Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, increasing commodity prices, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, there is backlash against globalization,
geopolitical disruptions, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR 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 Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR
2. Improving business portfolio management of Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR
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 Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR
Strengths of Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR are -
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR 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.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR 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.
Learning organization
- Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR 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 Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
High brand equity
– Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Ability to lead change in
– Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR is one of the leading players in the industry in United States. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the industry in United States but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Diverse revenue streams
– Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR 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.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR 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.
Analytics focus
– Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR 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 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.
Digital Transformation in industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR 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.
Training and development
– Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR has one of the best training and development program in 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR is one of the leading players in the 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
– Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR 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 Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Weaknesses of Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR are -
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the industry, Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of United States, Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR is planning to shift buying processes online.
High dependence on Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR 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.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR 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 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 Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR 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.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the industry over the last five years. Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR 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.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR, in the dynamic environment of industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR are -
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in industry. This can help Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR to build a more holistic ecosystem for Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR 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 Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR 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.
Manufacturing automation
– Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR 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.
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. Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR 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. Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR can improve the customer journey of consumers in the 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR can utilize new technology in the field of industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR 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 Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR 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 Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in sector.
Threats Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR are -
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR 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.
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. Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR is facing in sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
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 Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR 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 Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR prominent markets.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR 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 industry.
Increasing wage structure of Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR
– 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 Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR.
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. Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR needs to understand the core reasons impacting the industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
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.
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 Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to industry are lowering. It can presents Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
Regulatory challenges
– Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR 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 industry regulations.
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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR 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 Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR 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 Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR 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 Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR 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 Gulf Keystone Petroleum ADR needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.