Quintana Energy Services (QES) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Oil Well Services & Equipment
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Quintana Energy Services (United States)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Quintana Energy Services is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing transportation and logistics costs, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, increasing energy prices,
there is backlash against globalization, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Quintana Energy Services
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Quintana Energy Services can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Quintana Energy Services, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Quintana Energy Services 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 Quintana Energy Services can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Quintana Energy Services
2. Improving business portfolio management of Quintana Energy Services
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United States
4. Making a Oil Well Services & Equipment sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Quintana Energy Services
Strengths of Quintana Energy Services | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Quintana Energy Services are -
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Quintana Energy Services 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.
Strong track record of project management in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry
– Quintana Energy Services is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Quintana Energy Services in Oil Well Services & Equipment industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Training and development
– Quintana Energy Services has one of the best training and development program in Energy 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Quintana Energy Services is present in almost all the verticals within the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry. This has provided Quintana Energy Services a diverse revenue stream that has helped it to survive disruptions such as global pandemic in Covid-19, financial disruption of 2008, and supply chain disruption of 2021.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Oil Well Services & Equipment industry
– Quintana Energy Services has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Quintana Energy Services to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Quintana Energy Services to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Analytics focus
– Quintana Energy Services 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 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.
Ability to lead change in Oil Well Services & Equipment
– Quintana Energy Services is one of the leading players in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry in United States. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry in United States but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Quintana Energy Services in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Quintana Energy Services is one of the leading players in the Oil Well Services & Equipment 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 Quintana Energy Services in the Energy sector have low bargaining power. Quintana Energy Services has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Quintana Energy Services to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Quintana Energy Services has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Quintana Energy Services 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.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Quintana Energy Services 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.
Weaknesses of Quintana Energy Services | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Quintana Energy Services are -
Skills based hiring in Oil Well Services & Equipment industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Quintana Energy Services 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of United States, Quintana Energy Services needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
High dependence on Quintana Energy Services ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Quintana Energy Services 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 Quintana Energy Services has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Quintana Energy Services 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.
Employees’ less understanding of Quintana Energy Services strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Quintana Energy Services don’t have comprehensive understanding of the firm’s strategy. This is reflected in number of promotional campaigns over the last few years that had mixed messaging and competing priorities. Some of the strategic activities and services promoted in the promotional campaigns were not consistent with the organization’s strategy.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Oil Well Services & Equipment industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in United States, Quintana Energy Services 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 Oil Well Services & Equipment industry.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Quintana Energy Services is one of the leading players in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry in last five years.
Lack of clear differentiation of Quintana Energy Services products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Quintana Energy Services needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Quintana Energy Services 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. Quintana Energy Services should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Quintana Energy Services 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. Quintana Energy Services 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.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Quintana Energy Services is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Quintana Energy Services to provide better information regarding Oil Well Services & Equipment products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Quintana Energy Services Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Quintana Energy Services are -
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Quintana Energy Services can still utilize the low interest rates to borrow money for capital investment. Secondly it can also use the increase of government spending in infrastructure projects to get new business.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Quintana Energy Services 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 Quintana Energy Services to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Quintana Energy Services to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
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. Quintana Energy Services can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Quintana Energy Services has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Oil Well Services & Equipment industry. This can help Quintana Energy Services to build a more holistic ecosystem for Quintana Energy Services products in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
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. Quintana Energy Services 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. Quintana Energy Services 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 Quintana Energy Services 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 Quintana Energy Services to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Quintana Energy Services in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Developing new processes and practices
– Quintana Energy Services 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Quintana Energy Services 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 Oil Well Services & Equipment industry.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Quintana Energy Services can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Reconfiguring business model
– The expansion of digital payment system, the bringing down of international transactions costs using Bitcoin and other blockchain based currencies, etc can help Quintana Energy Services 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Quintana Energy Services can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Oil Well Services & Equipment 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Quintana Energy Services 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 Quintana Energy Services to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Threats Quintana Energy Services External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Quintana Energy Services are -
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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Oil Well Services & Equipment industry are lowering. It can presents Quintana Energy Services 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.
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.
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. Quintana Energy Services 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.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Quintana Energy Services 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.
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. Quintana Energy Services needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Quintana Energy Services in Oil Well Services & Equipment industry. The Oil Well Services & Equipment 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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Quintana Energy Services 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.
Increasing wage structure of Quintana Energy Services
– 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 Quintana Energy Services.
Environmental challenges
– Quintana Energy Services 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. Quintana Energy Services can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry.
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 Quintana Energy Services in the Oil Well Services & Equipment sector and impact the bottomline 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 Quintana Energy Services.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Quintana Energy Services has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Oil Well Services & Equipment industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Quintana Energy Services needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Oil Well Services & Equipment 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Quintana Energy Services Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Quintana Energy Services 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 Quintana Energy Services 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 Quintana Energy Services 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 Quintana Energy Services 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 Quintana Energy Services needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.