SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Aberdeen Asia-Pacific (United States)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Aberdeen Asia-Pacific is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, increasing commodity prices, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings,
wage bills are increasing, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Aberdeen Asia-Pacific
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Aberdeen Asia-Pacific can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Aberdeen Asia-Pacific, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Aberdeen Asia-Pacific 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 Aberdeen Asia-Pacific can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Aberdeen Asia-Pacific
2. Improving business portfolio management of Aberdeen Asia-Pacific
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United States
4. Making a Misc. Financial Services sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Aberdeen Asia-Pacific
Strengths of Aberdeen Asia-Pacific | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Aberdeen Asia-Pacific are -
Innovation driven organization
– Aberdeen Asia-Pacific is one of the most innovative firm in Misc. Financial Services sector.
Diverse revenue streams
– Aberdeen Asia-Pacific is present in almost all the verticals within the Misc. Financial Services industry. This has provided Aberdeen Asia-Pacific 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.
Learning organization
- Aberdeen Asia-Pacific 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 Aberdeen Asia-Pacific is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Aberdeen Asia-Pacific emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Aberdeen Asia-Pacific 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.
Ability to lead change in Misc. Financial Services
– Aberdeen Asia-Pacific is one of the leading players in the Misc. Financial Services industry in United States. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Misc. Financial Services industry in United States but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Aberdeen Asia-Pacific in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Aberdeen Asia-Pacific has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Aberdeen Asia-Pacific 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Aberdeen Asia-Pacific is one of the leading players in the Misc. Financial Services industry in United States. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in United States. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Aberdeen Asia-Pacific has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Misc. Financial Services industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Aberdeen Asia-Pacific have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Analytics focus
– Aberdeen Asia-Pacific 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 Misc. Financial Services 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.
Strong track record of project management in the Misc. Financial Services industry
– Aberdeen Asia-Pacific is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Aberdeen Asia-Pacific in Misc. Financial Services industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Organizational Resilience of Aberdeen Asia-Pacific
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Aberdeen Asia-Pacific does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Weaknesses of Aberdeen Asia-Pacific | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Aberdeen Asia-Pacific are -
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Aberdeen Asia-Pacific has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Misc. Financial Services industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of United States, Aberdeen Asia-Pacific needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Aberdeen Asia-Pacific is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Misc. Financial Services industry, but Aberdeen Asia-Pacific needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Aberdeen Asia-Pacific to focus more on services in the Misc. Financial Services industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Need for greater diversity
– Aberdeen Asia-Pacific 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 Aberdeen Asia-Pacific is one of the leading players in the Misc. Financial Services industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Misc. Financial Services industry in last five years.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Aberdeen Asia-Pacific needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Misc. Financial Services industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Aberdeen Asia-Pacific can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Aberdeen Asia-Pacific is planning to shift buying processes online.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Aberdeen Asia-Pacific has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Misc. Financial Services industry over the last five years. Aberdeen Asia-Pacific 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.
Employees’ less understanding of Aberdeen Asia-Pacific strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Aberdeen Asia-Pacific 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 dependence on Aberdeen Asia-Pacific ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Aberdeen Asia-Pacific still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Misc. Financial Services industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Aberdeen Asia-Pacific has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Misc. Financial Services industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in United States, Aberdeen Asia-Pacific 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 Misc. Financial Services industry.
Lack of clear differentiation of Aberdeen Asia-Pacific products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Aberdeen Asia-Pacific needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Aberdeen Asia-Pacific Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Aberdeen Asia-Pacific are -
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Aberdeen Asia-Pacific 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 Aberdeen Asia-Pacific to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Aberdeen Asia-Pacific 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 Aberdeen Asia-Pacific to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
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. Aberdeen Asia-Pacific can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Aberdeen Asia-Pacific is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Aberdeen Asia-Pacific can utilize new technology in the field of Misc. Financial Services industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Misc. Financial Services industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Aberdeen Asia-Pacific in the Misc. Financial Services industry. Now Aberdeen Asia-Pacific can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Aberdeen Asia-Pacific can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Aberdeen Asia-Pacific operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Misc. Financial Services sector.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Aberdeen Asia-Pacific in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Misc. Financial Services industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Misc. Financial Services industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Aberdeen Asia-Pacific 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. Aberdeen Asia-Pacific 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Aberdeen Asia-Pacific has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Misc. Financial Services industry. This can help Aberdeen Asia-Pacific to build a more holistic ecosystem for Aberdeen Asia-Pacific products in the Misc. Financial Services industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Aberdeen Asia-Pacific 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Misc. Financial Services industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Aberdeen Asia-Pacific can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Developing new processes and practices
– Aberdeen Asia-Pacific can develop new processes and procedures in Misc. Financial Services 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Aberdeen Asia-Pacific to conduct training and development for its employees across the world. This will result in not only reducing the cost of training but also help employees in different part of the world to integrate with the headquarter work culture, ethos, and standards.
Threats Aberdeen Asia-Pacific External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Aberdeen Asia-Pacific 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 Aberdeen Asia-Pacific.
Environmental challenges
– Aberdeen Asia-Pacific 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. Aberdeen Asia-Pacific can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Misc. Financial Services industry.
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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Misc. Financial Services industry are lowering. It can presents Aberdeen Asia-Pacific with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Misc. Financial Services sector.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Aberdeen Asia-Pacific 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 Misc. Financial Services industry and other sectors.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Aberdeen Asia-Pacific 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 Misc. Financial Services industry.
Regulatory challenges
– Aberdeen Asia-Pacific 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 Misc. Financial Services industry regulations.
High level of anxiety and lack of motivation
– the Great Resignation in United States is the sign of broader dissatisfaction among the workforce in United States. Aberdeen Asia-Pacific needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Misc. Financial Services industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Aberdeen Asia-Pacific is facing in Misc. Financial Services sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Misc. Financial Services industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Aberdeen Asia-Pacific can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Increasing wage structure of Aberdeen Asia-Pacific
– 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 Aberdeen Asia-Pacific.
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. Aberdeen Asia-Pacific 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.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Aberdeen Asia-Pacific may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Misc. Financial Services sector.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Aberdeen Asia-Pacific Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Aberdeen Asia-Pacific 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 Aberdeen Asia-Pacific 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 Aberdeen Asia-Pacific 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 Aberdeen Asia-Pacific 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 Aberdeen Asia-Pacific needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
