Voya Prime Rate Trust (PPR) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Misc. Financial Services
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Voya Prime Rate Trust (United States)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Voya Prime Rate Trust is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – there is increasing trade war between United States & China, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, increasing transportation and logistics costs, increasing energy prices, increasing commodity prices, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies,
cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Voya Prime Rate Trust
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Voya Prime Rate Trust can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Voya Prime Rate Trust, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Voya Prime Rate Trust 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 Voya Prime Rate Trust can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Voya Prime Rate Trust
2. Improving business portfolio management of Voya Prime Rate Trust
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United States
4. Making a Misc. Financial Services sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Voya Prime Rate Trust
Strengths of Voya Prime Rate Trust | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Voya Prime Rate Trust are -
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Voya Prime Rate Trust comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Misc. Financial Services 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.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Voya Prime Rate Trust has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Voya Prime Rate Trust 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.
Learning organization
- Voya Prime Rate Trust 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 Voya Prime Rate Trust is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Voya Prime Rate Trust emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Voya Prime Rate Trust 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.
Innovation driven organization
– Voya Prime Rate Trust is one of the most innovative firm in Misc. Financial Services sector.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Voya Prime Rate Trust in Misc. Financial Services industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Digital Transformation in Misc. Financial Services industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Voya Prime Rate Trust digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Voya Prime Rate Trust 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Voya Prime Rate Trust is one of the leading players in the Misc. Financial Services 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Voya Prime Rate Trust in the Financial sector have low bargaining power. Voya Prime Rate Trust has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Voya Prime Rate Trust to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Misc. Financial Services industry
– Voya Prime Rate Trust has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Voya Prime Rate Trust to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Misc. Financial Services industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Voya Prime Rate Trust to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Training and development
– Voya Prime Rate Trust has one of the best training and development program in Financial 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.
Organizational Resilience of Voya Prime Rate Trust
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Voya Prime Rate Trust does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Weaknesses of Voya Prime Rate Trust | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Voya Prime Rate Trust are -
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Voya Prime Rate Trust is just above the Misc. Financial Services 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.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Voya Prime Rate Trust has high operating costs in the Misc. Financial Services industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Voya Prime Rate Trust lucrative customers.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Voya Prime Rate Trust has some of the most successful models in the Misc. Financial Services industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Voya Prime Rate Trust should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Misc. Financial Services industry, Voya Prime Rate Trust 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, Voya Prime Rate Trust needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Voya Prime Rate Trust, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Misc. Financial Services 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Voya Prime Rate Trust 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 Misc. Financial Services industry using digital technology.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Voya Prime Rate Trust has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Misc. Financial Services industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Voya Prime Rate Trust has borrowed money from the capital market at higher rates. It needs to restructure the interest payment and costs so that it can compete better and improve profitability.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Voya Prime Rate Trust, in the dynamic environment of Misc. Financial Services industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Voya Prime Rate Trust has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
High dependence on Voya Prime Rate Trust ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Voya Prime Rate Trust still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Misc. Financial Services industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Voya Prime Rate Trust has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Voya Prime Rate Trust Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Voya Prime Rate Trust are -
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 Voya Prime Rate Trust 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Voya Prime Rate Trust 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
– Voya Prime Rate Trust has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Misc. Financial Services sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Voya Prime Rate Trust to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Voya Prime Rate Trust to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Buying journey improvements
– Voya Prime Rate Trust can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Misc. Financial Services 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Voya Prime Rate Trust can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Loyalty marketing
– Voya Prime Rate Trust 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Voya Prime Rate Trust is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Voya Prime Rate Trust can utilize new technology in the field of Misc. Financial Services industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Voya Prime Rate Trust 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 Voya Prime Rate Trust to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Misc. Financial Services industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Voya Prime Rate Trust in the Misc. Financial Services industry. Now Voya Prime Rate Trust can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Voya Prime Rate Trust to increase its market reach. Voya Prime Rate Trust 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Voya Prime Rate Trust 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 Misc. Financial Services industry.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Voya Prime Rate Trust 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Voya Prime Rate Trust has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Misc. Financial Services industry. This can help Voya Prime Rate Trust to build a more holistic ecosystem for Voya Prime Rate Trust products in the Misc. Financial Services industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Threats Voya Prime Rate Trust External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Voya Prime Rate Trust are -
Environmental challenges
– Voya Prime Rate Trust 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. Voya Prime Rate Trust can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Misc. Financial Services industry.
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. Voya Prime Rate Trust needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Misc. Financial Services industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
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.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Voya Prime Rate Trust in Misc. Financial Services industry. The Misc. Financial Services 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.
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 Voya Prime Rate Trust business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Voya Prime Rate Trust 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 Misc. Financial Services industry and other sectors.
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 Voya Prime Rate Trust.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Voya Prime Rate Trust is facing in Misc. Financial Services sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Voya Prime Rate Trust may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Misc. Financial Services sector.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Misc. Financial Services industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Voya Prime Rate Trust can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Voya Prime Rate Trust 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 Misc. Financial Services industry.
Increasing wage structure of Voya Prime Rate Trust
– 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 Voya Prime Rate Trust.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Voya Prime Rate Trust 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 Voya Prime Rate Trust prominent markets.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Voya Prime Rate Trust Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Voya Prime Rate Trust 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 Voya Prime Rate Trust 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 Voya Prime Rate Trust 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 Voya Prime Rate Trust 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 Voya Prime Rate Trust needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.