SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Mr Bricolage (France)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Mr Bricolage is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, increasing energy prices, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings,
digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, increasing commodity prices, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Mr Bricolage can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Mr Bricolage, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Mr Bricolage 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 Mr Bricolage can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Mr Bricolage
2. Improving business portfolio management of Mr Bricolage
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in France
4. Making a Retail (Home Improvement) sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Mr Bricolage
Strengths of Mr Bricolage | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Mr Bricolage are -
Analytics focus
– Mr Bricolage 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 (Home Improvement) 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Mr Bricolage is one of the leading players in the Retail (Home Improvement) 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.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Mr Bricolage 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.
Strong track record of project management in the Retail (Home Improvement) industry
– Mr Bricolage is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Mr Bricolage in the Services sector have low bargaining power. Mr Bricolage has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Mr Bricolage to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Organizational Resilience of Mr Bricolage
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Mr Bricolage does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Diverse revenue streams
– Mr Bricolage is present in almost all the verticals within the Retail (Home Improvement) industry. This has provided Mr Bricolage 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.
High brand equity
– Mr Bricolage has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Mr Bricolage to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Mr Bricolage in Retail (Home Improvement) industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Learning organization
- Mr Bricolage 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 Mr Bricolage is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Mr Bricolage emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Innovation driven organization
– Mr Bricolage is one of the most innovative firm in Retail (Home Improvement) sector.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Mr Bricolage has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Mr Bricolage staying ahead in the Retail (Home Improvement) industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Weaknesses of Mr Bricolage | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Mr Bricolage are -
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Mr Bricolage is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Mr Bricolage to provide better information regarding Retail (Home Improvement) products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Skills based hiring in Retail (Home Improvement) industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Mr Bricolage 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of France, Mr Bricolage needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
High dependence on Mr Bricolage ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of Mr Bricolage still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Retail (Home Improvement) industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Mr Bricolage has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Employees’ less understanding of Mr Bricolage strategy
– From the outside it seems that the employees of Mr Bricolage 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.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Mr Bricolage 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 to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Mr Bricolage is one of the leading players in the Retail (Home Improvement) industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Retail (Home Improvement) industry in last five years.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Mr Bricolage is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Retail (Home Improvement) industry, but Mr Bricolage needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Mr Bricolage to focus more on services in the Retail (Home Improvement) industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Retail (Home Improvement) industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in France, Mr Bricolage 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 (Home Improvement) industry.
High dependence on existing supply chain
– The disruption in the global supply chains because of the Covid-19 pandemic and blockage of the Suez Canal illustrated the fragile nature of Mr Bricolage supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Mr Bricolage is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Mr Bricolage vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that Mr Bricolage needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Retail (Home Improvement) industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Mr Bricolage can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Mr Bricolage is planning to shift buying processes online.
Mr Bricolage Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of Mr Bricolage are -
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Mr Bricolage 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Mr Bricolage can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Mr Bricolage to increase its market reach. Mr Bricolage 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– Mr Bricolage can develop new processes and procedures in Retail (Home Improvement) 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Mr Bricolage can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Retail (Home Improvement) 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.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Retail (Home Improvement) industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Mr Bricolage 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. Mr Bricolage 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Mr Bricolage can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Mr Bricolage operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Retail (Home Improvement) sector.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Mr Bricolage 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.
Reconfiguring business model
– The expansion of digital payment system, the bringing down of international transactions costs using Bitcoin and other blockchain based currencies, etc can help Mr Bricolage to reconfigure its entire business model. For example it can used blockchain based technologies to reduce piracy of its products in the big markets such as China. Secondly it can use the popularity of e-commerce in various developing markets to build a Direct to Customer business model rather than the current Channel Heavy distribution network.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Mr Bricolage is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Mr Bricolage can utilize new technology in the field of Retail (Home Improvement) 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 Mr Bricolage 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.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions in Retail (Home Improvement) industry
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Mr Bricolage in the Retail (Home Improvement) industry. Now Mr Bricolage can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Mr Bricolage has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Retail (Home Improvement) sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Mr Bricolage to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Mr Bricolage to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Threats Mr Bricolage External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of Mr Bricolage are -
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 Mr Bricolage 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 Retail (Home Improvement) industry and other sectors.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Mr Bricolage is facing in Retail (Home Improvement) sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
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 Mr Bricolage business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Environmental challenges
– Mr Bricolage 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. Mr Bricolage can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Retail (Home Improvement) industry.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Mr Bricolage 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 (Home Improvement) industry.
Regulatory challenges
– Mr Bricolage 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 (Home Improvement) industry regulations.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Mr Bricolage 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 acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Mr Bricolage has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Retail (Home Improvement) industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Mr Bricolage needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Retail (Home Improvement) 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.
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.
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. Mr Bricolage needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Retail (Home Improvement) 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, Mr Bricolage 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 (Home Improvement) sector.
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. Mr Bricolage 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 Mr Bricolage Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Mr Bricolage 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 Mr Bricolage 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 Mr Bricolage 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 Mr Bricolage 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 Mr Bricolage needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
