consolidated
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Malaysia
4. Making a Real Estate Operations sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of SHL Consolidated
Strengths of SHL Consolidated | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of SHL Consolidated are -
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– SHL Consolidated has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – SHL Consolidated staying ahead in the Real Estate Operations industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that SHL Consolidated 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– SHL Consolidated is present in almost all the verticals within the Real Estate Operations industry. This has provided SHL Consolidated 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.
Strong track record of project management in the Real Estate Operations industry
– SHL Consolidated is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Learning organization
- SHL Consolidated 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 SHL Consolidated is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at SHL Consolidated emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the SHL Consolidated 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Real Estate Operations industry
– SHL Consolidated has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled SHL Consolidated to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Real Estate Operations industry. The sustainable margins have also helped SHL Consolidated to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Organizational Resilience of SHL Consolidated
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing SHL Consolidated does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of SHL Consolidated in Real Estate Operations industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Training and development
– SHL Consolidated 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of SHL Consolidated comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Real Estate Operations 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of SHL Consolidated in the Services sector have low bargaining power. SHL Consolidated has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps SHL Consolidated to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Weaknesses of SHL Consolidated | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of SHL Consolidated are -
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, SHL Consolidated has high operating costs in the Real Estate Operations industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract SHL Consolidated lucrative customers.
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 SHL Consolidated supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, SHL Consolidated is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left SHL Consolidated vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, SHL Consolidated 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 Real Estate Operations industry using digital technology.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of SHL Consolidated is just above the Real Estate Operations industry average. It needs to redesign the compensation structure and incentives to increase the revenue per employees. Some of the steps that it can take are – hiring more specialists on project basis, etc.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Real Estate Operations industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in Malaysia, SHL Consolidated 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 Real Estate Operations industry.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at SHL Consolidated, in the dynamic environment of Real Estate Operations industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. SHL Consolidated has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Real Estate Operations industry, SHL Consolidated 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.
Products dominated business model
– Even though SHL Consolidated has some of the most successful models in the Real Estate Operations industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. SHL Consolidated should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
High dependence on SHL Consolidated ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of SHL Consolidated still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Real Estate Operations industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though SHL Consolidated has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As SHL Consolidated is one of the leading players in the Real Estate Operations industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Real Estate Operations industry in last five years.
Employees’ less understanding of SHL Consolidated strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of SHL Consolidated 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.
SHL Consolidated Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of SHL Consolidated are -
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, SHL Consolidated can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that SHL Consolidated operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Real Estate Operations sector.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, SHL Consolidated 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at SHL Consolidated 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 Real Estate Operations industry.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Real Estate Operations industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for SHL Consolidated in the Real Estate Operations industry. Now SHL Consolidated can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Real Estate Operations industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. SHL Consolidated can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
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. SHL Consolidated can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Loyalty marketing
– SHL Consolidated 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.
Manufacturing automation
– SHL Consolidated can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Real Estate Operations 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, SHL Consolidated is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. SHL Consolidated can utilize new technology in the field of Real Estate Operations industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Leveraging digital technologies
– SHL Consolidated 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects SHL Consolidated can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for SHL Consolidated 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 SHL Consolidated to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Real Estate Operations industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. SHL Consolidated 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. SHL Consolidated 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.
Threats SHL Consolidated External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of SHL Consolidated are -
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, SHL Consolidated may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Real Estate Operations sector.
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. SHL Consolidated needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Real Estate Operations industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
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 SHL Consolidated in the Real Estate Operations sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, SHL Consolidated 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 SHL Consolidated prominent markets.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Real Estate Operations industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. SHL Consolidated can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Real Estate Operations industry are lowering. It can presents SHL Consolidated with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Real Estate Operations sector.
Regulatory challenges
– SHL Consolidated 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 Real Estate Operations industry regulations.
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.
Environmental challenges
– SHL Consolidated 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. SHL Consolidated can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Real Estate Operations industry.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– SHL Consolidated has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Real Estate Operations industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, SHL Consolidated needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Real Estate Operations 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.
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 SHL Consolidated.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– SHL Consolidated 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.
Increasing wage structure of SHL Consolidated
– 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 SHL Consolidated.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of SHL Consolidated Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at SHL Consolidated 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 SHL Consolidated 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 SHL Consolidated 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 SHL Consolidated 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 SHL Consolidated needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.