SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Noram Ventures (United States)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Noram Ventures is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, technology disruption, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, increasing commodity prices,
supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , increasing energy prices, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Noram Ventures can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Noram Ventures, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Noram Ventures 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 Noram Ventures can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Noram Ventures
2. Improving business portfolio management of Noram Ventures
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United States
4. Making a Metal Mining sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Noram Ventures
Strengths of Noram Ventures | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Noram Ventures are -
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Noram Ventures in Metal Mining industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Learning organization
- Noram Ventures 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 Noram Ventures is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Noram Ventures emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Noram Ventures 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.
Innovation driven organization
– Noram Ventures is one of the most innovative firm in Metal Mining sector.
Strong track record of project management in the Metal Mining industry
– Noram Ventures is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Training and development
– Noram Ventures has one of the best training and development program in Basic Materials 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.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Noram Ventures 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.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Noram Ventures has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Noram Ventures 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.
Analytics focus
– Noram Ventures 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 United States is also helping it to harness the power of analytics for – marketing optimization, demand forecasting, customer relationship management, inventory management, information sharing across the value chain etc.
High brand equity
– Noram Ventures has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Noram Ventures to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Noram Ventures is one of the leading players in the Metal Mining industry in United States. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in United States. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Noram Ventures 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 Noram Ventures | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Noram Ventures are -
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 Noram Ventures supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Noram Ventures is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Noram Ventures vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Noram Ventures is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Metal Mining industry, but Noram Ventures needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Noram Ventures to focus more on services in the Metal Mining industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Noram Ventures 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Metal Mining industry, Noram Ventures 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.
Skills based hiring in Metal Mining industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Noram Ventures 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.
Need for greater diversity
– Noram Ventures 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, Noram Ventures 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 Noram Ventures lucrative customers.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Noram Ventures 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.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Noram Ventures, in the dynamic environment of Metal Mining industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Noram Ventures has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Noram Ventures needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Metal Mining industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Noram Ventures can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Noram Ventures is planning to shift buying processes online.
Lack of clear differentiation of Noram Ventures products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Noram Ventures needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Noram Ventures Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Noram Ventures are -
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Noram Ventures 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 Noram Ventures to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Noram Ventures can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Noram Ventures operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Metal Mining sector.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Noram Ventures in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Metal Mining industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Noram Ventures 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Noram Ventures 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Metal Mining industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Noram Ventures can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Noram Ventures 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Noram Ventures can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Metal Mining 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.
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. Noram Ventures 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. Noram Ventures 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 Noram Ventures 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 Noram Ventures to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Noram Ventures is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Noram Ventures 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 Noram Ventures 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Noram Ventures 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 Noram Ventures to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Noram Ventures to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Threats Noram Ventures External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Noram Ventures are -
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. Noram Ventures 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.
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. Noram Ventures needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Metal Mining industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Noram Ventures is facing in Metal Mining sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Noram Ventures 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 Noram Ventures prominent markets.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Noram Ventures has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Metal Mining industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Noram Ventures 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.
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.
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 Noram Ventures.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Metal Mining industry are lowering. It can presents Noram Ventures 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 Noram Ventures business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Noram Ventures 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.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Noram Ventures 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.
Increasing wage structure of Noram Ventures
– 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 Noram Ventures.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Noram Ventures in Metal Mining industry. The Metal Mining 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Noram Ventures Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Noram Ventures 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 Noram Ventures 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 Noram Ventures 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 Noram Ventures 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 Noram Ventures needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
