Strategic Planning Report on BCG Matrix and SWOT Analysis for Business

This report delves into the realm of strategic planning, emphasizing its crucial role in today's competitive business environment. It examines two key strategic planning tools: the BCG matrix and SWOT analysis, illustrating their application in achieving business objectives. The introduction defines strategic planning and highlights the significance of these tools. The report then elaborates on the BCG matrix, explaining its four categories (Dogs, Question Mark, Stars, and Cash Cows) and how it aids in portfolio management. It provides examples, such as Sainsbury's financial services. The report also explores SWOT analysis, detailing its components (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats) and their interplay with the internal and external environments. An example of Woolworths' SWOT is provided. The concept of strategic fit and stretch is also discussed. The conclusion underscores the value of strategic planning in guiding companies toward success. The report is well-referenced with academic sources.

STRATEGIC PLANNING
GENERAL FRAMEWORK

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
The present report was based on strategic planning which is very essential in this competitive
world. His is because the competition is very high and to meet this it is necessary for the
companies to manage their work in proper manner. Thus, the present report discussed the two
strategic planning tools and how they help in attaining the business objective on time. These
tools are BCG matrix and the SWOT analysis.

TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
BCG analysis in formulation of strategies..............................................................................3
SWOT analysis and concept of fit and stretch.......................................................................4
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................5
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................7

INTRODUCTION
Strategic planning is defined as the process through which the companies can plan their
strategies and how to go in direction for attaining the objectives (Smith, 2017). For the effective
strategic planning the role of two techniques that is BCG matrix and SWOT analysis will be
made. This is because this helps the company in providing direction which can lead to success.
BCG analysis in formulation of strategies
This is a strategic management tool which can be used by the company in order to plan
for long- term strategies which will help the company in management of portfolio of their
product and services. A company deals in a wide range of products and services and is very
necessary for them to manage in such a way that all the products and services are effectively
managed. This technique has four categories in which the product of companies falls. These are
discussed in the following points connected below-
Dogs- under this the products which have low growth or the low market share comes.
Here the companies need to remove the products which comes under this category. For dealing
with these products the strategic option can be liquidation or divestitures or retrenchment.
Question mark- this is the category in which the products which is having high growth
market but along with a low market share comes. For this category the company needs to invest
some money to increase their market share. The strategic option available for this category of
product are product development, market penetration and other.
Star products- these are the products which are high in growth market and is also having
high market share. Here the company needs to maintain and improve these products for success.
In case of star the strategic option available is vertical and horizontal integration, market
penetration, market development and many other strategies to retain the product in star category.
Cash cows- these are the products which has low growth market but high market share.
Here the company needs to take that much advantage of these products till there market share
decreases. Here the strategic option available can be diversification or product development
(Shanbhag, Dutt and Bagwe, 2016).
For example, for company Sainsbury the star product is the financial service strategic
business unit for the company which they need to maintain in order to maintain their
profitability. Also, the supplier management service of the company is the cash cow because they
do not have much effective supply management and thus, they need to improve this. For the

question mark and dogs comes the confectionery items and synthetic fibre products comes in
category of dogs.
SWOT analysis and concept of fit and stretch
This is another strategic planning technique which is helpful for companies in order to
identify their strengths and weakness for managing it with the changes taking place in the
environment (Chiu and Lin, 2019). This is a strategic technique which is used to analyse the
internal environment of the company and then in accordance to those points the company
identifies the opportunity and threats within the market. The factors comprising the SWOT
analysis are discussed in the following points connected below-
Strength- this is the factor which outlines all the capabilities and the areas in which the
company and its operations excels and are good. It is very necessary for the companies to
maintain all these capabilities and continuously try to upgrade these in accordance to the changes
in the external environment.
Weakness- these are the areas in which the company is lacking or is not having the
required amount of skills which they need to have to operate in competitive world. Here the
company need to work on improving the weakness so that they can be converted into strengths
and this assist the company in improving their performance.
Opportunities- these are the options which are present in the external environment and
which can improve the area of working of the company. These opportunities need to be
identified by the company in order to gain competitive advantage over the other companies.
Threats- these are the factors which may degrade or reduce the working capacity of the
company. This is majorly because of the fact that this pertains to the external factors which are
not in control of the company (Gürel and Tat, 2017). Thus, for dealing with the threat the
strengths will be helpful.
For example, the SWOT of Woolworths is as follows-
Strengths
 2nd largest retail chain in Australia.
 Deals in every diverse category and
also has presence in brick and mortar
and online selling.
Weakness
 Low inter- personal presence.
 Late entry in online marketing.
Opportunity Threats

 Growth in hotel and super market
sector.
 Use of loyalty programs in retaining
consumers.
 Use of social media for improving
CRM.
 Rising organic product pricing.
 Economic recession.
 Strong competition in international
market (Supply chain management
Woolworths, 2020).
From this SWOT of company, it can be analysed that this analysis helped the company in
critically analysing the company and knowing the positive and negative points of the company.
That is whether the company is able to meet the opportunity and threat present n the external
environment or not. For example, the opportunity is growth in hotel sector this can be grabbed by
company because it is the 2nd largest company and they can invest in going to other sectors also.
Strategic Fit and stretch
Strategic stretch- this is defined as the goal which cannot be attained because of variation in the
resources required and the resources which are present with the company (Phadermrod, Crowder
and Wills, 2019).
Strategic fit- this is the degree to which the company is able to match all the requirements of
meeting the opportunity with the present resources and the capabilities. Here the company is fit
that is having the resources required to meet the goals and the strategy.
CONCLUSION
In the end of the report it can be concluded that using the strategic planning is very
helpful for the company in attaining success. This is because of the reason that this planning
provides a direction to the company in which they can move and attain all objectives. The
present report discussed the two strategic planning tools that is BCG matrix and SWOT analysis
and how it helped in management of portfolio of product and services.

REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Chiu, C.C. and Lin, K.S., 2019, July. Rule-Based BCG Matrix for Product Portfolio Analysis.
In International Conference on Software Engineering, Artificial Intelligence, Networking
and Parallel/Distributed Computing (pp. 17-32). Springer, Cham.
Gürel, E. and Tat, M., 2017. SWOT analysis: a theoretical review. Journal of International
Social Research. 10(51).
Phadermrod, B., Crowder, R.M. and Wills, G.B., 2019. Importance-performance analysis based
SWOT analysis. International Journal of Information Management. 44. pp.194-203.
Shanbhag, M., Dutt, M.L. and Bagwe, S., 2016. Strategic talent management: A conceptual
analysis of BCG model. Imperial Journal of Interdisciplinary Research. 2(7). pp.552-
556.
Smith, R.D., 2017. Strategic planning for public relations. Routledge.
Online
Supply chain management Woolworths. 2020. [Online]. Available through: <
https://slideplayer.com/slide/14822151/>