SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Noront Resources (United States)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Noront Resources is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , geopolitical disruptions,
increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, there is backlash against globalization, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Noront Resources can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Noront Resources, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Noront Resources 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 Noront Resources can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Noront Resources
2. Improving business portfolio management of Noront Resources
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United States
4. Making a Gold & Silver sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Noront Resources
Strengths of Noront Resources | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Noront Resources are -
Successful track record of launching new products
– Noront Resources has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Noront Resources 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 Noront Resources comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Gold & Silver industry, building diversified operations across different geographies so that disruption in one part of the world doesn’t impact the overall performance of the firm, and integrating the various business operations and processes through its digital transformation drive.
Organizational Resilience of Noront Resources
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Noront Resources does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Strong track record of project management in the Gold & Silver industry
– Noront Resources is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Noront Resources has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Gold & Silver industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Noront Resources have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Learning organization
- Noront Resources 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 Noront Resources is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Noront Resources emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
High brand equity
– Noront Resources has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Noront Resources to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Noront Resources in the Basic Materials sector have low bargaining power. Noront Resources has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Noront Resources to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Diverse revenue streams
– Noront Resources is present in almost all the verticals within the Gold & Silver industry. This has provided Noront Resources 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Gold & Silver industry
– Noront Resources has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Noront Resources to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Gold & Silver industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Noront Resources to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Digital Transformation in Gold & Silver industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Noront Resources digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Noront Resources 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.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Noront Resources has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Noront Resources staying ahead in the Gold & Silver industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Weaknesses of Noront Resources | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Noront Resources are -
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Noront Resources is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Noront Resources to provide better information regarding Gold & Silver products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Noront Resources needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Gold & Silver industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Noront Resources can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Noront Resources is planning to shift buying processes online.
Need for greater diversity
– Noront Resources 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.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Noront Resources is just above the Gold & Silver 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.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Noront Resources has some of the most successful models in the Gold & Silver industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Noront Resources should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Noront Resources has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Gold & Silver industry over the last five years. Noront Resources 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.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Noront Resources, in the dynamic environment of Gold & Silver industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Noront Resources has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
High dependence on existing supply chain
– The disruption in the global supply chains because of the Covid-19 pandemic and blockage of the Suez Canal illustrated the fragile nature of Noront Resources supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Noront Resources is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Noront Resources vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Noront Resources, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Gold & Silver 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.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Noront Resources has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Gold & Silver industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Noront Resources is one of the leading players in the Gold & Silver industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Gold & Silver industry in last five years.
Noront Resources Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Noront Resources are -
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Noront Resources is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Noront Resources can utilize new technology in the field of Gold & Silver industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Gold & Silver industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Noront Resources in the Gold & Silver industry. Now Noront Resources can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Noront Resources 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 Noront Resources to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Noront Resources can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
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 Noront Resources 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Noront Resources to increase its market reach. Noront Resources 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.
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. Noront Resources can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Gold & Silver industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Noront Resources 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. Noront Resources 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Noront Resources 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 Noront Resources to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Noront Resources 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Noront Resources 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Noront Resources has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Gold & Silver industry. This can help Noront Resources to build a more holistic ecosystem for Noront Resources products in the Gold & Silver industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Manufacturing automation
– Noront Resources can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Gold & Silver sector. It can use CAD and 3D printing to build a quick prototype and pilot testing products. It can leverage automation using machine learning and artificial intelligence to do faster production at lowers costs, and it can leverage the growth in satellite and tracking technologies to improve inventory management, transportation, and shipping.
Threats Noront Resources External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Noront Resources are -
Regulatory challenges
– Noront Resources 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 Gold & Silver industry regulations.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Noront Resources 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.
Increasing wage structure of Noront Resources
– 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 Noront Resources.
Environmental challenges
– Noront Resources 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. Noront Resources can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Gold & Silver industry.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Noront Resources has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Gold & Silver industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Noront Resources needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Gold & Silver sector. According to Mckinsey study top managers believe that the adoption of technology in operations, communications is 20-25 times faster than what they planned in the beginning of 2019.
High level of anxiety and lack of motivation
– the Great Resignation in United States is the sign of broader dissatisfaction among the workforce in United States. Noront Resources needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Gold & Silver industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Noront Resources is facing in Gold & Silver 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 Noront Resources in the Gold & Silver sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Gold & Silver industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Noront Resources can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Noront Resources demand
– There is a high probability of declining consumer confidence, given – high inflammation rate, rise of gig economy, lower job stability, increasing cost of living, higher interest rates, and aging demography. All the factors contribute to people saving higher rate of their income, resulting in lower consumer demand in Gold & Silver industry and other sectors.
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. Noront Resources 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.
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 Noront Resources 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 Noront Resources.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Noront Resources Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Noront Resources 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 Noront Resources 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 Noront Resources 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 Noront Resources 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 Noront Resources needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.