Golden Star (GSC) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Gold & Silver
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Golden Star (Canada)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Golden Star is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – there is backlash against globalization, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, increasing transportation and logistics costs, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion,
increasing commodity prices, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Golden Star can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Golden Star, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Golden Star 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 Golden Star can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Golden Star
2. Improving business portfolio management of Golden Star
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Canada
4. Making a Gold & Silver sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Golden Star
Strengths of Golden Star | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Golden Star are -
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Gold & Silver industry
– Golden Star has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Golden Star to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Gold & Silver industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Golden Star to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Innovation driven organization
– Golden Star is one of the most innovative firm in Gold & Silver sector.
Ability to lead change in Gold & Silver
– Golden Star is one of the leading players in the Gold & Silver industry in Canada. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Gold & Silver industry in Canada but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Golden Star in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Strong track record of project management in the Gold & Silver industry
– Golden Star is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Training and development
– Golden Star 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.
Organizational Resilience of Golden Star
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Golden Star does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Digital Transformation in Gold & Silver industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Golden Star digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Golden Star 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Golden Star is one of the leading players in the Gold & Silver industry in Canada. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in Canada. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Golden Star has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Gold & Silver industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Golden Star have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
High brand equity
– Golden Star has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Golden Star to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Golden Star comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Gold & Silver 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Golden Star in Gold & Silver industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Weaknesses of Golden Star | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Golden Star are -
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Canada, Golden Star needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
High dependence on Golden Star ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Golden Star still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Gold & Silver industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Golden Star has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Golden Star has some of the most successful models in the Gold & Silver industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Golden Star should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Golden Star 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 Gold & Silver industry using digital technology.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Golden Star 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.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Golden Star, in the dynamic environment of Gold & Silver industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Golden Star has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Golden Star needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Gold & Silver industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Golden Star can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Golden Star is planning to shift buying processes online.
Employees’ less understanding of Golden Star strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Golden Star 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.
Lack of clear differentiation of Golden Star products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Golden Star needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Golden Star has high operating costs in the Gold & Silver industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Golden Star lucrative customers.
Need for greater diversity
– Golden Star 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.
Golden Star Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Golden Star are -
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Golden Star has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Gold & Silver industry. This can help Golden Star to build a more holistic ecosystem for Golden Star products in the Gold & Silver industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Gold & Silver industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Golden Star can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Golden Star 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Golden Star 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Golden Star can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Golden Star operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Gold & Silver sector.
Manufacturing automation
– Golden Star can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Gold & Silver 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Golden Star in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Gold & Silver industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Gold & Silver industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Golden Star in the Gold & Silver industry. Now Golden Star can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Golden Star has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Gold & Silver sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Golden Star to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Golden Star to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Golden Star is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Golden Star can utilize new technology in the field of Gold & Silver 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 Golden Star 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 Golden Star to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Gold & Silver industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Golden Star 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. Golden Star 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 Golden Star 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 Gold & Silver industry.
Threats Golden Star External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Golden Star are -
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Golden Star 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 Golden Star prominent markets.
Backlash against dominant players
– US Congress and other legislative arms of the government are getting tough on big business especially technology companies. The digital arm of Golden Star 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 Gold & Silver industry are lowering. It can presents Golden Star with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Gold & Silver sector.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Golden Star 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 Gold & Silver industry and other sectors.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Golden Star may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Gold & Silver sector.
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 Golden Star in the Gold & Silver sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Golden Star has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Gold & Silver industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Golden Star needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Gold & Silver sector. According to Mckinsey study top managers believe that the adoption of technology in operations, communications is 20-25 times faster than what they planned in the beginning of 2019.
High level of anxiety and lack of motivation
– the Great Resignation in United States is the sign of broader dissatisfaction among the workforce in United States. Golden Star needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Gold & Silver industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Environmental challenges
– Golden Star 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. Golden Star can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Gold & Silver 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.
Increasing wage structure of Golden Star
– 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 Golden Star.
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 Golden Star.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Golden Star 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 Gold & Silver industry.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Golden Star Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Golden Star 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 Golden Star 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 Golden Star 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 Golden Star 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 Golden Star needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.