Cathedral Energy Svcs (CET) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Oil Well Services & Equipment
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Cathedral Energy Svcs (Canada)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Cathedral Energy Svcs is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing commodity prices, there is backlash against globalization, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, technology disruption, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%,
increasing transportation and logistics costs, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Cathedral Energy Svcs
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Cathedral Energy Svcs can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Cathedral Energy Svcs, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Cathedral Energy Svcs 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 Cathedral Energy Svcs can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Cathedral Energy Svcs
2. Improving business portfolio management of Cathedral Energy Svcs
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Canada
4. Making a Oil Well Services & Equipment sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Cathedral Energy Svcs
Strengths of Cathedral Energy Svcs | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Cathedral Energy Svcs are -
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Cathedral Energy Svcs in Oil Well Services & Equipment industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Diverse revenue streams
– Cathedral Energy Svcs is present in almost all the verticals within the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry. This has provided Cathedral Energy Svcs 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Cathedral Energy Svcs comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Oil Well Services & Equipment 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.
Strong track record of project management in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry
– Cathedral Energy Svcs is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Analytics focus
– Cathedral Energy Svcs 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 Oil Well Services & Equipment 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Cathedral Energy Svcs is one of the leading players in the Oil Well Services & Equipment 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.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Cathedral Energy Svcs has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Cathedral Energy Svcs staying ahead in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Digital Transformation in Oil Well Services & Equipment industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Cathedral Energy Svcs digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Cathedral Energy Svcs 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Oil Well Services & Equipment industry
– Cathedral Energy Svcs has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Cathedral Energy Svcs to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Cathedral Energy Svcs to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Learning organization
- Cathedral Energy Svcs 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 Cathedral Energy Svcs is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Cathedral Energy Svcs emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Cathedral Energy Svcs 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.
Ability to lead change in Oil Well Services & Equipment
– Cathedral Energy Svcs is one of the leading players in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry in Canada. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry in Canada but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Cathedral Energy Svcs in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Weaknesses of Cathedral Energy Svcs | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Cathedral Energy Svcs are -
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Cathedral Energy Svcs has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry over the last five years. Cathedral Energy Svcs 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Cathedral Energy Svcs 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 Oil Well Services & Equipment industry using digital technology.
Need for greater diversity
– Cathedral Energy Svcs 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.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of Cathedral Energy Svcs, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Oil Well Services & Equipment 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.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Cathedral Energy Svcs has some of the most successful models in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Cathedral Energy Svcs should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Cathedral Energy Svcs has high operating costs in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Cathedral Energy Svcs lucrative customers.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Canada, Cathedral Energy Svcs needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Cathedral Energy Svcs is just above the Oil Well Services & Equipment 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 dependence on Cathedral Energy Svcs ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Cathedral Energy Svcs still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Oil Well Services & Equipment industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Cathedral Energy Svcs has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry, Cathedral Energy Svcs 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.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Cathedral Energy Svcs 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.
Cathedral Energy Svcs Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Cathedral Energy Svcs are -
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Cathedral Energy Svcs has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Oil Well Services & Equipment sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Cathedral Energy Svcs to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Cathedral Energy Svcs to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Loyalty marketing
– Cathedral Energy Svcs 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.
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. Cathedral Energy Svcs can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
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 Cathedral Energy Svcs 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.
Manufacturing automation
– Cathedral Energy Svcs can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Oil Well Services & Equipment 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– Cathedral Energy Svcs can develop new processes and procedures in Oil Well Services & Equipment 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Cathedral Energy Svcs to increase its market reach. Cathedral Energy Svcs 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Cathedral Energy Svcs is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Cathedral Energy Svcs can utilize new technology in the field of Oil Well Services & Equipment industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Cathedral Energy Svcs 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Oil Well Services & Equipment industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Cathedral Energy Svcs can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Cathedral Energy Svcs 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. Cathedral Energy Svcs 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Cathedral Energy Svcs 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Cathedral Energy Svcs can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Threats Cathedral Energy Svcs External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Cathedral Energy Svcs 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. Cathedral Energy Svcs 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.
Environmental challenges
– Cathedral Energy Svcs 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. Cathedral Energy Svcs can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Cathedral Energy Svcs 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 Oil Well Services & Equipment industry.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Cathedral Energy Svcs 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 Cathedral Energy Svcs prominent markets.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Oil Well Services & Equipment industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Cathedral Energy Svcs can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Cathedral Energy Svcs may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Oil Well Services & Equipment sector.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Cathedral Energy Svcs 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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Oil Well Services & Equipment industry are lowering. It can presents Cathedral Energy Svcs with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Oil Well Services & Equipment sector.
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. Cathedral Energy Svcs needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
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.
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 Cathedral Energy Svcs in the Oil Well Services & Equipment sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
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 Cathedral Energy Svcs 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 Oil Well Services & Equipment industry and other sectors.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Cathedral Energy Svcs Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Cathedral Energy Svcs 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 Cathedral Energy Svcs 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 Cathedral Energy Svcs 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 Cathedral Energy Svcs 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 Cathedral Energy Svcs needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
