Alphabet A BDR (GOGL34) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
NA
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Alphabet A BDR (Brazil)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Alphabet A BDR is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing commodity prices, geopolitical disruptions, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , there is backlash against globalization, wage bills are increasing, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion,
cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Alphabet A BDR can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Alphabet A BDR, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Alphabet A BDR 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 Alphabet A BDR can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Alphabet A BDR
2. Improving business portfolio management of Alphabet A BDR
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Brazil
4. Making a NA sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Alphabet A BDR
Strengths of Alphabet A BDR | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Alphabet A BDR are -
Diverse revenue streams
– Alphabet A BDR is present in almost all the verticals within the NA industry. This has provided Alphabet A BDR 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 NA industry
– Alphabet A BDR is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Training and development
– Alphabet A BDR has one of the best training and development program in NA 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 Alphabet A BDR comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the NA 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.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Alphabet A BDR has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Alphabet A BDR 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Alphabet A BDR has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive NA industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Alphabet A BDR have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Innovation driven organization
– Alphabet A BDR is one of the most innovative firm in NA sector.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Alphabet A BDR in NA industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Alphabet A BDR has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Alphabet A BDR staying ahead in the NA industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Digital Transformation in NA industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Alphabet A BDR digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Alphabet A BDR 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in NA industry
– Alphabet A BDR has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Alphabet A BDR to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the NA industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Alphabet A BDR to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Ability to lead change in NA
– Alphabet A BDR is one of the leading players in the NA industry in Brazil. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the NA industry in Brazil but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Alphabet A BDR in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Weaknesses of Alphabet A BDR | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Alphabet A BDR are -
Products dominated business model
– Even though Alphabet A BDR has some of the most successful models in the NA industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Alphabet A BDR should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Alphabet A BDR is one of the leading players in the NA industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the NA industry in last five years.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Alphabet A BDR needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the NA industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Alphabet A BDR can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Alphabet A BDR 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 Alphabet A BDR supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Alphabet A BDR is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Alphabet A BDR vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Lack of clear differentiation of Alphabet A BDR products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Alphabet A BDR needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Need for greater diversity
– Alphabet A BDR 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Brazil, Alphabet A BDR needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Alphabet A BDR is just above the NA 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 decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Alphabet A BDR has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the NA industry over the last five years. Alphabet A BDR 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.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Alphabet A BDR has high operating costs in the NA industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Alphabet A BDR lucrative customers.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Alphabet A BDR is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the NA industry, but Alphabet A BDR needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Alphabet A BDR to focus more on services in the NA industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Alphabet A BDR Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Alphabet A BDR are -
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Alphabet A BDR has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in NA sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Alphabet A BDR to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Alphabet A BDR to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Alphabet A BDR 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 Alphabet A BDR to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Alphabet A BDR has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in NA industry. This can help Alphabet A BDR to build a more holistic ecosystem for Alphabet A BDR products in the NA industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Alphabet A BDR 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Alphabet A BDR 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 NA industry.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Alphabet A BDR can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Loyalty marketing
– Alphabet A BDR 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Alphabet A BDR is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Alphabet A BDR can utilize new technology in the field of NA industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, 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. Alphabet A BDR can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Buying journey improvements
– Alphabet A BDR can improve the customer journey of consumers in the NA 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Alphabet A BDR 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 Alphabet A BDR to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in NA industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Alphabet A BDR in the NA industry. Now Alphabet A BDR can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Alphabet A BDR 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.
Threats Alphabet A BDR External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Alphabet A BDR are -
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to NA industry are lowering. It can presents Alphabet A BDR with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the NA sector.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Alphabet A BDR 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 Alphabet A BDR prominent markets.
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 Alphabet A BDR in the NA sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Alphabet A BDR 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.
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. Alphabet A BDR 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.
Environmental challenges
– Alphabet A BDR 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. Alphabet A BDR can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the NA industry.
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 Alphabet A BDR business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Alphabet A BDR in NA industry. The NA 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.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Alphabet A BDR may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of NA sector.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Alphabet A BDR 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 NA industry and other sectors.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Alphabet A BDR 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 NA industry.
Regulatory challenges
– Alphabet A BDR 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 NA 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. Alphabet A BDR needs to understand the core reasons impacting the NA industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Alphabet A BDR Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Alphabet A BDR 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 Alphabet A BDR 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 Alphabet A BDR 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 Alphabet A BDR 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 Alphabet A BDR needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.