SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for CRCAM Atlantique (France)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , CRCAM Atlantique is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, wage bills are increasing, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, technology disruption, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, there is increasing trade war between United States & China,
challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, increasing transportation and logistics costs, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that CRCAM Atlantique can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the CRCAM Atlantique, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which CRCAM Atlantique 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 CRCAM Atlantique can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of CRCAM Atlantique
2. Improving business portfolio management of CRCAM Atlantique
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in France
4. Making a Regional Banks sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of CRCAM Atlantique
Strengths of CRCAM Atlantique | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of CRCAM Atlantique are -
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– CRCAM Atlantique has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – CRCAM Atlantique staying ahead in the Regional Banks industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Organizational Resilience of CRCAM Atlantique
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing CRCAM Atlantique does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Successful track record of launching new products
– CRCAM Atlantique has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. CRCAM Atlantique 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 CRCAM Atlantique in Regional Banks industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of CRCAM Atlantique in the Financial sector have low bargaining power. CRCAM Atlantique has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps CRCAM Atlantique to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Learning organization
- CRCAM Atlantique 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 CRCAM Atlantique is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at CRCAM Atlantique emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Ability to recruit top talent
– CRCAM Atlantique is one of the leading players in the Regional Banks industry in France. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in France. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Analytics focus
– CRCAM Atlantique 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 Regional Banks industry. The technology infrastructure of France 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.
Innovation driven organization
– CRCAM Atlantique is one of the most innovative firm in Regional Banks sector.
Diverse revenue streams
– CRCAM Atlantique is present in almost all the verticals within the Regional Banks industry. This has provided CRCAM Atlantique 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.
Highly skilled collaborators
– CRCAM Atlantique has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Regional Banks industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of CRCAM Atlantique have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the CRCAM Atlantique 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.
Weaknesses of CRCAM Atlantique | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of CRCAM Atlantique are -
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee of CRCAM Atlantique is just above the Regional Banks 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
CRCAM Atlantique has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Regional Banks industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of France, CRCAM Atlantique needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, CRCAM Atlantique has high operating costs in the Regional Banks industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract CRCAM Atlantique lucrative customers.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Regional Banks industry, CRCAM Atlantique 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that CRCAM Atlantique needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Regional Banks industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at CRCAM Atlantique can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as CRCAM Atlantique is planning to shift buying processes online.
High dependence on CRCAM Atlantique ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of CRCAM Atlantique still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Regional Banks industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though CRCAM Atlantique has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Need for greater diversity
– CRCAM Atlantique 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.
Employees’ less understanding of CRCAM Atlantique strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of CRCAM Atlantique 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 Regional Banks industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at CRCAM Atlantique 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.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of CRCAM Atlantique, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Regional Banks industry. But it has very little resources allocation to manage the risks emerging from events such as natural disasters, climate change, melting of permafrost, tacking the rise of artificial intelligence, opportunities and threats emerging from commercialization of space etc.
CRCAM Atlantique Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of CRCAM Atlantique are -
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help CRCAM Atlantique to increase its market reach. CRCAM Atlantique 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.
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. CRCAM Atlantique can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Regional Banks industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. CRCAM Atlantique can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Loyalty marketing
– CRCAM Atlantique 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.
Buying journey improvements
– CRCAM Atlantique can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Regional Banks 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, CRCAM Atlantique is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. CRCAM Atlantique can utilize new technology in the field of Regional Banks industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, CRCAM Atlantique 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.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, CRCAM Atlantique 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 CRCAM Atlantique to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Regional Banks industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for CRCAM Atlantique in the Regional Banks industry. Now CRCAM Atlantique 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 Regional Banks industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. CRCAM Atlantique 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. CRCAM Atlantique 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for CRCAM Atlantique 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 CRCAM Atlantique to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects CRCAM Atlantique can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Manufacturing automation
– CRCAM Atlantique can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Regional Banks 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.
Threats CRCAM Atlantique External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of CRCAM Atlantique 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. CRCAM Atlantique needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Regional Banks industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
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.
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. CRCAM Atlantique 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.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, CRCAM Atlantique 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 CRCAM Atlantique prominent markets.
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 CRCAM Atlantique.
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.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Regional Banks industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. CRCAM Atlantique 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 CRCAM Atlantique
– 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 CRCAM Atlantique.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that CRCAM Atlantique is facing in Regional Banks sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– CRCAM Atlantique 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 Regional Banks industry.
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 CRCAM Atlantique business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Consumer confidence and its impact on CRCAM Atlantique 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 Regional Banks industry and other sectors.
Environmental challenges
– CRCAM Atlantique 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. CRCAM Atlantique can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Regional Banks industry.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of CRCAM Atlantique Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at CRCAM Atlantique 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 CRCAM Atlantique 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 CRCAM Atlantique 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 CRCAM Atlantique 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 CRCAM Atlantique needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.