Citizens, Inc. SWOT Analysis / Matrix

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SWOT analysis is a vital strategic planning tool that can be used by Citizens, Inc. managers to do a situational analysis of the firm . It is an important technique to analyze the present Strengths (S), Weakness (W), Opportunities (O) & Threats (T) Citizens, Inc. is facing in its current business environment.

The Citizens, Inc. is one of the leading firms in its industry. Citizens, Inc. maintains its prominent position in market by carefully analyzing and reviewing the SWOT analysis. SWOT analysis a highly interactive process and requires effective coordination among various departments within the firm such as – marketing, finance, operations, management information systems and strategic planning.

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The SWOT Analysis framework helps an organization to identify the internal strategic factors such as -strengths and weaknesses, & external strategic factors such as - opportunities and threats. It leads to a 2X2 matrix – also called SWOT Matrix.

The Strengths-Weaknesses-Opportunities-Threats (SWOT) Analysis / Matrix helps the managers of the Citizens, Inc. to develop four types of strategies:

SO (strengths-opportunities) Strategies
WO (weaknesses-opportunities) Strategies
ST (strengths-threats) Strategies
WT (weaknesses-threats) Strategies

SWOT Matrix Strategies Objective

The primary purpose of SWOT matrix is to identify the strategies that a firm can utilize to exploit external opportunities, counter threats, and build on & protect Citizens, Inc. strengths, and eradicate its weaknesses.

Step by Step Guide to Citizens, Inc. SWOT Analysis

Strengths of Citizens, Inc. – Internal Strategic Factors

As one of the leading firms in its industry, Citizens, Inc. has numerous strengths that enable it to thrive in the market place. These strengths not only help it to protect the market share in existing markets but also help in penetrating new markets. Based on Fern Fort University extensive research – some of the strengths of Citizens, Inc. are –

Read - Citizens, Inc. Porter 5 Forces Analysis & Industry Analysis
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Good Returns on Capital Expenditure – Citizens, Inc. is relatively successful at execution of new projects and generated good returns on capital expenditure by building new revenue streams.
Reliable suppliers – It has a strong base of reliable supplier of raw material thus enabling the company to overcome any supply chain bottlenecks.
Strong Brand Portfolio – Over the years Citizens, Inc. has invested in building a strong brand portfolio. The SWOT analysis of Citizens, Inc. just underlines this fact. This brand portfolio can be extremely useful if the organization wants to expand into new product categories.
Automation of activities brought consistency of quality to Citizens, Inc. products and has enabled the company to scale up and scale down based on the demand conditions in the market.
Successful track record of integrating complimentary firms through mergers & acquisition. It has successfully integrated number of technology companies in the past few years to streamline its operations and to build a reliable supply chain.
Highly successful at Go To Market strategies for its products.
Successful track record of developing new products – product innovation.
Strong distribution network – Over the years Citizens, Inc. has built a reliable distribution network that can reach majority of its potential market.

Weakness of Citizens, Inc. – Internal Strategic Factors

Weakness are the areas where Citizens, Inc. can improve upon. Strategy is about making choices and weakness are the areas where a firm can improve using SWOT analysis and build on its competitive advantage and strategic positioning.

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Days inventory is high compare to the competitors – making the company raise more capital to invest in the channel. This can impact the long term growth of Citizens, Inc.
There are gaps in the product range sold by the company. This lack of choice can give a new competitor a foothold in the market.
Limited success outside core business – Even though Citizens, Inc. is one of the leading organizations in its industry it has faced challenges in moving to other product segments with its present culture.
Not highly successful at integrating firms with different work culture. As mentioned earlier even though Citizens, Inc. is successful at integrating small companies it has its share of failure to merge firms that have different work culture.
Not very good at product demand forecasting leading to higher rate of missed opportunities compare to its competitors. One of the reason why the days inventory is high compare to its competitors is that Citizens, Inc. is not very good at demand forecasting thus end up keeping higher inventory both in-house and in channel.
The company has not being able to tackle the challenges present by the new entrants in the segment and has lost small market share in the niche categories. Citizens, Inc. has to build internal feedback mechanism directly from sales team on ground to counter these challenges.
Investment in Research and Development is below the fastest growing players in the industry. Even though Citizens, Inc. is spending above the industry average on Research and Development, it has not been able to compete with the leading players in the industry in terms of innovation. It has come across as a mature firm looking forward to bring out products based on tested features in the market.

