SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Boustead Singapore Ltd (Singapore)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Boustead Singapore Ltd is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, increasing energy prices, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy,
cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, technology disruption, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Boustead Singapore Ltd
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Boustead Singapore Ltd can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Boustead Singapore Ltd, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Boustead Singapore Ltd 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 Singapore Ltd can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Boustead Singapore Ltd
2. Improving business portfolio management of Boustead Singapore Ltd
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Singapore
4. Making a Construction Services sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Boustead Singapore Ltd
Strengths of Boustead Singapore Ltd | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Boustead Singapore Ltd are -
Analytics focus
– Boustead Singapore Ltd 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 Construction Services industry. The technology infrastructure of Singapore 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.
Ability to lead change in Construction Services
– Boustead Singapore Ltd is one of the leading players in the Construction Services industry in Singapore. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Construction Services industry in Singapore but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Boustead Singapore Ltd in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Training and development
– Boustead Singapore Ltd has one of the best training and development program in Capital Goods 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.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Boustead Singapore Ltd has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Boustead Singapore Ltd staying ahead in the Construction Services industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Diverse revenue streams
– Boustead Singapore Ltd is present in almost all the verticals within the Construction Services industry. This has provided Boustead Singapore Ltd 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Boustead Singapore Ltd in Construction Services industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Boustead Singapore Ltd is one of the leading players in the Construction Services industry in Singapore. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in Singapore. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Strong track record of project management in the Construction Services industry
– Boustead Singapore Ltd is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Boustead Singapore Ltd 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.
Innovation driven organization
– Boustead Singapore Ltd is one of the most innovative firm in Construction Services sector.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Boustead Singapore Ltd 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Construction Services industry
– Boustead Singapore Ltd has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Boustead Singapore Ltd to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Construction Services industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Boustead Singapore Ltd to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Weaknesses of Boustead Singapore Ltd | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Boustead Singapore Ltd are -
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Boustead Singapore Ltd is just above the Construction Services 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.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Boustead Singapore Ltd is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Boustead Singapore Ltd to provide better information regarding Construction Services products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Need for greater diversity
– Boustead Singapore Ltd 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Construction Services industry, Boustead Singapore Ltd 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.
High dependence on Boustead Singapore Ltd ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Boustead Singapore Ltd still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Construction Services industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Boustead Singapore Ltd has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Skills based hiring in Construction Services industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Boustead Singapore Ltd 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.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Boustead Singapore Ltd has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Construction Services industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Lack of clear differentiation of Boustead Singapore Ltd products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Boustead Singapore Ltd needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Employees’ less understanding of Boustead Singapore Ltd strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Boustead Singapore Ltd 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.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Boustead Singapore Ltd has high operating costs in the Construction Services industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Boustead Singapore Ltd lucrative customers.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Boustead Singapore Ltd, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Construction Services 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.
Boustead Singapore Ltd Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Boustead Singapore Ltd are -
Loyalty marketing
– Boustead Singapore Ltd 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. Boustead Singapore Ltd can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Buying journey improvements
– Boustead Singapore Ltd can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Construction 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Boustead Singapore Ltd 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Boustead Singapore Ltd has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Construction Services sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Boustead Singapore Ltd to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Boustead Singapore Ltd to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Boustead Singapore Ltd 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Boustead Singapore Ltd 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 Singapore Ltd to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Boustead Singapore Ltd in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Construction Services industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Boustead Singapore Ltd can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Boustead Singapore Ltd to increase its market reach. Boustead Singapore Ltd will be able to reach out to new customers. Secondly 5G will also provide technology framework to build new tools and products that can help more immersive consumer experience and faster consumer journey.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Boustead Singapore Ltd 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 Singapore Ltd to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Boustead Singapore Ltd has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Construction Services industry. This can help Boustead Singapore Ltd to build a more holistic ecosystem for Boustead Singapore Ltd products in the Construction Services industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Developing new processes and practices
– Boustead Singapore Ltd can develop new processes and procedures in Construction Services 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.
Threats Boustead Singapore Ltd External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Boustead Singapore Ltd are -
New competition
– After the dotcom bust of 2001, financial crisis of 2008-09, the business formation in US economy had declined. But in 2020 alone, there are more than 1.5 million new business applications in United States. This can lead to greater competition for Boustead Singapore Ltd in the Construction Services sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Regulatory challenges
– Boustead Singapore Ltd 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 Construction Services industry regulations.
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 Singapore Ltd.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Boustead Singapore Ltd has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Construction Services industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Boustead Singapore Ltd needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Construction 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.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Boustead Singapore Ltd 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.
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. Boustead Singapore Ltd needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Construction Services industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
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 Boustead Singapore Ltd business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Boustead Singapore Ltd 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 Construction Services industry and other sectors.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Construction Services industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Boustead Singapore Ltd can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
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, Boustead Singapore Ltd 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 Boustead Singapore Ltd prominent markets.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Boustead Singapore Ltd is facing in Construction Services 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 Boustead Singapore Ltd in Construction Services industry. The Construction 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Boustead Singapore Ltd Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Boustead Singapore Ltd 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 Singapore Ltd 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 Singapore Ltd 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 Singapore Ltd 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 Singapore Ltd needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.