SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Conifex Timber Inc (Canada)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Conifex Timber Inc is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, technology disruption, increasing transportation and logistics costs, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation,
geopolitical disruptions, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Conifex Timber Inc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Conifex Timber Inc can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Conifex Timber Inc, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Conifex Timber Inc 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 Conifex Timber Inc can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Conifex Timber Inc
2. Improving business portfolio management of Conifex Timber Inc
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Canada
4. Making a Forestry & Wood Products sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Conifex Timber Inc
Strengths of Conifex Timber Inc | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Conifex Timber Inc are -
Ability to recruit top talent
– Conifex Timber Inc is one of the leading players in the Forestry & Wood Products 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 Conifex Timber Inc in Forestry & Wood Products industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Diverse revenue streams
– Conifex Timber Inc is present in almost all the verticals within the Forestry & Wood Products industry. This has provided Conifex Timber Inc 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.
Analytics focus
– Conifex Timber Inc 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 Forestry & Wood Products 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.
Innovation driven organization
– Conifex Timber Inc is one of the most innovative firm in Forestry & Wood Products sector.
High brand equity
– Conifex Timber Inc has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Conifex Timber Inc to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Strong track record of project management in the Forestry & Wood Products industry
– Conifex Timber Inc is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Conifex Timber Inc comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Forestry & Wood Products 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Conifex Timber Inc has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Forestry & Wood Products industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Conifex Timber Inc have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Learning organization
- Conifex Timber Inc 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 Conifex Timber Inc is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Conifex Timber Inc emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Ability to lead change in Forestry & Wood Products
– Conifex Timber Inc is one of the leading players in the Forestry & Wood Products industry in Canada. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Forestry & Wood Products industry in Canada but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Conifex Timber Inc in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Conifex Timber Inc 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.
Weaknesses of Conifex Timber Inc | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Conifex Timber Inc are -
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Conifex Timber Inc, in the dynamic environment of Forestry & Wood Products industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Conifex Timber Inc has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Forestry & Wood Products industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in Canada, Conifex Timber Inc 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 Forestry & Wood Products industry.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Conifex Timber Inc 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 Forestry & Wood Products industry using digital technology.
Need for greater diversity
– Conifex Timber Inc 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.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Conifex Timber Inc has high operating costs in the Forestry & Wood Products industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Conifex Timber Inc lucrative customers.
High dependence on Conifex Timber Inc ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Conifex Timber Inc still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Forestry & Wood Products industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Conifex Timber Inc has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Conifex Timber Inc is just above the Forestry & Wood Products 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.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Conifex Timber Inc, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Forestry & Wood Products 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.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Conifex Timber Inc is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Conifex Timber Inc to provide better information regarding Forestry & Wood Products products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Canada, Conifex Timber Inc needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Conifex Timber Inc has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Forestry & Wood Products industry over the last five years. Conifex Timber Inc 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.
Conifex Timber Inc Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Conifex Timber Inc are -
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Conifex Timber Inc 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Conifex Timber Inc in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Forestry & Wood Products industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Conifex Timber Inc has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Forestry & Wood Products sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Conifex Timber Inc to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Conifex Timber Inc to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Forestry & Wood Products industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Conifex Timber Inc in the Forestry & Wood Products industry. Now Conifex Timber Inc can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
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 Conifex Timber Inc 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Conifex Timber Inc 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
– Conifex Timber Inc can develop new processes and procedures in Forestry & Wood Products 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Conifex Timber Inc is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Conifex Timber Inc can utilize new technology in the field of Forestry & Wood Products industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Conifex Timber Inc has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Forestry & Wood Products industry. This can help Conifex Timber Inc to build a more holistic ecosystem for Conifex Timber Inc products in the Forestry & Wood Products industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Conifex Timber Inc 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 Forestry & Wood Products industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Conifex Timber Inc 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. Conifex Timber Inc 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.
Manufacturing automation
– Conifex Timber Inc can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Forestry & Wood Products 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Conifex Timber Inc can build a diversified supply chain model across various countries in - South East Asia, India, and other parts of the world. This reconfiguration of global supply chain can help Conifex Timber Inc to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Threats Conifex Timber Inc External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Conifex Timber Inc are -
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 Conifex Timber Inc.
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 Conifex Timber Inc business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Regulatory challenges
– Conifex Timber Inc 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 Forestry & Wood Products industry regulations.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Forestry & Wood Products industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Conifex Timber Inc can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Increasing wage structure of Conifex Timber Inc
– 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 Conifex Timber Inc.
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.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Conifex Timber Inc 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.
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. Conifex Timber Inc needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Forestry & Wood Products industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Conifex Timber Inc is facing in Forestry & Wood Products sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
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 Conifex Timber Inc in the Forestry & Wood Products sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Conifex Timber Inc has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Forestry & Wood Products industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Conifex Timber Inc needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Forestry & Wood Products 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.
Environmental challenges
– Conifex Timber Inc 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. Conifex Timber Inc can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Forestry & Wood Products industry.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Conifex Timber Inc 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 Forestry & Wood Products industry and other sectors.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Conifex Timber Inc Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Conifex Timber Inc 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 Conifex Timber Inc 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 Conifex Timber Inc 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 Conifex Timber Inc 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 Conifex Timber Inc needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
