Bryn Mawr Bank (BMTC) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Regional Banks
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Bryn Mawr Bank (United States)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Bryn Mawr Bank is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, increasing transportation and logistics costs, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , wage bills are increasing,
competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, geopolitical disruptions, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Bryn Mawr Bank can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Bryn Mawr Bank, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Bryn Mawr Bank 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 Bryn Mawr Bank can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Bryn Mawr Bank
2. Improving business portfolio management of Bryn Mawr Bank
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United States
4. Making a Regional Banks sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Bryn Mawr Bank
Strengths of Bryn Mawr Bank | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Bryn Mawr Bank are -
High brand equity
– Bryn Mawr Bank has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Bryn Mawr Bank to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Strong track record of project management in the Regional Banks industry
– Bryn Mawr Bank 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
– Bryn Mawr Bank has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Regional Banks industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Bryn Mawr Bank have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Bryn Mawr Bank has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Bryn Mawr Bank staying ahead in the Regional Banks industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Analytics focus
– Bryn Mawr Bank 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 Regional Banks industry. The technology infrastructure of United States 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 Regional Banks
– Bryn Mawr Bank is one of the leading players in the Regional Banks industry in United States. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Regional Banks industry in United States but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Bryn Mawr Bank in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Bryn Mawr Bank 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 Regional Banks industry
– Bryn Mawr Bank has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Bryn Mawr Bank to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Regional Banks industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Bryn Mawr Bank to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Bryn Mawr Bank has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Bryn Mawr Bank 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Bryn Mawr Bank in Regional Banks industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Diverse revenue streams
– Bryn Mawr Bank is present in almost all the verticals within the Regional Banks industry. This has provided Bryn Mawr Bank 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.
Innovation driven organization
– Bryn Mawr Bank is one of the most innovative firm in Regional Banks sector.
Weaknesses of Bryn Mawr Bank | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Bryn Mawr Bank are -
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Bryn Mawr Bank has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Regional Banks 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 Bryn Mawr Bank products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Bryn Mawr Bank needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Bryn Mawr Bank is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Regional Banks industry, but Bryn Mawr Bank needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Bryn Mawr Bank to focus more on services in the Regional Banks industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Skills based hiring in Regional Banks industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Bryn Mawr Bank 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 bargaining power of channel partners in Regional Banks industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in United States, Bryn Mawr Bank 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 Regional Banks industry.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Bryn Mawr Bank 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.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Bryn Mawr Bank has high operating costs in the Regional Banks industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Bryn Mawr Bank lucrative customers.
Employees’ less understanding of Bryn Mawr Bank strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Bryn Mawr Bank 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
– Bryn Mawr Bank 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 strategic competitive environment developments
– As Bryn Mawr Bank is one of the leading players in the Regional Banks industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Regional Banks industry in last five years.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Bryn Mawr Bank, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Regional Banks 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.
Bryn Mawr Bank Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Bryn Mawr Bank are -
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Bryn Mawr Bank 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Bryn Mawr Bank in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Regional Banks industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Regional Banks industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Bryn Mawr Bank 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. Bryn Mawr Bank 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Bryn Mawr Bank 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Bryn Mawr Bank to increase its market reach. Bryn Mawr Bank 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.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Regional Banks industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Bryn Mawr Bank in the Regional Banks industry. Now Bryn Mawr Bank can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Bryn Mawr Bank has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Regional Banks sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Bryn Mawr Bank to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Bryn Mawr Bank to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Bryn Mawr Bank 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 Bryn Mawr Bank to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Developing new processes and practices
– Bryn Mawr Bank can develop new processes and procedures in Regional Banks 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Bryn Mawr Bank 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 Bryn Mawr Bank to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Bryn Mawr Bank has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Regional Banks industry. This can help Bryn Mawr Bank to build a more holistic ecosystem for Bryn Mawr Bank products in the Regional Banks industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, 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, Bryn Mawr Bank can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Bryn Mawr Bank operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Regional Banks sector.
Manufacturing automation
– Bryn Mawr Bank can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Regional Banks 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.
Threats Bryn Mawr Bank External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Bryn Mawr Bank are -
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Bryn Mawr Bank may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Regional Banks sector.
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.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Bryn Mawr Bank 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.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Bryn Mawr Bank has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Regional Banks industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Bryn Mawr Bank needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Regional Banks 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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Bryn Mawr Bank 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 Regional Banks industry and other sectors.
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, Bryn Mawr Bank 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 Bryn Mawr Bank prominent markets.
Increasing wage structure of Bryn Mawr Bank
– 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 Bryn Mawr Bank.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Regional Banks industry are lowering. It can presents Bryn Mawr Bank with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Regional Banks sector.
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 Bryn Mawr Bank.
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 Bryn Mawr Bank in the Regional Banks sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
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. Bryn Mawr Bank 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.
Regulatory challenges
– Bryn Mawr Bank 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 Regional Banks industry regulations.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Bryn Mawr Bank Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Bryn Mawr Bank 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 Bryn Mawr Bank 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 Bryn Mawr Bank 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 Bryn Mawr Bank 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 Bryn Mawr Bank needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.