General Finance C Pref (GFNCP) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Containers & Packaging
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for General Finance C Pref (United States)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , General Finance C Pref is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, there is backlash against globalization, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, wage bills are increasing, increasing commodity prices, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic ,
increasing transportation and logistics costs, technology disruption, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of General Finance C Pref
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that General Finance C Pref can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the General Finance C Pref, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which General Finance C Pref 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 General Finance C Pref can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of General Finance C Pref
2. Improving business portfolio management of General Finance C Pref
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United States
4. Making a Containers & Packaging sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of General Finance C Pref
Strengths of General Finance C Pref | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of General Finance C Pref are -
Analytics focus
– General Finance C Pref 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 Containers & Packaging 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of General Finance C Pref comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Containers & Packaging 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.
Digital Transformation in Containers & Packaging industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For General Finance C Pref digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. General Finance C Pref 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
– General Finance C Pref has one of the best training and development program in Basic Materials 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
– General Finance C Pref is one of the leading players in the Containers & Packaging 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.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that General Finance C Pref 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.
Ability to lead change in Containers & Packaging
– General Finance C Pref is one of the leading players in the Containers & Packaging industry in United States. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Containers & Packaging industry in United States but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled General Finance C Pref in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Organizational Resilience of General Finance C Pref
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing General Finance C Pref does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Innovation driven organization
– General Finance C Pref is one of the most innovative firm in Containers & Packaging sector.
Learning organization
- General Finance C Pref 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 General Finance C Pref is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at General Finance C Pref emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Diverse revenue streams
– General Finance C Pref is present in almost all the verticals within the Containers & Packaging industry. This has provided General Finance C Pref 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of General Finance C Pref in Containers & Packaging industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Weaknesses of General Finance C Pref | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of General Finance C Pref are -
Skills based hiring in Containers & Packaging industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at General Finance C Pref 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, General Finance C Pref 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 Containers & Packaging industry using digital technology.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Containers & Packaging industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in United States, General Finance C Pref 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 Containers & Packaging industry.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of General Finance C Pref is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Containers & Packaging industry, but General Finance C Pref needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help General Finance C Pref to focus more on services in the Containers & Packaging industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As General Finance C Pref is one of the leading players in the Containers & Packaging industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Containers & Packaging industry in last five years.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
General Finance C Pref has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Containers & Packaging 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 decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, General Finance C Pref has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Containers & Packaging industry over the last five years. General Finance C Pref 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.
Need for greater diversity
– General Finance C Pref 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that General Finance C Pref needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Containers & Packaging industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at General Finance C Pref can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as General Finance C Pref is planning to shift buying processes online.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at General Finance C Pref, in the dynamic environment of Containers & Packaging industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. General Finance C Pref has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of General Finance C Pref is just above the Containers & Packaging 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.
General Finance C Pref Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of General Finance C Pref are -
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Containers & Packaging industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for General Finance C Pref in the Containers & Packaging industry. Now General Finance C Pref can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Leveraging digital technologies
– General Finance C Pref 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of General Finance C Pref has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Containers & Packaging industry. This can help General Finance C Pref to build a more holistic ecosystem for General Finance C Pref products in the Containers & Packaging industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Developing new processes and practices
– General Finance C Pref can develop new processes and procedures in Containers & Packaging 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.
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 General Finance C Pref 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for General Finance C Pref 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 General Finance C Pref to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Containers & Packaging industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. General Finance C Pref 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. General Finance C Pref 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at General Finance C Pref 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 Containers & Packaging industry.
Loyalty marketing
– General Finance C Pref 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.
Buying journey improvements
– General Finance C Pref can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Containers & Packaging 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for General Finance C Pref 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, General Finance C Pref 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– General Finance C Pref has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Containers & Packaging sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled General Finance C Pref to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help General Finance C Pref to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Threats General Finance C Pref External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of General Finance C Pref are -
Consumer confidence and its impact on General Finance C Pref 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 Containers & Packaging industry and other sectors.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, General Finance C Pref 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 General Finance C Pref prominent markets.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that General Finance C Pref is facing in Containers & Packaging sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– General Finance C Pref 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.
Regulatory challenges
– General Finance C Pref 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 Containers & Packaging industry regulations.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Containers & Packaging industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. General Finance C Pref can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, General Finance C Pref may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Containers & Packaging sector.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for General Finance C Pref in Containers & Packaging industry. The Containers & Packaging industry is already at various protected from local competition in China, with the rise of trade war the protection levels may go up. This presents a clear threat of current business model in Chinese market.
Environmental challenges
– General Finance C Pref 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. General Finance C Pref can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Containers & Packaging 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.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– General Finance C Pref has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Containers & Packaging industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, General Finance C Pref needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Containers & Packaging 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.
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 General Finance C Pref in the Containers & Packaging sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Increasing wage structure of General Finance C Pref
– 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 General Finance C Pref.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of General Finance C Pref Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at General Finance C Pref 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 General Finance C Pref 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 General Finance C Pref 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 General Finance C Pref 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 General Finance C Pref needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
