Salt Lake Potash (SO4) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Coal
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Salt Lake Potash (Australia)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Salt Lake Potash is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, technology disruption, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, geopolitical disruptions, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, increasing energy prices,
banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Salt Lake Potash can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Salt Lake Potash, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Salt Lake Potash 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 Salt Lake Potash can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Salt Lake Potash
2. Improving business portfolio management of Salt Lake Potash
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Australia
4. Making a Coal sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Salt Lake Potash
Strengths of Salt Lake Potash | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Salt Lake Potash are -
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Salt Lake Potash 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Salt Lake Potash is present in almost all the verticals within the Coal industry. This has provided Salt Lake Potash a diverse revenue stream that has helped it to survive disruptions such as global pandemic in Covid-19, financial disruption of 2008, and supply chain disruption of 2021.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Salt Lake Potash comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Coal 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Salt Lake Potash is one of the leading players in the Coal 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.
Learning organization
- Salt Lake Potash 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 Salt Lake Potash is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Salt Lake Potash emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Salt Lake Potash has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Salt Lake Potash 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Salt Lake Potash in Coal industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
High brand equity
– Salt Lake Potash has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Salt Lake Potash to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Strong track record of project management in the Coal industry
– Salt Lake Potash is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Digital Transformation in Coal industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Salt Lake Potash digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Salt Lake Potash 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.
Analytics focus
– Salt Lake Potash 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 Coal 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Coal industry
– Salt Lake Potash has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Salt Lake Potash to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Coal industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Salt Lake Potash to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Weaknesses of Salt Lake Potash | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Salt Lake Potash are -
Employees’ less understanding of Salt Lake Potash strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Salt Lake Potash 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.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Salt Lake Potash is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Salt Lake Potash to provide better information regarding Coal products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Salt Lake Potash, in the dynamic environment of Coal industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Salt Lake Potash has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Salt Lake Potash has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Coal industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Salt Lake Potash is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Coal industry, but Salt Lake Potash needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Salt Lake Potash to focus more on services in the Coal industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Skills based hiring in Coal industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Salt Lake Potash 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.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of Salt Lake Potash is just above the Coal industry average. It needs to redesign the compensation structure and incentives to increase the revenue per employees. Some of the steps that it can take are – hiring more specialists on project basis, etc.
High dependence on Salt Lake Potash ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Salt Lake Potash still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Coal industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Salt Lake Potash has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Lack of clear differentiation of Salt Lake Potash products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Salt Lake Potash needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Salt Lake Potash 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.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Coal industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in Australia, Salt Lake Potash 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 Coal industry.
Salt Lake Potash Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Salt Lake Potash are -
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Salt Lake Potash can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Salt Lake Potash can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Salt Lake Potash operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Coal sector.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Salt Lake Potash in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Coal industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Salt Lake Potash has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Coal sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Salt Lake Potash to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Salt Lake Potash to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Developing new processes and practices
– Salt Lake Potash can develop new processes and procedures in Coal 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.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Coal industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Salt Lake Potash 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. Salt Lake Potash 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Salt Lake Potash is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Salt Lake Potash can utilize new technology in the field of Coal 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 Salt Lake Potash 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
– Salt Lake Potash can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Coal 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.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Salt Lake Potash 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 Coal industry.
Loyalty marketing
– Salt Lake Potash 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Salt Lake Potash 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Salt Lake Potash to increase its market reach. Salt Lake Potash 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.
Threats Salt Lake Potash External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Salt Lake Potash 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 Salt Lake Potash.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Salt Lake Potash 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 Coal 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 Salt Lake Potash in the Coal sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Salt Lake Potash in Coal industry. The Coal 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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Coal industry are lowering. It can presents Salt Lake Potash with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Coal sector.
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.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Salt Lake Potash may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Coal sector.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Salt Lake Potash 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.
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
– Salt Lake Potash 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. Salt Lake Potash can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Coal industry.
Regulatory challenges
– Salt Lake Potash 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 Coal industry regulations.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Salt Lake Potash is facing in Coal sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Coal industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Salt Lake Potash can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Salt Lake Potash Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Salt Lake Potash 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 Salt Lake Potash 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 Salt Lake Potash 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 Salt Lake Potash 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 Salt Lake Potash needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
