SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Excelsior Mining (Canada)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Excelsior Mining is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing energy prices, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, there is backlash against globalization, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies,
increasing transportation and logistics costs, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Excelsior Mining can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Excelsior Mining, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Excelsior Mining 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 Excelsior Mining can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Excelsior Mining
2. Improving business portfolio management of Excelsior Mining
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Canada
4. Making a Metal Mining sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Excelsior Mining
Strengths of Excelsior Mining | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Excelsior Mining are -
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Excelsior Mining in the Basic Materials sector have low bargaining power. Excelsior Mining has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Excelsior Mining to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Learning organization
- Excelsior Mining 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 Excelsior Mining is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Excelsior Mining emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Ability to lead change in Metal Mining
– Excelsior Mining is one of the leading players in the Metal Mining industry in Canada. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Metal Mining industry in Canada but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Excelsior Mining in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Excelsior Mining 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.
Organizational Resilience of Excelsior Mining
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Excelsior Mining does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Excelsior Mining 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.
Strong track record of project management in the Metal Mining industry
– Excelsior Mining is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Analytics focus
– Excelsior Mining 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 Metal Mining 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Excelsior Mining is one of the leading players in the Metal Mining 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Excelsior Mining in Metal Mining industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Excelsior Mining has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Excelsior Mining 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Excelsior Mining comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Metal Mining 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.
Weaknesses of Excelsior Mining | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Excelsior Mining are -
Need for greater diversity
– Excelsior Mining 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.
Employees’ less understanding of Excelsior Mining strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Excelsior Mining 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.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Excelsior Mining has high operating costs in the Metal Mining industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Excelsior Mining lucrative customers.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Excelsior Mining has some of the most successful models in the Metal Mining industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Excelsior Mining should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Excelsior Mining is just above the Metal Mining 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Excelsior Mining 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 Metal Mining industry using digital technology.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Canada, Excelsior Mining needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Excelsior Mining 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.
High dependence on Excelsior Mining ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Excelsior Mining still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Metal Mining industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Excelsior Mining has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Excelsior Mining is one of the leading players in the Metal Mining industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Metal Mining industry in last five years.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Metal Mining industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in Canada, Excelsior Mining 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 Metal Mining industry.
Excelsior Mining Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Excelsior Mining are -
Leveraging digital technologies
– Excelsior Mining 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.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Metal Mining industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Excelsior Mining 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. Excelsior Mining 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Excelsior Mining 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Excelsior Mining has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Metal Mining sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Excelsior Mining to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Excelsior Mining to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Excelsior Mining has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Metal Mining industry. This can help Excelsior Mining to build a more holistic ecosystem for Excelsior Mining products in the Metal Mining industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Excelsior Mining can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Excelsior Mining to increase its market reach. Excelsior Mining 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– Excelsior Mining can develop new processes and procedures in Metal Mining 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Excelsior Mining 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 Excelsior Mining to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Excelsior Mining can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Excelsior Mining operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Metal Mining sector.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Excelsior Mining is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Excelsior Mining can utilize new technology in the field of Metal Mining industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Excelsior Mining 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 Excelsior Mining 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 Metal Mining industry.
Threats Excelsior Mining External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Excelsior Mining are -
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Excelsior Mining may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Metal Mining sector.
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 Metal Mining industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Excelsior Mining can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Excelsior Mining 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 Metal Mining industry.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Excelsior Mining 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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Excelsior Mining is facing in Metal Mining sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Metal Mining industry are lowering. It can presents Excelsior Mining with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Metal Mining sector.
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 Excelsior Mining business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Capital market disruption
– During the Covid-19, Dow Jones has touched record high. The valuations of a number of companies are way beyond their existing business model potential. This can lead to capital market correction which can put a number of suppliers, collaborators, value chain partners in great financial difficulty. It will directly impact the business of Excelsior Mining.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Excelsior Mining has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Metal Mining industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Excelsior Mining needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Metal Mining 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 international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Excelsior Mining 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 Excelsior Mining prominent markets.
Environmental challenges
– Excelsior Mining 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. Excelsior Mining can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Metal Mining industry.
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 Excelsior Mining in the Metal Mining sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Excelsior Mining Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Excelsior Mining 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 Excelsior Mining 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 Excelsior Mining 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 Excelsior Mining 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 Excelsior Mining needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.