SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for SARAIVA LIVR PN (Brazil)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , SARAIVA LIVR PN is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – geopolitical disruptions, technology disruption, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, increasing commodity prices, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies,
competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, increasing transportation and logistics costs, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that SARAIVA LIVR PN can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the SARAIVA LIVR PN, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which SARAIVA LIVR PN 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 SARAIVA LIVR PN can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of SARAIVA LIVR PN
2. Improving business portfolio management of SARAIVA LIVR PN
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Brazil
4. Making a Retail (Specialty) sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of SARAIVA LIVR PN
Strengths of SARAIVA LIVR PN | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of SARAIVA LIVR PN are -
Learning organization
- SARAIVA LIVR PN 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 SARAIVA LIVR PN is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at SARAIVA LIVR PN emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Innovation driven organization
– SARAIVA LIVR PN is one of the most innovative firm in Retail (Specialty) sector.
Ability to recruit top talent
– SARAIVA LIVR PN is one of the leading players in the Retail (Specialty) industry in Brazil. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in Brazil. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Ability to lead change in Retail (Specialty)
– SARAIVA LIVR PN is one of the leading players in the Retail (Specialty) industry in Brazil. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Retail (Specialty) industry in Brazil but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled SARAIVA LIVR PN in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
High brand equity
– SARAIVA LIVR PN has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled SARAIVA LIVR PN to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of SARAIVA LIVR PN in Retail (Specialty) industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Training and development
– SARAIVA LIVR PN 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.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the SARAIVA LIVR PN 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.
Strong track record of project management in the Retail (Specialty) industry
– SARAIVA LIVR PN is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Highly skilled collaborators
– SARAIVA LIVR PN has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Retail (Specialty) industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of SARAIVA LIVR PN have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– SARAIVA LIVR PN has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – SARAIVA LIVR PN staying ahead in the Retail (Specialty) industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Digital Transformation in Retail (Specialty) industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For SARAIVA LIVR PN digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. SARAIVA LIVR PN 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.
Weaknesses of SARAIVA LIVR PN | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of SARAIVA LIVR PN are -
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Retail (Specialty) industry, SARAIVA LIVR PN 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 bargaining power of channel partners in Retail (Specialty) industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in Brazil, SARAIVA LIVR PN 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 Retail (Specialty) industry.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, SARAIVA LIVR PN 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.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at SARAIVA LIVR PN, in the dynamic environment of Retail (Specialty) industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. SARAIVA LIVR PN has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, SARAIVA LIVR PN has high operating costs in the Retail (Specialty) industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract SARAIVA LIVR PN lucrative customers.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, SARAIVA LIVR PN has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Retail (Specialty) industry over the last five years. SARAIVA LIVR PN 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.
Employees’ less understanding of SARAIVA LIVR PN strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of SARAIVA LIVR PN 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Brazil, SARAIVA LIVR PN needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that SARAIVA LIVR PN needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Retail (Specialty) industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at SARAIVA LIVR PN can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as SARAIVA LIVR PN is planning to shift buying processes online.
Lack of clear differentiation of SARAIVA LIVR PN products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, SARAIVA LIVR PN needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
High dependence on SARAIVA LIVR PN ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of SARAIVA LIVR PN still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Retail (Specialty) industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though SARAIVA LIVR PN has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
SARAIVA LIVR PN Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of SARAIVA LIVR PN are -
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, SARAIVA LIVR PN 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 SARAIVA LIVR PN to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at SARAIVA LIVR PN 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 Retail (Specialty) industry.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects SARAIVA LIVR PN can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
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 SARAIVA LIVR PN 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, SARAIVA LIVR PN is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. SARAIVA LIVR PN can utilize new technology in the field of Retail (Specialty) industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, SARAIVA LIVR PN can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that SARAIVA LIVR PN operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Retail (Specialty) sector.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help SARAIVA LIVR PN to increase its market reach. SARAIVA LIVR PN 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for SARAIVA LIVR PN 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 SARAIVA LIVR PN to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for SARAIVA LIVR PN 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– SARAIVA LIVR PN 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– SARAIVA LIVR PN has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Retail (Specialty) sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled SARAIVA LIVR PN to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help SARAIVA LIVR PN to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of SARAIVA LIVR PN has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Retail (Specialty) industry. This can help SARAIVA LIVR PN to build a more holistic ecosystem for SARAIVA LIVR PN products in the Retail (Specialty) industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Buying journey improvements
– SARAIVA LIVR PN can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Retail (Specialty) 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.
Threats SARAIVA LIVR PN External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of SARAIVA LIVR PN are -
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Retail (Specialty) industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. SARAIVA LIVR PN can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Increasing wage structure of SARAIVA LIVR PN
– 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 SARAIVA LIVR PN.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, SARAIVA LIVR PN 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 SARAIVA LIVR PN prominent markets.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– SARAIVA LIVR PN has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Retail (Specialty) industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, SARAIVA LIVR PN needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Retail (Specialty) 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.
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.
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 SARAIVA LIVR PN.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Retail (Specialty) industry are lowering. It can presents SARAIVA LIVR PN with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Retail (Specialty) sector.
Regulatory challenges
– SARAIVA LIVR PN 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 Retail (Specialty) industry regulations.
High level of anxiety and lack of motivation
– the Great Resignation in United States is the sign of broader dissatisfaction among the workforce in United States. SARAIVA LIVR PN needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Retail (Specialty) industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that SARAIVA LIVR PN is facing in Retail (Specialty) sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– SARAIVA LIVR PN 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.
Environmental challenges
– SARAIVA LIVR PN 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. SARAIVA LIVR PN can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Retail (Specialty) industry.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of SARAIVA LIVR PN Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at SARAIVA LIVR PN 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 SARAIVA LIVR PN 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 SARAIVA LIVR PN 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 SARAIVA LIVR PN 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 SARAIVA LIVR PN needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
