SWOT Analysis
As part of your annual planning process it is a good time to conduct a self-assessment of your company. This can be done in the form of a SWOT analysis – Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats. Assessing each of these key attributes can provide insight into your company’s strategic performance.
Strengths are what your company is really good at. Some strengths can be viewed as core competencies. Strengths may include industry leadership, management capability, technological advantage, employee expertise, etc. Leveraging strengths can lead to sustainable strategic advantage. Weaknesses or limitations are areas where you might be vulnerable in the marketplace or to competition. Sometimes, weaknesses are the inverse of strengths, e.g. the technology that you are employing may be coming obsolete as competitors are investing in more state of the art technology.
Opportunities present themselves based on changes in the competitive environment, market place, changes in regulations, patents, etc. Likewise, threats may surface as a result of increased government regulation, a soft economy, new entrants in the marketplace with substitute products, etc.
Conducting a SWOT analysis on a periodic basis as part of your planning process will ensure that you are formulating strategies that will make you a long term player in the marketplace.