SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Emera Incorporated (Canada)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Emera Incorporated is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, geopolitical disruptions, technology disruption, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , wage bills are increasing,
challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Emera Incorporated
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Emera Incorporated can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Emera Incorporated, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Emera Incorporated 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 Emera Incorporated can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Emera Incorporated
2. Improving business portfolio management of Emera Incorporated
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Canada
4. Making a Electric Utilities sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Emera Incorporated
Strengths of Emera Incorporated | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Emera Incorporated are -
Training and development
– Emera Incorporated has one of the best training and development program in Utilities 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Electric Utilities industry
– Emera Incorporated has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Emera Incorporated to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Electric Utilities industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Emera Incorporated to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Digital Transformation in Electric Utilities industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Emera Incorporated digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Emera Incorporated 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.
Strong track record of project management in the Electric Utilities industry
– Emera Incorporated is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Emera Incorporated is one of the leading players in the Electric Utilities industry in Canada. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in Canada. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Emera Incorporated has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Emera Incorporated staying ahead in the Electric Utilities industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Learning organization
- Emera Incorporated 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 Emera Incorporated is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Emera Incorporated emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Emera Incorporated 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.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Emera Incorporated has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Emera Incorporated 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Emera Incorporated is present in almost all the verticals within the Electric Utilities industry. This has provided Emera Incorporated 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.
Analytics focus
– Emera Incorporated 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 Electric Utilities industry. The technology infrastructure of Canada 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Emera Incorporated comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Electric Utilities 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.
Weaknesses of Emera Incorporated | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Emera Incorporated are -
Skills based hiring in Electric Utilities industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Emera Incorporated 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 Electric Utilities industry, Emera Incorporated 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Emera Incorporated has not been able to do capital spending to the tune of the competition. This has resulted into fewer innovations and company facing stiff competition from both existing competitors and new entrants who are disrupting the Electric Utilities industry using digital technology.
High dependence on Emera Incorporated ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Emera Incorporated still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Electric Utilities industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Emera Incorporated has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Electric Utilities industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in Canada, Emera Incorporated 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 Electric Utilities industry.
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 Emera Incorporated supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Emera Incorporated is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Emera Incorporated vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Emera Incorporated has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Electric Utilities industry over the last five years. Emera Incorporated 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Emera Incorporated needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Electric Utilities industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Emera Incorporated can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Emera Incorporated is planning to shift buying processes online.
Employees’ less understanding of Emera Incorporated strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Emera Incorporated 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.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Emera Incorporated has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Electric Utilities industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Need for greater diversity
– Emera Incorporated 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.
Emera Incorporated Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Emera Incorporated are -
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Emera Incorporated can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Buying journey improvements
– Emera Incorporated can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Electric Utilities 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Emera Incorporated has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Electric Utilities sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Emera Incorporated to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Emera Incorporated to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
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. Emera Incorporated can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Developing new processes and practices
– Emera Incorporated can develop new processes and procedures in Electric Utilities 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Emera Incorporated has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Electric Utilities industry. This can help Emera Incorporated to build a more holistic ecosystem for Emera Incorporated products in the Electric Utilities industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Emera Incorporated 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 Emera Incorporated to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Emera Incorporated 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 Electric Utilities industry.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Electric Utilities industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Emera Incorporated in the Electric Utilities industry. Now Emera Incorporated can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Emera Incorporated is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Emera Incorporated can utilize new technology in the field of Electric Utilities industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Emera Incorporated 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Electric Utilities industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Emera Incorporated can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Emera Incorporated 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.
Threats Emera Incorporated External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Emera Incorporated are -
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 Emera Incorporated.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Emera Incorporated is facing in Electric Utilities sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Emera Incorporated in Electric Utilities industry. The Electric Utilities 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, Emera Incorporated may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Electric Utilities sector.
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 Emera Incorporated business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
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. Emera Incorporated 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.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Emera Incorporated 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.
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.
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. Emera Incorporated needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Electric Utilities industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Electric Utilities industry are lowering. It can presents Emera Incorporated with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Electric Utilities sector.
Environmental challenges
– Emera Incorporated 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. Emera Incorporated can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Electric Utilities industry.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Emera Incorporated 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 Electric Utilities industry.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Emera Incorporated has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Electric Utilities industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Emera Incorporated needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Electric Utilities 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Emera Incorporated Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Emera Incorporated 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 Emera Incorporated 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 Emera Incorporated 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 Emera Incorporated 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 Emera Incorporated needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