Opportunities for Citizens, Inc. – External Strategic Factors

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New environmental policies – The new opportunities will create a level playing field for all the players in the industry. It represent a great opportunity for Citizens, Inc. to drive home its advantage in new technology and gain market share in the new product category.
The new technology provides an opportunity to Citizens, Inc. to practices differentiated pricing strategy in the new market. It will enable the firm to maintain its loyal customers with great service and lure new customers through other value oriented propositions.
Government green drive also opens an opportunity for procurement of Citizens, Inc. products by the state as well as federal government contractors.
New trends in the consumer behavior can open up new market for the Citizens, Inc. . It provides a great opportunity for the organization to build new revenue streams and diversify into new product categories too.
Opening up of new markets because of government agreement – the adoption of new technology standard and government free trade agreement has provided Citizens, Inc. an opportunity to enter a new emerging market.
Organization’s core competencies can be a success in similar other products field. A comparative example could be - GE healthcare research helped it in developing better Oil drilling machines.
The market development will lead to dilution of competitor’s advantage and enable Citizens, Inc. to increase its competitiveness compare to the other competitors.
Decreasing cost of transportation because of lower shipping prices can also bring down the cost of Citizens, Inc.’s products thus providing an opportunity to the company - either to boost its profitability or pass on the benefits to the customers to gain market share.

Threats Citizens, Inc. Facing - External Strategic Factors

Liability laws in different countries are different and Citizens, Inc. may be exposed to various liability claims given change in policies in those markets.
The company can face lawsuits in various markets given - different laws and continuous fluctuations regarding product standards in those markets.
Imitation of the counterfeit and low quality product is also a threat to Citizens, Inc.’s product especially in the emerging markets and low income markets.
Changing consumer buying behavior from online channel could be a threat to the existing physical infrastructure driven supply chain model.
New environment regulations under Paris agreement (2016) could be a threat to certain existing product categories .
New technologies developed by the competitor or market disruptor could be a serious threat to the industry in medium to long term future.
Rising raw material can pose a threat to the Citizens, Inc. profitability.
Shortage of skilled workforce in certain global market represents a threat to steady growth of profits for Citizens, Inc. in those markets.

Limitations of SWOT Analysis for Citizens, Inc.

Although the SWOT analysis is widely used as a strategic planning tool, the analysis does have its share of limitations.

Certain capabilities or factors of an organization can be both a strength and weakness at the same time. This is one of the major limitations of SWOT analysis . For example changing environmental regulations can be both a threat to company it can also be an opportunity in a sense that it will enable the company to be on a level playing field or at advantage to competitors if it able to develop the products faster than the competitors.
SWOT does not show how to achieve a competitive advantage, so it must not be an end in itself.
The matrix is only a starting point for a discussion on how proposed strategies could be implemented. It provided an evaluation window but not an implementation plan based on strategic competitiveness of Citizens, Inc.
SWOT is a static assessment - analysis of status quo with few prospective changes. As circumstances, capabilities, threats, and strategies change, the dynamics of a competitive environment may not be revealed in a single matrix.
SWOT analysis may lead the firm to overemphasize a single internal or external factor in formulating strategies. There are interrelationships among the key internal and external factors that SWOT does not reveal that may be important in devising strategies.

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Weighted SWOT Analysis of Citizens, Inc.

In light of the above mentioned limitations of the SWOT analysis / matrix, corporate managers decided to provide weightage to each internal strength and weakness of the firm. Organizations also assess the likelihood of events taking place in the coming future and how strong their impact could be on company's performance.

This method is called Weighted SWOT analysis. It is better than doing simplistic SWOT analysis because with Weighted SWOT Analysis Citizens, Inc. managers can focus on the most critical factors and discount the non-important one. It also solves the long list problem where organizations ends up making a long list but none of the factors deemed too critical.

Limitation of Weighted SWOT analysis of Citizens, Inc.

This approach also suffers from one major drawback - it focus on individual importance of factor rather than how they are collectively important and impact the business holistically.

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Example of Weighted SWOT Analysis

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SWOT Worksheet & Template

If you like to do your own SWOT analysis or want to make your own Weighted SWOT SWOT matrix then feel free to download Fern Fort University SWOT Analysis Template.

References / Citations & Bibliography

M. E. Porter, Competitive Strategy(New York: Free Press, 1980)
A. D. Chandler, Strategy and Structure (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1962)
O. E. Williamson, Markets and Hierarchies(New York: Free Press, 1975);
L. Wrigley, Divisional Autonomy and Diversification (PhD, Harvard Business School, 1970)
R. E. White, Generic Business Strategies, Organizational Context and Performance: An Empirical Investigation, Strategic Management Journal7 (1986)