Harrison Vickers Waterman (HVCW) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources

Introduction to SWOT Analysis

SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Harrison Vickers Waterman (United States)

Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Harrison Vickers Waterman is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing household debt because of falling income levels, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, technology disruption, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, etc

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Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Harrison Vickers Waterman

SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Harrison Vickers Waterman can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Harrison Vickers Waterman, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Harrison Vickers Waterman 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 Harrison Vickers Waterman can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Harrison Vickers Waterman
2. Improving business portfolio management of Harrison Vickers Waterman
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United States
4. Making a Business Services sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Harrison Vickers Waterman

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Strengths of Harrison Vickers Waterman | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The strengths of Harrison Vickers Waterman are -

Successful track record of launching new products

– Harrison Vickers Waterman has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Harrison Vickers Waterman 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.

Innovation driven organization

– Harrison Vickers Waterman is one of the most innovative firm in Business Services sector.

Effective Research and Development (R&D)

– Harrison Vickers Waterman has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Harrison Vickers Waterman staying ahead in the Business Services industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.

High brand equity

– Harrison Vickers Waterman has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Harrison Vickers Waterman to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.

Analytics focus

– Harrison Vickers Waterman 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 Business 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.

Learning organization

- Harrison Vickers Waterman 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 Harrison Vickers Waterman is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Harrison Vickers Waterman emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.

Strong track record of project management in the Business Services industry

– Harrison Vickers Waterman is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.

Superior customer experience

– The customer experience strategy of Harrison Vickers Waterman in Business Services industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.

Sustainable margins compare to other players in Business Services industry

– Harrison Vickers Waterman has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Harrison Vickers Waterman to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Business Services industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Harrison Vickers Waterman to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.

Diverse revenue streams

– Harrison Vickers Waterman is present in almost all the verticals within the Business Services industry. This has provided Harrison Vickers Waterman 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.

Training and development

– Harrison Vickers Waterman has one of the best training and development program in Services 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.

Digital Transformation in Business Services industry

- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Harrison Vickers Waterman digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Harrison Vickers Waterman 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.

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Weaknesses of Harrison Vickers Waterman | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The weaknesses of Harrison Vickers Waterman are -

Need for greater diversity

– Harrison Vickers Waterman 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.

Workers concerns about automation

– As automation is fast increasing in the Business Services industry, Harrison Vickers Waterman 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.

High dependence on Harrison Vickers Waterman ‘s star products

– The top 2 products and services of Harrison Vickers Waterman still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Business Services industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Harrison Vickers Waterman has relatively successful track record of launching new products.

Employees’ less understanding of Harrison Vickers Waterman strategy

– From the outside it seems that the employees of Harrison Vickers Waterman 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.

Aligning sales with marketing

– From the outside it seems that Harrison Vickers Waterman needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Business Services industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Harrison Vickers Waterman can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Harrison Vickers Waterman is planning to shift buying processes online.

High cash cycle compare to competitors

Harrison Vickers Waterman has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Business Services industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.

High bargaining power of channel partners in Business Services industry

– because of the regulatory requirements in United States, Harrison Vickers Waterman 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 Business Services industry.

Skills based hiring in Business Services industry

– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Harrison Vickers Waterman 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.

Slow to strategic competitive environment developments

– As Harrison Vickers Waterman is one of the leading players in the Business Services industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Business Services industry in last five years.

Products dominated business model

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

Interest costs

– Compare to the competition, Harrison Vickers Waterman 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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Harrison Vickers Waterman Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The opportunities of Harrison Vickers Waterman are -

Learning at scale

– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Harrison Vickers Waterman 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.

Building a culture of innovation

– managers at Harrison Vickers Waterman 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 Business Services industry.

Using analytics as competitive advantage

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

Manufacturing automation

– Harrison Vickers Waterman can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Business Services 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.

Finding new ways to collaborate

– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Business Services industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Harrison Vickers Waterman can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.

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 Harrison Vickers Waterman 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.

Leveraging digital technologies

– Harrison Vickers Waterman 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.

Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Business Services industry

– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Harrison Vickers Waterman in the Business Services industry. Now Harrison Vickers Waterman can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.

Lowering marketing communication costs

– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Harrison Vickers Waterman in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Business Services industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.

Creating value in data economy

– The success of analytics program of Harrison Vickers Waterman has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Business Services industry. This can help Harrison Vickers Waterman to build a more holistic ecosystem for Harrison Vickers Waterman products in the Business Services industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.

Redefining models of collaboration and team work

– As explained in the weaknesses section, Harrison Vickers Waterman is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Harrison Vickers Waterman can utilize new technology in the field of Business Services industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.

Reforming the budgeting process

- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Harrison Vickers Waterman can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.

Developing new processes and practices

– Harrison Vickers Waterman can develop new processes and procedures in Business Services industry using technology such as automation using artificial intelligence, real time transportation and products tracking, 3D modeling for concept development and new products pilot testing etc.

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Threats Harrison Vickers Waterman External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The threats of Harrison Vickers Waterman are -

Increasing wage structure of Harrison Vickers Waterman

– 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 Harrison Vickers Waterman.

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 Harrison Vickers Waterman business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.

Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution

– Harrison Vickers Waterman has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Business Services industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Harrison Vickers Waterman needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Business Services 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.

Learning curve for new practices

– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Harrison Vickers Waterman may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Business Services sector.

Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins

– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Harrison Vickers Waterman 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 Harrison Vickers Waterman prominent markets.

Regulatory challenges

– Harrison Vickers Waterman 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 Business Services industry regulations.

Consumer confidence and its impact on Harrison Vickers Waterman 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 Business Services industry and other sectors.

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.

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 Harrison Vickers Waterman in the Business Services sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.

High dependence on third party suppliers

– Harrison Vickers Waterman 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.

Instability in the European markets

– European Union markets are facing three big challenges post Covid – expanded balance sheets, Brexit related business disruption, and aggressive Russia looking to distract the existing security mechanism. Harrison Vickers Waterman will face different problems in different parts of Europe. For example it will face inflationary pressures in UK, France, and Germany, balance sheet expansion and demand challenges in Southern European countries, and geopolitical instability in the Eastern Europe.

Barriers of entry lowering

– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Business Services industry are lowering. It can presents Harrison Vickers Waterman with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Business Services sector.

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 Harrison Vickers Waterman.

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Weighted SWOT Analysis of Harrison Vickers Waterman Template, Example

Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Harrison Vickers Waterman 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 Harrison Vickers Waterman 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 Harrison Vickers Waterman 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 Harrison Vickers Waterman 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 Harrison Vickers Waterman needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.

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