SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Beijing Cuiwei Tower (China)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Beijing Cuiwei Tower is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – there is backlash against globalization, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, wage bills are increasing, increasing energy prices, 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%, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic ,
increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, increasing transportation and logistics costs, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Beijing Cuiwei Tower
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Beijing Cuiwei Tower can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Beijing Cuiwei Tower, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Beijing Cuiwei Tower 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 Beijing Cuiwei Tower can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Beijing Cuiwei Tower
2. Improving business portfolio management of Beijing Cuiwei Tower
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in China
4. Making a Retail (Department & Discount) sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Beijing Cuiwei Tower
Strengths of Beijing Cuiwei Tower | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Beijing Cuiwei Tower are -
Learning organization
- Beijing Cuiwei Tower 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 Beijing Cuiwei Tower is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Beijing Cuiwei Tower emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Beijing Cuiwei Tower in Retail (Department & Discount) industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Diverse revenue streams
– Beijing Cuiwei Tower is present in almost all the verticals within the Retail (Department & Discount) industry. This has provided Beijing Cuiwei Tower 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
– Beijing Cuiwei Tower is one of the leading players in the Retail (Department & Discount) industry in China. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in China. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Organizational Resilience of Beijing Cuiwei Tower
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Beijing Cuiwei Tower does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Retail (Department & Discount) industry
– Beijing Cuiwei Tower has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Beijing Cuiwei Tower to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Retail (Department & Discount) industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Beijing Cuiwei Tower to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Beijing Cuiwei Tower in the Services sector have low bargaining power. Beijing Cuiwei Tower has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Beijing Cuiwei Tower to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Beijing Cuiwei Tower has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Beijing Cuiwei Tower 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.
Training and development
– Beijing Cuiwei Tower has one of the best training and development program in Services 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.
High brand equity
– Beijing Cuiwei Tower has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Beijing Cuiwei Tower to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Analytics focus
– Beijing Cuiwei Tower 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 Retail (Department & Discount) industry. The technology infrastructure of China 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.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Beijing Cuiwei Tower 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.
Weaknesses of Beijing Cuiwei Tower | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Beijing Cuiwei Tower are -
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Beijing Cuiwei Tower needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Retail (Department & Discount) industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Beijing Cuiwei Tower can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Beijing Cuiwei Tower is planning to shift buying processes online.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Beijing Cuiwei Tower, in the dynamic environment of Retail (Department & Discount) industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Beijing Cuiwei Tower has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Retail (Department & Discount) industry, Beijing Cuiwei Tower 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.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Beijing Cuiwei Tower has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Retail (Department & Discount) industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
High dependence on Beijing Cuiwei Tower ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Beijing Cuiwei Tower still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Retail (Department & Discount) industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Beijing Cuiwei Tower has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Beijing Cuiwei Tower is just above the Retail (Department & Discount) 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 Beijing Cuiwei Tower strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Beijing Cuiwei Tower 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.
Skills based hiring in Retail (Department & Discount) industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Beijing Cuiwei Tower 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Beijing Cuiwei Tower is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Retail (Department & Discount) industry, but Beijing Cuiwei Tower needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Beijing Cuiwei Tower to focus more on services in the Retail (Department & Discount) industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Retail (Department & Discount) industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in China, Beijing Cuiwei Tower 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 Retail (Department & Discount) industry.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Beijing Cuiwei Tower has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Retail (Department & Discount) industry over the last five years. Beijing Cuiwei Tower 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.
Beijing Cuiwei Tower Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Beijing Cuiwei Tower are -
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Beijing Cuiwei Tower in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Retail (Department & Discount) industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Beijing Cuiwei Tower 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Beijing Cuiwei Tower is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Beijing Cuiwei Tower can utilize new technology in the field of Retail (Department & Discount) industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Beijing Cuiwei Tower 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.
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. Beijing Cuiwei Tower can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Beijing Cuiwei Tower to increase its market reach. Beijing Cuiwei Tower 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Beijing Cuiwei Tower has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Retail (Department & Discount) sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Beijing Cuiwei Tower to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Beijing Cuiwei Tower to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Buying journey improvements
– Beijing Cuiwei Tower can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Retail (Department & Discount) 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
– Beijing Cuiwei Tower 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.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Retail (Department & Discount) industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Beijing Cuiwei Tower 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. Beijing Cuiwei Tower 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Beijing Cuiwei Tower has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Retail (Department & Discount) industry. This can help Beijing Cuiwei Tower to build a more holistic ecosystem for Beijing Cuiwei Tower products in the Retail (Department & Discount) industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Manufacturing automation
– Beijing Cuiwei Tower can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Retail (Department & Discount) 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Beijing Cuiwei Tower can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Threats Beijing Cuiwei Tower External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Beijing Cuiwei Tower are -
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. Beijing Cuiwei Tower needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Retail (Department & Discount) industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
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 Beijing Cuiwei Tower 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.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Beijing Cuiwei Tower may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Retail (Department & Discount) sector.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Beijing Cuiwei Tower is facing in Retail (Department & Discount) sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Environmental challenges
– Beijing Cuiwei Tower 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. Beijing Cuiwei Tower can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Retail (Department & Discount) industry.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Beijing Cuiwei Tower 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 Retail (Department & Discount) industry.
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.
Regulatory challenges
– Beijing Cuiwei Tower 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 Retail (Department & Discount) industry regulations.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Beijing Cuiwei Tower 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.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Beijing Cuiwei Tower in Retail (Department & Discount) industry. The Retail (Department & Discount) 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.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Beijing Cuiwei Tower has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Retail (Department & Discount) industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Beijing Cuiwei Tower needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Retail (Department & Discount) 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. Beijing Cuiwei Tower 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Beijing Cuiwei Tower Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Beijing Cuiwei Tower 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 Beijing Cuiwei Tower 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 Beijing Cuiwei Tower 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 Beijing Cuiwei Tower 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 Beijing Cuiwei Tower needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.