Colony NorthStar Pref G (CLNY_pg) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Colony NorthStar Pref G (United States)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Colony NorthStar Pref G is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – wage bills are increasing, there is backlash against globalization, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, technology disruption, increasing commodity prices, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion,
talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, geopolitical disruptions, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Colony NorthStar Pref G
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Colony NorthStar Pref G can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Colony NorthStar Pref G, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Colony NorthStar Pref G 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 Colony NorthStar Pref G can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Colony NorthStar Pref G
2. Improving business portfolio management of Colony NorthStar Pref G
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 Colony NorthStar Pref G
Strengths of Colony NorthStar Pref G | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Colony NorthStar Pref G are -
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Colony NorthStar Pref G 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in industry
– Colony NorthStar Pref G has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Colony NorthStar Pref G to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Colony NorthStar Pref G to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Digital Transformation in industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Colony NorthStar Pref G digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Colony NorthStar Pref G 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.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Colony NorthStar Pref G has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Colony NorthStar Pref G 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
– Colony NorthStar Pref G is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
High brand equity
– Colony NorthStar Pref G has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Colony NorthStar Pref G to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Colony NorthStar Pref G 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 Colony NorthStar Pref G have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Colony NorthStar Pref G in industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Diverse revenue streams
– Colony NorthStar Pref G is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided Colony NorthStar Pref G 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Colony NorthStar Pref G 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Colony NorthStar Pref G in the sector have low bargaining power. Colony NorthStar Pref G has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Colony NorthStar Pref G to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Colony NorthStar Pref G 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.
Weaknesses of Colony NorthStar Pref G | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Colony NorthStar Pref G are -
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Colony NorthStar Pref G is one of the leading players in the industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the industry in last five years.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Colony NorthStar Pref G has high operating costs in the industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Colony NorthStar Pref G lucrative customers.
Employees’ less understanding of Colony NorthStar Pref G strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Colony NorthStar Pref G 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.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Colony NorthStar Pref G 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.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Colony NorthStar Pref G has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Colony NorthStar Pref G, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact 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.
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 Colony NorthStar Pref G supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Colony NorthStar Pref G is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Colony NorthStar Pref G vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
High dependence on Colony NorthStar Pref G ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Colony NorthStar Pref G still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Colony NorthStar Pref G has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Colony NorthStar Pref G, in the dynamic environment of industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Colony NorthStar Pref G has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Colony NorthStar Pref G 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 industry using digital technology.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of United States, Colony NorthStar Pref G needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Colony NorthStar Pref G Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Colony NorthStar Pref G are -
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. Colony NorthStar Pref G 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. Colony NorthStar Pref G 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.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Colony NorthStar Pref G in the industry. Now Colony NorthStar Pref G can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Colony NorthStar Pref G 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– Colony NorthStar Pref G 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Colony NorthStar Pref G 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 Colony NorthStar Pref G to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Colony NorthStar Pref G to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Colony NorthStar Pref G has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in industry. This can help Colony NorthStar Pref G to build a more holistic ecosystem for Colony NorthStar Pref G products in the industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Reconfiguring business model
– The expansion of digital payment system, the bringing down of international transactions costs using Bitcoin and other blockchain based currencies, etc can help Colony NorthStar Pref G to reconfigure its entire business model. For example it can used blockchain based technologies to reduce piracy of its products in the big markets such as China. Secondly it can use the popularity of e-commerce in various developing markets to build a Direct to Customer business model rather than the current Channel Heavy distribution network.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Colony NorthStar Pref G can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Colony NorthStar Pref G operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in sector.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Colony NorthStar Pref G 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.
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. Colony NorthStar Pref G can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Manufacturing automation
– Colony NorthStar Pref G 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Colony NorthStar Pref G 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 Colony NorthStar Pref G to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Loyalty marketing
– Colony NorthStar Pref G 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.
Threats Colony NorthStar Pref G External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Colony NorthStar Pref G are -
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to industry are lowering. It can presents Colony NorthStar Pref G with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Colony NorthStar Pref G is facing in sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Increasing wage structure of Colony NorthStar Pref G
– 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 Colony NorthStar Pref G.
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 Colony NorthStar Pref G.
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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Colony NorthStar Pref G 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.
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. Colony NorthStar Pref G 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.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Colony NorthStar Pref G 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 Colony NorthStar Pref G prominent markets.
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 Colony NorthStar Pref G business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Colony NorthStar Pref G can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Colony NorthStar Pref G has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Colony NorthStar Pref G 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.
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. Colony NorthStar Pref G needs to understand the core reasons impacting the industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Colony NorthStar Pref G Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Colony NorthStar Pref G 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 Colony NorthStar Pref G 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 Colony NorthStar Pref G 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 Colony NorthStar Pref G 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 Colony NorthStar Pref G needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.