Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Siteone Landscape Supply is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – wage bills are increasing, increasing commodity prices, there is backlash against globalization, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, technology disruption, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%,
competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Siteone Landscape Supply
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Siteone Landscape Supply can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Siteone Landscape Supply, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Siteone Landscape Supply 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 Siteone Landscape Supply can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Siteone Landscape Supply
2. Improving business portfolio management of Siteone Landscape Supply
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United States
4. Making a Crops sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Siteone Landscape Supply
Strengths of Siteone Landscape Supply | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Siteone Landscape Supply are -
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Siteone Landscape Supply in Crops industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Innovation driven organization
– Siteone Landscape Supply is one of the most innovative firm in Crops sector.
Organizational Resilience of Siteone Landscape Supply
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Siteone Landscape Supply does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Ability to lead change in Crops
– Siteone Landscape Supply is one of the leading players in the Crops industry in United States. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Crops industry in United States but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Siteone Landscape Supply 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
– Siteone Landscape Supply is one of the leading players in the Crops 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Siteone Landscape Supply has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Crops industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Siteone Landscape Supply have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Training and development
– Siteone Landscape Supply has one of the best training and development program in Consumer/Non-Cyclical 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.
Learning organization
- Siteone Landscape Supply 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 Siteone Landscape Supply is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Siteone Landscape Supply emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Strong track record of project management in the Crops industry
– Siteone Landscape Supply is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Siteone Landscape Supply comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Crops 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.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Siteone Landscape Supply has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Siteone Landscape Supply staying ahead in the Crops industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Diverse revenue streams
– Siteone Landscape Supply is present in almost all the verticals within the Crops industry. This has provided Siteone Landscape Supply 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.
Weaknesses of Siteone Landscape Supply | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Siteone Landscape Supply are -
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Crops industry, Siteone Landscape Supply 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.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Siteone Landscape Supply is just above the Crops 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 cash cycle compare to competitors
Siteone Landscape Supply has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Crops industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Siteone Landscape Supply has some of the most successful models in the Crops industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. Siteone Landscape Supply should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Skills based hiring in Crops industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Siteone Landscape Supply 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Siteone Landscape Supply 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 Crops industry using digital technology.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Siteone Landscape Supply is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Crops industry, but Siteone Landscape Supply needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Siteone Landscape Supply to focus more on services in the Crops industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Siteone Landscape Supply needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Crops industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Siteone Landscape Supply can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Siteone Landscape Supply is planning to shift buying processes online.
High dependence on Siteone Landscape Supply ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Siteone Landscape Supply still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Crops industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Siteone Landscape Supply has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Need for greater diversity
– Siteone Landscape Supply has taken concrete steps on diversity, equity, and inclusion. But the efforts so far has resulted in limited success. It needs to expand the recruitment and selection process to hire more people from the minorities and underprivileged background.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Siteone Landscape Supply has high operating costs in the Crops industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Siteone Landscape Supply lucrative customers.
Siteone Landscape Supply Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Siteone Landscape Supply are -
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Siteone Landscape Supply 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Siteone Landscape Supply can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Crops 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
– Siteone Landscape Supply 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Siteone Landscape Supply 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 Siteone Landscape Supply to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Crops industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Siteone Landscape Supply can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Siteone Landscape Supply is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Siteone Landscape Supply can utilize new technology in the field of Crops industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Manufacturing automation
– Siteone Landscape Supply can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Crops 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.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Crops industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Siteone Landscape Supply in the Crops industry. Now Siteone Landscape Supply can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Crops industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Siteone Landscape Supply 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. Siteone Landscape Supply 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Siteone Landscape Supply in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Crops industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Developing new processes and practices
– Siteone Landscape Supply can develop new processes and procedures in Crops 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Siteone Landscape Supply has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Crops sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Siteone Landscape Supply to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Siteone Landscape Supply to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Siteone Landscape Supply 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 Siteone Landscape Supply to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Threats Siteone Landscape Supply External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Siteone Landscape Supply are -
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Siteone Landscape Supply 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 Siteone Landscape Supply prominent markets.
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 Siteone Landscape Supply business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Siteone Landscape Supply in Crops industry. The Crops 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.
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 Siteone Landscape Supply.
Regulatory challenges
– Siteone Landscape Supply 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 Crops industry regulations.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Crops industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Siteone Landscape Supply can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Increasing wage structure of Siteone Landscape Supply
– 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 Siteone Landscape Supply.
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 Siteone Landscape Supply 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 Crops industry and other sectors.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Siteone Landscape Supply is facing in Crops sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Siteone Landscape Supply has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Crops industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Siteone Landscape Supply needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Crops sector. According to Mckinsey study top managers believe that the adoption of technology in operations, communications is 20-25 times faster than what they planned in the beginning of 2019.
Technology disruption because of hacks, piracy etc
– The colonial pipeline illustrated, how vulnerable modern organization are to international hackers, miscreants, and disruptors. The cyber security interruption, data leaks, etc can seriously jeopardize the future growth of the organization.
Environmental challenges
– Siteone Landscape Supply 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. Siteone Landscape Supply can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Crops industry.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Siteone Landscape Supply Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Siteone Landscape Supply 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 Siteone Landscape Supply 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 Siteone Landscape Supply 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 Siteone Landscape Supply 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 Siteone Landscape Supply needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.