Garda Capital Group SWOT Analysis / Matrix

Business Essays, Term Papers & Research Papers

SWOT analysis is a strategic planning tool that can be used by Garda Capital Group managers to do a situational analysis of the organization . It is a handy technique to map out the present Strengths (S), Weakness (W), Opportunities (O) & Threats (T) Garda Capital Group is facing in its current business environment.

The Garda Capital Group is one of the leading organizatations in its industry. Garda Capital Group 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 company such as – marketing, finance, operations, management information systems and strategic planning.


Order Now - Garda Capital Group SWOT Analysis
Check out- Garda Capital Group PESTEL / PEST & Environment Analysis
Article continues after advertisement


The SWOT Analysis framework enables 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 known as SWOT Matrix.

The Strengths-Weaknesses-Opportunities-Threats (SWOT) Analysis / Matrix helps the managers of the Garda Capital Group 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 central purpose of SWOT matrix is to identify the strategies that a company can utilize to exploit external opportunities, counter threats, and build on & protect Garda Capital Group strengths, and eradicate its weaknesses.

Step by Step Guide to Garda Capital Group SWOT Analysis

Strengths of Garda Capital Group – Internal Strategic Factors

As one of the leading firms in its industry, Garda Capital Group 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 Garda Capital Group are –

Read - Garda Capital Group Porter 5 Forces Analysis & Industry Analysis
Article continues after advertisement

• Strong distribution network – Over the years Garda Capital Group has built a reliable distribution network that can reach majority of its potential market.
• Strong dealer community – It has built a culture among distributor & dealers where the dealers not only promote company’s products but also invest in training the sales team to explain to the customer how he/she can extract the maximum benefits out of the products.
• Successful track record of developing new products – product innovation.
• Highly successful at Go To Market strategies for its products.
• Superb Performance in New Markets – Garda Capital Group has built expertise at entering new markets and making success of them. The expansion has helped the organization to build new revenue stream and diversify the economic cycle risk in the markets it operates in.
• Reliable suppliers – It has a strong base of reliable supplier of raw material thus enabling the company to overcome any supply chain bottlenecks.
• Good Returns on Capital Expenditure – Garda Capital Group is relatively successful at execution of new projects and generated good returns on capital expenditure by building new revenue streams.
• Highly skilled workforce through successful training and learning programs. Garda Capital Group is investing huge resources in training and development of its employees resulting in a workforce that is not only highly skilled but also motivated to achieve more.

---

Weakness of Garda Capital Group – Internal Strategic Factors

Weakness are the areas where Garda Capital Group can improve upon. Strategy is about making choices and weakness are the areas where a company can improve using SWOT analysis and build on its competitive advantage and strategic positioning.

Article continues after advertisement

• 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. Garda Capital Group has to build internal feedback mechanism directly from sales team on ground to counter these challenges.
• Limited success outside core business – Even though Garda Capital Group is one of the leading organizations in its industry it has faced challenges in moving to other product segments with its present culture.
• 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.
• 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 Garda Capital Group is not very good at demand forecasting thus end up keeping higher inventory both in-house and in channel.
• Financial planning is not done properly and efficiently. The current asset ratio and liquid asset ratios suggest that the company can use the cash more efficiently than what it is doing at present.
• The profitability ratio and Net Contribution % of Garda Capital Group are below the industry average.
• The marketing of the products left a lot to be desired. Even though the product is a success in terms of sale but its positioning and unique selling proposition is not clearly defined which can lead to the attacks in this segment from the competitors.

Opportunities for Garda Capital Group – External Strategic Factors

Article continues after advertisement

• Decreasing cost of transportation because of lower shipping prices can also bring down the cost of Garda Capital Group’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.
• Economic uptick and increase in customer spending, after years of recession and slow growth rate in the industry, is an opportunity for Garda Capital Group to capture new customers and increase its market share.
• Government green drive also opens an opportunity for procurement of Garda Capital Group products by the state as well as federal government contractors.
• New customers from online channel – Over the past few years the company has invested vast sum of money into the online platform. This investment has opened new sales channel for Garda Capital Group. In the next few years the company can leverage this opportunity by knowing its customer better and serving their needs using big data analytics.
• Stable free cash flow provides opportunities to invest in adjacent product segments. With more cash in bank the company can invest in new technologies as well as in new products segments. This should open a window of opportunity for Garda Capital Group in other product categories.
• The new taxation policy can significantly impact the way of doing business and can open new opportunity for established players such as Garda Capital Group to increase its profitability.
• Opening up of new markets because of government agreement – the adoption of new technology standard and government free trade agreement has provided Garda Capital Group an opportunity to enter a new emerging market.
• 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 Garda Capital Group to drive home its advantage in new technology and gain market share in the new product category.

Threats Garda Capital Group Facing - External Strategic Factors

• Imitation of the counterfeit and low quality product is also a threat to Garda Capital Group’s product especially in the emerging markets and low income markets.
• The company can face lawsuits in various markets given - different laws and continuous fluctuations regarding product standards in those markets.
• Liability laws in different countries are different and Garda Capital Group may be exposed to various liability claims given change in policies in those markets.
• As the company is operating in numerous countries it is exposed to currency fluctuations especially given the volatile political climate in number of markets across the world.
• Rising raw material can pose a threat to the Garda Capital Group profitability.
• Growing strengths of local distributors also presents a threat in some markets as the competition is paying higher margins to the local distributors.
• Intense competition – Stable profitability has increased the number of players in the industry over last two years which has put downward pressure on not only profitability but also on overall sales.
• No regular supply of innovative products – Over the years the company has developed numerous products but those are often response to the development by other players. Secondly the supply of new products is not regular thus leading to high and low swings in the sales number over period of time.

Limitations of SWOT Analysis for Garda Capital Group

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 Garda Capital Group
• 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.

Article continues after advertisement

Weighted SWOT Analysis of Garda Capital Group

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 Garda Capital Group 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 Garda Capital Group

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.

Buy Custom Essay and Term Paper on SWOT Analysis / Matrix , Weighted SWOT Analysis of Garda Capital Group

Example of Weighted SWOT Analysis

You can email us to get an example document of Weighted SWOT analysis.

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)