Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Corporate Office Properties is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – geopolitical disruptions, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, increasing transportation and logistics costs, technology disruption, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion,
increasing commodity prices, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Corporate Office Properties
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Corporate Office Properties can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Corporate Office Properties, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Corporate Office Properties 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 Corporate Office Properties can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Corporate Office Properties
2. Improving business portfolio management of Corporate Office Properties
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United States
4. Making a Real Estate Operations sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Corporate Office Properties
Strengths of Corporate Office Properties | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Corporate Office Properties are -
Strong track record of project management in the Real Estate Operations industry
– Corporate Office Properties is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Diverse revenue streams
– Corporate Office Properties is present in almost all the verticals within the Real Estate Operations industry. This has provided Corporate Office Properties 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.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Corporate Office Properties has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Corporate Office Properties 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.
Innovation driven organization
– Corporate Office Properties is one of the most innovative firm in Real Estate Operations sector.
Organizational Resilience of Corporate Office Properties
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Corporate Office Properties does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Corporate Office Properties has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Corporate Office Properties staying ahead in the Real Estate Operations industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Corporate Office Properties 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
- Corporate Office Properties 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 Corporate Office Properties is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Corporate Office Properties emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Corporate Office Properties has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Real Estate Operations industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Corporate Office Properties have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Corporate Office Properties 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Corporate Office Properties in the Services sector have low bargaining power. Corporate Office Properties has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Corporate Office Properties to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Digital Transformation in Real Estate Operations industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Corporate Office Properties digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Corporate Office Properties 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.
Weaknesses of Corporate Office Properties | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Corporate Office Properties are -
Need for greater diversity
– Corporate Office Properties 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.
Skills based hiring in Real Estate Operations industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Corporate Office Properties 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.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Corporate Office Properties is one of the leading players in the Real Estate Operations industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Real Estate Operations industry in last five years.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Corporate Office Properties is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Corporate Office Properties to provide better information regarding Real Estate Operations products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
High dependence on Corporate Office Properties ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Corporate Office Properties still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Real Estate Operations industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Corporate Office Properties has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Real Estate Operations industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in United States, Corporate Office Properties 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 Real Estate Operations industry.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Real Estate Operations industry, Corporate Office Properties 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of United States, Corporate Office Properties needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Corporate Office Properties has high operating costs in the Real Estate Operations industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Corporate Office Properties lucrative customers.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Corporate Office Properties, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Real Estate Operations 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 decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Corporate Office Properties has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Real Estate Operations industry over the last five years. Corporate Office Properties 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.
Corporate Office Properties Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Corporate Office Properties are -
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Corporate Office Properties in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Real Estate Operations industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Corporate Office Properties has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Real Estate Operations industry. This can help Corporate Office Properties to build a more holistic ecosystem for Corporate Office Properties products in the Real Estate Operations industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Real Estate Operations industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Corporate Office Properties in the Real Estate Operations industry. Now Corporate Office Properties 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, Corporate Office Properties 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 Corporate Office Properties to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Corporate Office Properties 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Corporate Office Properties can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Corporate Office Properties operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Real Estate Operations sector.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Corporate Office Properties has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Real Estate Operations sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Corporate Office Properties to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Corporate Office Properties to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Corporate Office Properties 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Corporate Office Properties can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Real Estate Operations 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Corporate Office Properties 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Corporate Office Properties 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 Corporate Office Properties to increase its market reach. Corporate Office Properties 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Corporate Office Properties 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 Corporate Office Properties to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Threats Corporate Office Properties External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Corporate Office Properties are -
Regulatory challenges
– Corporate Office Properties 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 Real Estate Operations industry regulations.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Corporate Office Properties has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Real Estate Operations industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Corporate Office Properties needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Real Estate Operations 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. Corporate Office Properties needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Real Estate Operations industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
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 Corporate Office Properties business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Increasing wage structure of Corporate Office Properties
– 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 Corporate Office Properties.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Real Estate Operations industry are lowering. It can presents Corporate Office Properties with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Real Estate Operations sector.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Corporate Office Properties 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 Corporate Office Properties prominent markets.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Corporate Office Properties 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 Real Estate Operations industry.
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 Real Estate Operations industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Corporate Office Properties can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Corporate Office Properties 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.
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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Corporate Office Properties 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 Real Estate Operations industry and other sectors.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Corporate Office Properties Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Corporate Office Properties 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 Corporate Office Properties 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 Corporate Office Properties 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 Corporate Office Properties 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 Corporate Office Properties needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.