SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Avz Minerals Ltd (Australia)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Avz Minerals Ltd is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – wage bills are increasing, geopolitical disruptions, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , there is increasing trade war between United States & China, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, increasing commodity prices,
technology disruption, there is backlash against globalization, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Avz Minerals Ltd can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Avz Minerals Ltd, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Avz Minerals Ltd 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 Avz Minerals Ltd can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Avz Minerals Ltd
2. Improving business portfolio management of Avz Minerals Ltd
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Australia
4. Making a Metal Mining sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Avz Minerals Ltd
Strengths of Avz Minerals Ltd | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Avz Minerals Ltd are -
Organizational Resilience of Avz Minerals Ltd
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Avz Minerals Ltd does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Avz Minerals Ltd comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Metal Mining 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.
Learning organization
- Avz Minerals Ltd 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 Avz Minerals Ltd is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Avz Minerals Ltd emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Digital Transformation in Metal Mining industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Avz Minerals Ltd digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Avz Minerals Ltd 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 Metal Mining industry
– Avz Minerals Ltd has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Avz Minerals Ltd to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Metal Mining industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Avz Minerals Ltd to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Avz Minerals Ltd in Metal Mining industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Avz Minerals Ltd 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.
Analytics focus
– Avz Minerals Ltd 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 Metal Mining industry. The technology infrastructure of Australia 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.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Avz Minerals Ltd has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Avz Minerals Ltd 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.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Avz Minerals Ltd has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Avz Minerals Ltd staying ahead in the Metal Mining industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Diverse revenue streams
– Avz Minerals Ltd is present in almost all the verticals within the Metal Mining industry. This has provided Avz Minerals Ltd 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Avz Minerals Ltd is one of the leading players in the Metal Mining industry in Australia. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in Australia. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Weaknesses of Avz Minerals Ltd | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Avz Minerals Ltd are -
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Avz Minerals Ltd is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Avz Minerals Ltd to provide better information regarding Metal Mining products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Skills based hiring in Metal Mining industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Avz Minerals Ltd 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Avz Minerals Ltd needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Metal Mining industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Avz Minerals Ltd can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Avz Minerals Ltd is planning to shift buying processes online.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Metal Mining industry, Avz Minerals Ltd 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Avz Minerals Ltd is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Metal Mining industry, but Avz Minerals Ltd needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Avz Minerals Ltd to focus more on services in the Metal Mining industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Employees’ less understanding of Avz Minerals Ltd strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Avz Minerals Ltd 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Avz Minerals Ltd 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 Metal Mining industry using digital technology.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Metal Mining industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in Australia, Avz Minerals Ltd 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 Metal Mining industry.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Avz Minerals Ltd 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.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Avz Minerals Ltd has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Metal Mining industry over the last five years. Avz Minerals Ltd 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.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Avz Minerals Ltd, in the dynamic environment of Metal Mining industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Avz Minerals Ltd has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Avz Minerals Ltd Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Avz Minerals Ltd are -
Leveraging digital technologies
– Avz Minerals Ltd 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.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Metal Mining industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Avz Minerals Ltd in the Metal Mining industry. Now Avz Minerals Ltd can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Metal Mining industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Avz Minerals Ltd can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Manufacturing automation
– Avz Minerals Ltd can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Metal Mining 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Avz Minerals Ltd 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Avz Minerals Ltd 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 Avz Minerals Ltd to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Avz Minerals Ltd 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Avz Minerals Ltd to increase its market reach. Avz Minerals Ltd 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, Avz Minerals Ltd is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Avz Minerals Ltd can utilize new technology in the field of Metal Mining industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Avz Minerals Ltd in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Metal Mining industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Metal Mining industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Avz Minerals Ltd 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. Avz Minerals Ltd 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Avz Minerals Ltd has focused on building a highly responsive customer relationship management platform. This platform is built on in-house data and driven by analytics and artificial intelligence. The customer analytics can help the organization to fine tune its loyalty marketing efforts, increase the wallet share of the organization, reduce wastage on mainstream advertising spending, build better pricing strategies using personalization, etc.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Avz Minerals Ltd can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Threats Avz Minerals Ltd External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Avz Minerals Ltd are -
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 Avz Minerals Ltd.
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 Avz Minerals Ltd 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 Metal Mining industry and other sectors.
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. Avz Minerals Ltd needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Metal Mining industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Avz Minerals Ltd may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Metal Mining sector.
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 Avz Minerals Ltd business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
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.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Avz Minerals Ltd has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Metal Mining industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Avz Minerals Ltd needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Metal Mining 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.
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. Avz Minerals Ltd 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
– Avz Minerals Ltd 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. Avz Minerals Ltd can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Metal Mining industry.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Metal Mining industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Avz Minerals Ltd 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 Avz Minerals Ltd
– 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 Avz Minerals Ltd.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Avz Minerals Ltd 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 Metal Mining industry.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Avz Minerals Ltd Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Avz Minerals Ltd 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 Avz Minerals Ltd 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 Avz Minerals Ltd 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 Avz Minerals Ltd 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 Avz Minerals Ltd needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.