Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return (FLC) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources

Introduction to SWOT Analysis

SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return (United States)

Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , increasing transportation and logistics costs, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, increasing commodity prices, wage bills are increasing, geopolitical disruptions, there is backlash against globalization, increasing energy prices, etc

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Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return

SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return 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.

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SWOT Objectives / Importance of SWOT Analysis and SWOT Matrix

SWOT analysis of Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return
2. Improving business portfolio management of Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return
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 Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return

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Strengths of Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The strengths of Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return are -

Learning organization

- Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return 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 Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.

Digital Transformation in Misc. Financial Services industry

- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return 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.

Innovation driven organization

– Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return is one of the most innovative firm in Misc. Financial Services sector.

Diverse revenue streams

– Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return is present in almost all the verticals within the Misc. Financial Services industry. This has provided Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return 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.

High brand equity

– Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.

Low bargaining power of suppliers

– Suppliers of Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return in the Financial sector have low bargaining power. Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.

Superior customer experience

– The customer experience strategy of Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return in Misc. Financial Services industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.

Analytics focus

– Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return 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.

Ability to lead change in Misc. Financial Services

– Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return 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 Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.

Sustainable margins compare to other players in Misc. Financial Services industry

– Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Misc. Financial Services industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.

Strong track record of project management in the Misc. Financial Services industry

– Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.

Organizational Resilience of Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return

– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.

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Weaknesses of Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The weaknesses of Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return are -

Ability to respond to the competition

– As the decision making is very deliberative at Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return, in the dynamic environment of Misc. Financial Services industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.

Lack of clear differentiation of Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return products

– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.

Employees’ less understanding of Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return strategy

– From the outside it seems that the employees of Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return 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.

Skills based hiring in Misc. Financial Services industry

– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return 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.

Products dominated business model

– Even though Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return has some of the most successful models in the Misc. Financial Services industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.

Aligning sales with marketing

– From the outside it seems that Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return 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 Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return is planning to shift buying processes online.

Low market penetration in new markets

– Outside its home market of United States, Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.

Slow to harness new channels of communication

– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return to provide better information regarding Misc. Financial Services products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.

Slow to strategic competitive environment developments

– As Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return 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.

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 Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.

Interest costs

– Compare to the competition, Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return 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.

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Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The opportunities of Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return are -

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. Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.

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. Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.

Building a culture of innovation

– managers at Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return 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 Misc. Financial Services industry.

Lowering marketing communication costs

– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return 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.

Better consumer reach

– The expansion of the 5G network will help Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return to increase its market reach. Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return 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.

Loyalty marketing

– Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return 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.

Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities

– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return 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 Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.

Creating value in data economy

– The success of analytics program of Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Misc. Financial Services industry. This can help Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return to build a more holistic ecosystem for Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return products in the Misc. Financial Services industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.

Learning at scale

– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return 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.

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 Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return in the Misc. Financial Services industry. Now Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.

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 Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return 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, Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Misc. Financial Services sector.

Using analytics as competitive advantage

– Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Misc. Financial Services sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.

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Threats Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The threats of Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return are -

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 Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return in the Misc. Financial Services sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.

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. Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.

Consumer confidence and its impact on Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return 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.

Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins

– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return 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 Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return prominent markets.

Learning curve for new practices

– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return 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.

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. Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Misc. Financial Services industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.

Stagnating economy with rate increase

– Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return 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.

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.

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 Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return.

Barriers of entry lowering

– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Misc. Financial Services industry are lowering. It can presents Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return 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.

Increasing wage structure of Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return

– 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 Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return.

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 Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.

High dependence on third party suppliers

– Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return 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.

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Weighted SWOT Analysis of Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return Template, Example

Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return 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 Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return 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 Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return 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 Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return 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 Flaherty & Crumrine Total Return needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.

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