Voyageurs du Monde SA (ALVDM) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources
Personal Services
Strategy / MBA Resources
Introduction to SWOT Analysis
SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Voyageurs du Monde SA (France)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Voyageurs du Monde SA is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, increasing transportation and logistics costs, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, there is backlash against globalization, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google,
competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Voyageurs du Monde SA
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Voyageurs du Monde SA can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Voyageurs du Monde SA, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Voyageurs du Monde SA 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 Voyageurs du Monde SA can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Voyageurs du Monde SA
2. Improving business portfolio management of Voyageurs du Monde SA
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in France
4. Making a Personal Services sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Voyageurs du Monde SA
Strengths of Voyageurs du Monde SA | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Voyageurs du Monde SA are -
Ability to lead change in Personal Services
– Voyageurs du Monde SA is one of the leading players in the Personal Services industry in France. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Personal Services industry in France but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled Voyageurs du Monde SA in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Voyageurs du Monde SA 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Voyageurs du Monde SA has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Personal Services industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of Voyageurs du Monde SA have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of Voyageurs du Monde SA comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Personal Services 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.
Strong track record of project management in the Personal Services industry
– Voyageurs du Monde SA is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Voyageurs du Monde SA has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Voyageurs du Monde SA staying ahead in the Personal Services industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
High brand equity
– Voyageurs du Monde SA has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Voyageurs du Monde SA to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Digital Transformation in Personal Services industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Voyageurs du Monde SA digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Voyageurs du Monde SA 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Voyageurs du Monde SA in Personal Services industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Organizational Resilience of Voyageurs du Monde SA
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Voyageurs du Monde SA does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Training and development
– Voyageurs du Monde SA 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.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Voyageurs du Monde SA has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Voyageurs du Monde SA 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.
Weaknesses of Voyageurs du Monde SA | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Voyageurs du Monde SA are -
Lack of clear differentiation of Voyageurs du Monde SA products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Voyageurs du Monde SA needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Need for greater diversity
– Voyageurs du Monde SA 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 dependence on Voyageurs du Monde SA ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Voyageurs du Monde SA still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Personal Services industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Voyageurs du Monde SA has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Voyageurs du Monde SA is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Voyageurs du Monde SA to provide better information regarding Personal Services products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Voyageurs du Monde SA has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Personal Services 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 operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, Voyageurs du Monde SA has high operating costs in the Personal Services industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Voyageurs du Monde SA lucrative customers.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Personal Services industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in France, Voyageurs du Monde SA 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 Personal Services industry.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative at Voyageurs du Monde SA, in the dynamic environment of Personal Services industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Voyageurs du Monde SA has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of France, Voyageurs du Monde SA needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Skills based hiring in Personal Services industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Voyageurs du Monde SA 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 Voyageurs du Monde SA is just above the Personal Services 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.
Voyageurs du Monde SA Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Voyageurs du Monde SA are -
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Voyageurs du Monde SA 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 Personal Services industry.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Voyageurs du Monde SA has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Personal Services sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Voyageurs du Monde SA to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Voyageurs du Monde SA 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 Voyageurs du Monde SA 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 Voyageurs du Monde SA to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Voyageurs du Monde SA is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Voyageurs du Monde SA can utilize new technology in the field of Personal Services industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
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. Voyageurs du Monde SA can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Voyageurs du Monde SA 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Voyageurs du Monde SA can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Voyageurs du Monde SA operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Personal Services sector.
Buying journey improvements
– Voyageurs du Monde SA can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Personal Services 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Personal Services industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Voyageurs du Monde SA can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Voyageurs du Monde SA 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.
Manufacturing automation
– Voyageurs du Monde SA can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Personal Services 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 Personal Services industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Voyageurs du Monde SA in the Personal Services industry. Now Voyageurs du Monde SA can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Loyalty marketing
– Voyageurs du Monde SA 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.
Threats Voyageurs du Monde SA External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Voyageurs du Monde SA are -
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Personal Services industry are lowering. It can presents Voyageurs du Monde SA with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Personal Services sector.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Voyageurs du Monde SA has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Personal Services industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Voyageurs du Monde SA needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Personal Services 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.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Voyageurs du Monde SA in Personal Services industry. The Personal Services 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.
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.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Voyageurs du Monde SA 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 Voyageurs du Monde SA prominent markets.
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. Voyageurs du Monde SA needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Personal Services industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Voyageurs du Monde SA is facing in Personal Services 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 Personal Services industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Voyageurs du Monde SA can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Regulatory challenges
– Voyageurs du Monde SA 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 Personal Services industry regulations.
Increasing wage structure of Voyageurs du Monde SA
– 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 Voyageurs du Monde SA.
Environmental challenges
– Voyageurs du Monde SA 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. Voyageurs du Monde SA can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Personal Services industry.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Voyageurs du Monde SA may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Personal Services sector.
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 Voyageurs du Monde SA in the Personal Services sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Voyageurs du Monde SA Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Voyageurs du Monde SA 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 Voyageurs du Monde SA 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 Voyageurs du Monde SA 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 Voyageurs du Monde SA 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 Voyageurs du Monde SA needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.