Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , King’s Flair Intl is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, technology disruption, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, increasing household debt because of falling income levels,
increasing energy prices, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of King’s Flair Intl
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that King’s Flair Intl can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the King’s Flair Intl, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which King’s Flair Intl 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 King’s Flair Intl can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of King’s Flair Intl
2. Improving business portfolio management of King’s Flair Intl
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Hong Kong
4. Making a Furniture & Fixtures sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of King’s Flair Intl
Strengths of King’s Flair Intl | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of King’s Flair Intl are -
Analytics focus
– King’s Flair Intl 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 Furniture & Fixtures industry. The technology infrastructure of Hong Kong 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 brand equity
– King’s Flair Intl has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled King’s Flair Intl to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Innovation driven organization
– King’s Flair Intl is one of the most innovative firm in Furniture & Fixtures sector.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy of King’s Flair Intl comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Furniture & Fixtures 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
– King’s Flair Intl is one of the leading players in the Furniture & Fixtures industry in Hong Kong. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in Hong Kong. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– King’s Flair Intl has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – King’s Flair Intl staying ahead in the Furniture & Fixtures industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of King’s Flair Intl in Furniture & Fixtures industry is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Learning organization
- King’s Flair Intl 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 King’s Flair Intl is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at King’s Flair Intl emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Highly skilled collaborators
– King’s Flair Intl has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Furniture & Fixtures industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of King’s Flair Intl have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Ability to lead change in Furniture & Fixtures
– King’s Flair Intl is one of the leading players in the Furniture & Fixtures industry in Hong Kong. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Furniture & Fixtures industry in Hong Kong but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled King’s Flair Intl in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Digital Transformation in Furniture & Fixtures industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For King’s Flair Intl digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. King’s Flair Intl 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.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that King’s Flair Intl 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 King’s Flair Intl | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of King’s Flair Intl are -
High dependence on King’s Flair Intl ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of King’s Flair Intl still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Furniture & Fixtures industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though King’s Flair Intl has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of King’s Flair Intl, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Furniture & Fixtures 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.
Products dominated business model
– Even though King’s Flair Intl has some of the most successful models in the Furniture & Fixtures industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. King’s Flair Intl should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, King’s Flair Intl has high operating costs in the Furniture & Fixtures industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract King’s Flair Intl lucrative customers.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the Furniture & Fixtures industry, King’s Flair Intl 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.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As King’s Flair Intl is one of the leading players in the Furniture & Fixtures industry, it takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the Furniture & Fixtures industry in last five years.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, King’s Flair Intl is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help King’s Flair Intl to provide better information regarding Furniture & Fixtures products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, King’s Flair Intl has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Furniture & Fixtures industry over the last five years. King’s Flair Intl 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.
Skills based hiring in Furniture & Fixtures industry
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at King’s Flair Intl 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that King’s Flair Intl needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Furniture & Fixtures industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at King’s Flair Intl can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as King’s Flair Intl is planning to shift buying processes online.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of King’s Flair Intl is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Furniture & Fixtures industry, but King’s Flair Intl needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help King’s Flair Intl to focus more on services in the Furniture & Fixtures industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
King’s Flair Intl Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of King’s Flair Intl are -
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– King’s Flair Intl has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Furniture & Fixtures sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled King’s Flair Intl to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help King’s Flair Intl to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, King’s Flair Intl is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. King’s Flair Intl can utilize new technology in the field of Furniture & Fixtures industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for King’s Flair Intl in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Furniture & Fixtures industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Buying journey improvements
– King’s Flair Intl can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Furniture & Fixtures 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.
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. King’s Flair Intl can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Loyalty marketing
– King’s Flair Intl 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of King’s Flair Intl has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Furniture & Fixtures industry. This can help King’s Flair Intl to build a more holistic ecosystem for King’s Flair Intl products in the Furniture & Fixtures industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– consumer behavior has changed in the Furniture & Fixtures industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. King’s Flair Intl 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. King’s Flair Intl 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Furniture & Fixtures industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. King’s Flair Intl can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, King’s Flair Intl 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, King’s Flair Intl can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that King’s Flair Intl operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Furniture & Fixtures sector.
Manufacturing automation
– King’s Flair Intl can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Furniture & Fixtures 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 King’s Flair Intl can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Threats King’s Flair Intl External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of King’s Flair Intl are -
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Furniture & Fixtures industry are lowering. It can presents King’s Flair Intl with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Furniture & Fixtures sector.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that King’s Flair Intl is facing in Furniture & Fixtures sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Consumer confidence and its impact on King’s Flair Intl 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 Furniture & Fixtures industry and other sectors.
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 King’s Flair Intl business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
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. King’s Flair Intl 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.
Environmental challenges
– King’s Flair Intl 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. King’s Flair Intl can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Furniture & Fixtures 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.
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. King’s Flair Intl needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Furniture & Fixtures 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, King’s Flair Intl may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Furniture & Fixtures sector.
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.
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 King’s Flair Intl in the Furniture & Fixtures sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– King’s Flair Intl has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Furniture & Fixtures industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, King’s Flair Intl needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Furniture & Fixtures 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.
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 King’s Flair Intl.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of King’s Flair Intl Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at King’s Flair Intl 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 King’s Flair Intl 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 King’s Flair Intl 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 King’s Flair Intl 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 King’s Flair Intl needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
