SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for MCAN Mortgage Corporation (Canada)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , MCAN Mortgage Corporation is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , increasing transportation and logistics costs, increasing commodity prices, increasing energy prices, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, wage bills are increasing, there is backlash against globalization,
talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of MCAN Mortgage Corporation
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that MCAN Mortgage Corporation can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the MCAN Mortgage Corporation, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which MCAN Mortgage Corporation 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 MCAN Mortgage Corporation can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of MCAN Mortgage Corporation
2. Improving business portfolio management of MCAN Mortgage Corporation
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Canada
4. Making a Consumer Financial Services sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of MCAN Mortgage Corporation
Strengths of MCAN Mortgage Corporation | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of MCAN Mortgage Corporation are -
Strong track record of project management in the Consumer Financial Services industry
– MCAN Mortgage Corporation is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Digital Transformation in Consumer Financial Services industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For MCAN Mortgage Corporation digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. MCAN Mortgage Corporation 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.
Organizational Resilience of MCAN Mortgage Corporation
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing MCAN Mortgage Corporation does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Training and development
– MCAN Mortgage Corporation has one of the best training and development program in Financial 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Consumer Financial Services industry
– MCAN Mortgage Corporation has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled MCAN Mortgage Corporation to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Consumer Financial Services industry. The sustainable margins have also helped MCAN Mortgage Corporation to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Successful track record of launching new products
– MCAN Mortgage Corporation has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. MCAN Mortgage Corporation 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.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that MCAN Mortgage Corporation 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
- MCAN Mortgage Corporation 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 MCAN Mortgage Corporation is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at MCAN Mortgage Corporation emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Analytics focus
– MCAN Mortgage Corporation 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 Consumer Financial Services industry. The technology infrastructure of Canada 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.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the MCAN Mortgage Corporation 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.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– MCAN Mortgage Corporation has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – MCAN Mortgage Corporation staying ahead in the Consumer Financial Services industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
High brand equity
– MCAN Mortgage Corporation has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled MCAN Mortgage Corporation to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Weaknesses of MCAN Mortgage Corporation | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of MCAN Mortgage Corporation are -
High bargaining power of channel partners in Consumer Financial Services industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in Canada, MCAN Mortgage Corporation 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 Consumer Financial Services industry.
Employees’ less understanding of MCAN Mortgage Corporation strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of MCAN Mortgage Corporation 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of MCAN Mortgage Corporation is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Consumer Financial Services industry, but MCAN Mortgage Corporation needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help MCAN Mortgage Corporation to focus more on services in the Consumer Financial Services industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of MCAN Mortgage Corporation, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Consumer Financial Services industry. But it has very little resources allocation to manage the risks emerging from events such as natural disasters, climate change, melting of permafrost, tacking the rise of artificial intelligence, opportunities and threats emerging from commercialization of space etc.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, MCAN Mortgage Corporation 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Canada, MCAN Mortgage Corporation needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Consumer Financial Services industry, MCAN Mortgage Corporation 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 MCAN Mortgage Corporation ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of MCAN Mortgage Corporation still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Consumer Financial Services industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though MCAN Mortgage Corporation has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As MCAN Mortgage Corporation is one of the leading players in the Consumer Financial Services industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Consumer Financial Services industry in last five years.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
MCAN Mortgage Corporation has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Consumer Financial 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.
Skills based hiring in Consumer Financial Services industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at MCAN Mortgage Corporation 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.
MCAN Mortgage Corporation Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of MCAN Mortgage Corporation are -
Loyalty marketing
– MCAN Mortgage Corporation 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– MCAN Mortgage Corporation can develop new processes and procedures in Consumer Financial 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– MCAN Mortgage Corporation has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Consumer Financial Services sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled MCAN Mortgage Corporation to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help MCAN Mortgage Corporation to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Buying journey improvements
– MCAN Mortgage Corporation can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Consumer Financial Services 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, MCAN Mortgage Corporation 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help MCAN Mortgage Corporation to increase its market reach. MCAN Mortgage Corporation will be able to reach out to new customers. Secondly 5G will also provide technology framework to build new tools and products that can help more immersive consumer experience and faster consumer journey.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, MCAN Mortgage Corporation is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. MCAN Mortgage Corporation can utilize new technology in the field of Consumer Financial Services industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Consumer Financial Services industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. MCAN Mortgage Corporation 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. MCAN Mortgage Corporation 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for MCAN Mortgage Corporation 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– MCAN Mortgage Corporation 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.
Manufacturing automation
– MCAN Mortgage Corporation can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Consumer Financial 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, MCAN Mortgage Corporation can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that MCAN Mortgage Corporation operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Consumer Financial Services sector.
Identify volunteer opportunities
– Covid-19 has impacted working population in two ways – it has led to people soul searching about their professional choices, resulting in mass resignation. Secondly it has encouraged people to do things that they are passionate about. This has opened opportunities for businesses to build volunteer oriented socially driven projects. MCAN Mortgage Corporation can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Threats MCAN Mortgage Corporation External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of MCAN Mortgage Corporation are -
Environmental challenges
– MCAN Mortgage Corporation 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. MCAN Mortgage Corporation can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Consumer Financial Services industry.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– MCAN Mortgage Corporation has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Consumer Financial Services industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, MCAN Mortgage Corporation needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Consumer Financial 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.
Increasing wage structure of MCAN Mortgage Corporation
– 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 MCAN Mortgage Corporation.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– MCAN Mortgage Corporation 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.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– MCAN Mortgage Corporation 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 Consumer Financial Services industry.
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.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, MCAN Mortgage Corporation 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 MCAN Mortgage Corporation prominent markets.
Consumer confidence and its impact on MCAN Mortgage Corporation 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 Consumer Financial Services industry and other sectors.
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. MCAN Mortgage Corporation 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.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for MCAN Mortgage Corporation in Consumer Financial Services industry. The Consumer Financial Services 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.
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.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Consumer Financial Services industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. MCAN Mortgage Corporation can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
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 MCAN Mortgage Corporation in the Consumer Financial Services sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of MCAN Mortgage Corporation Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at MCAN Mortgage Corporation 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 MCAN Mortgage Corporation 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 MCAN Mortgage Corporation 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 MCAN Mortgage Corporation 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 MCAN Mortgage Corporation needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.