Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR 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, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , wage bills are increasing, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies,
increasing energy prices, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR 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 AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR
2. Improving business portfolio management of AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United States
4. Making a sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR
Strengths of AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR are -
Ability to lead change in
– AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR is one of the leading players in the industry in United States. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the industry in United States but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Strong track record of project management in the industry
– AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Diverse revenue streams
– AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR 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.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the 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.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR in industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Ability to recruit top talent
– AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR is one of the leading players in the industry in United States. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in United States. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
High brand equity
– AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Learning organization
- AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR 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 AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Weaknesses of AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR are -
Products dominated business model
– Even though AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR has some of the most successful models in the industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Skills based hiring in industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR 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.
Employees’ less understanding of AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR 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.
Need for greater diversity
– AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR 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.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the industry, but AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR to focus more on services in the industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Lack of clear differentiation of AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR is planning to shift buying processes online.
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 AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of United States, AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR is just above the 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.
AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR are -
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Leveraging digital technologies
– AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR 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.
Loyalty marketing
– AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR 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 industry.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR can utilize new technology in the field of industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Manufacturing automation
– AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in 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.
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. AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in sector.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR 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 AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR 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. AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR can develop new processes and procedures in 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 AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR are -
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 AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR 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 industry.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the 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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR is facing in sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
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 AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR.
Consumer confidence and its impact on AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR 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 industry and other sectors.
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.
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.
Regulatory challenges
– AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR 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 industry regulations.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR 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 AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR prominent markets.
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. AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR 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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to industry are lowering. It can presents AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR 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 AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR 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 AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR 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 AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR 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 AmTrust Financial Services Pb ADR needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.