Strategic Analysis

SWOT is the heart of Strategic Analysis. SWOT analysis is the process of carefully inspecting the business and its environment through the various dimensions of Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats.

S = Strengths are the companies’ core competencies, and include proprietary technology, skills, resources, market position, patents, and others.

W = Weaknesses are conditions within the company that can lead to poor performance, and can include obsolete equipment, heavy debt burden, poor product or market image, weak management, and others.

O = Opportunities are outside conditions or circumstances that the company could turn to its advantage, and could include a specialty niche skill or technology that suddenly realizes a growth in broad market interest.

T = Threats are current or future conditions in the outside environment that may harm the company, and might include population shifts, purchasing preferences, new technologies, or an increase in competition.

As with most of the concepts presented in COMMON SENSE, SWOT in of itself will not give specific answers. Instead, it is a way to organize information and assign probabilities to potential events - both good and bad - as the basis for developing business strategy and operational plans.

Review your processes and procedures:
Corporate Structure
Organizational Structure
Competitors
Business Level Strategies
Corporate Strategies
Core Competencies

Assess Levels of:
Customer Satisfaction
Competitiveness
Productivity
Profitability

Which are strengths and which are competitive advantages?
Which are weaknesses and which are competitive disadvantages?

Shaping Your Strategy: It’s time to translate those strengths and weaknesses into business opportunities, once you’ve analyzed the current sustainability status of your company or business unit and developed a general sense of its strengths and weaknesses. Think strategically about your organization’s best position; think in terms of minimization and optimization.

Minimization means reducing the size of your footprint in terms of the adverse environmental, social and economic impacts of your activities. Minimization is aimed at reducing ecological damage, reducing employee accidents and decreasing harm to the community. Strategic Minimization:

Look for processes and procedures that generate waste.
Look for areas of stakeholder conflict.
Benchmark your company against others.

Optimization is “being more good.” We use the term to mean producing positive benefits in the three areas of environmental, social and economic impact. Optimization aims not just to reduce pollution but to restore the environment; not just to eliminate employee accidents but to create a healthier, happier workforce; not just to decrease harm to the community but to revitalize it. Strategic Optimization:

Push minimization efforts toward optimization.
Look for new product and service ideas that grow out of your sustainability efforts.
Look for new markets that are hidden in the margins of more obvious, traditional markets.

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