Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Preferred Apt. Communities is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – there is backlash against globalization, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, wage bills are increasing, increasing energy prices, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , there is increasing trade war between United States & China,
digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Preferred Apt. Communities
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Preferred Apt. Communities can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Preferred Apt. Communities, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Preferred Apt. Communities 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 Preferred Apt. Communities can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Preferred Apt. Communities
2. Improving business portfolio management of Preferred Apt. Communities
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United States
4. Making a Real Estate Operations sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Preferred Apt. Communities
Strengths of Preferred Apt. Communities | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Preferred Apt. Communities are -
Digital Transformation in Real Estate Operations industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Preferred Apt. Communities digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Preferred Apt. Communities 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.
Learning organization
- Preferred Apt. Communities 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 Preferred Apt. Communities is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Preferred Apt. Communities emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Preferred Apt. Communities in Real Estate Operations industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Preferred Apt. Communities 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Real Estate Operations industry
– Preferred Apt. Communities has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Preferred Apt. Communities to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Real Estate Operations industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Preferred Apt. Communities to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Diverse revenue streams
– Preferred Apt. Communities is present in almost all the verticals within the Real Estate Operations industry. This has provided Preferred Apt. Communities 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.
Ability to lead change in Real Estate Operations
– Preferred Apt. Communities is one of the leading players in the Real Estate Operations industry in United States. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Real Estate Operations industry in United States but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Preferred Apt. Communities 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)
– Preferred Apt. Communities has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Preferred Apt. Communities 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.
Organizational Resilience of Preferred Apt. Communities
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Preferred Apt. Communities does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Preferred Apt. Communities 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.
High brand equity
– Preferred Apt. Communities has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Preferred Apt. Communities to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Preferred Apt. Communities 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.
Weaknesses of Preferred Apt. Communities | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Preferred Apt. Communities are -
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Preferred Apt. Communities 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Preferred Apt. Communities needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Real Estate Operations industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Preferred Apt. Communities can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Preferred Apt. Communities is planning to shift buying processes online.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Preferred Apt. Communities 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 Preferred Apt. Communities lucrative customers.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of United States, Preferred Apt. Communities needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Skills based hiring in Real Estate Operations industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Preferred Apt. Communities 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Real Estate Operations industry, Preferred Apt. Communities 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 Preferred Apt. Communities ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Preferred Apt. Communities 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 Preferred Apt. Communities has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Need for greater diversity
– Preferred Apt. Communities 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Preferred Apt. Communities is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Real Estate Operations industry, but Preferred Apt. Communities needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Preferred Apt. Communities to focus more on services in the Real Estate Operations industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Preferred Apt. Communities has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Real Estate Operations industry over the last five years. Preferred Apt. Communities 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.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Preferred Apt. Communities, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Real Estate Operations 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.
Preferred Apt. Communities Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Preferred Apt. Communities are -
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Preferred Apt. Communities 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Preferred Apt. Communities can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Real Estate Operations 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Preferred Apt. Communities can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
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. Preferred Apt. Communities 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. Preferred Apt. Communities 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Preferred Apt. Communities 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 Preferred Apt. Communities to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Preferred Apt. Communities 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Preferred Apt. Communities is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Preferred Apt. Communities 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.
Manufacturing automation
– Preferred Apt. Communities 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– Preferred Apt. Communities can develop new processes and procedures in Real Estate Operations 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Preferred Apt. Communities in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Real Estate Operations industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Preferred Apt. Communities has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Real Estate Operations industry. This can help Preferred Apt. Communities to build a more holistic ecosystem for Preferred Apt. Communities products in the Real Estate Operations industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
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. Preferred Apt. Communities can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Preferred Apt. Communities has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Real Estate Operations sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Preferred Apt. Communities to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Preferred Apt. Communities to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Threats Preferred Apt. Communities External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Preferred Apt. Communities are -
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Preferred Apt. Communities 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.
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 Preferred Apt. Communities.
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.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Preferred Apt. Communities has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Real Estate Operations industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Preferred Apt. Communities 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.
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.
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 Preferred Apt. Communities business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Real Estate Operations industry are lowering. It can presents Preferred Apt. Communities 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.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Preferred Apt. Communities 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 Preferred Apt. Communities prominent markets.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Preferred Apt. Communities 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 Real Estate Operations industry.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Preferred Apt. Communities in Real Estate Operations industry. The Real Estate Operations 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.
Regulatory challenges
– Preferred Apt. Communities 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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Preferred Apt. Communities is facing in Real Estate Operations sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Preferred Apt. Communities 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Preferred Apt. Communities Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Preferred Apt. Communities 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 Preferred Apt. Communities 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 Preferred Apt. Communities 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 Preferred Apt. Communities 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 Preferred Apt. Communities needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.