Your analysis thus far, you have come to understand your organization, its industry, and identified key competitors. Your team has compiled what you believe to be the key internal Strengths and Weaknesses of your organization as well as what your team believes to be the key external Opportunities and Threats facing your organization. This work has culminated in the development of both the internal and external evaluation matrixes. The next step is to begin crafting strategies.
We can never consider all feasible alternatives that could benefit our organization; there are just too many possibilities to consider everything. Our goal is to develop a manageable set of attractive alternative strategies, examine each strategy in turn, and select what we believe to be the best strategy for our organization. The first tool we will use to accomplish this task is the SWOT matrix (we will discuss this in detail during class).
Strengths-Weaknesses-Opportunities-Threats (SWOT) Matrix
For this assignment, you are required to complete the Strengths-Weaknesses-Opportunities-Threats (SWOT) Matrix. The SWOT matrix is a matching tool that helps you to develop strategies by matching your identified SWOT factors and creating strategies that bridge those factors together. This assignment requires you to think in terms of the Triple Bottom Line. The strategies you develop will seek to improve organizational performance along the interrelated dimensions of economic, environmental, and social dimensions; profits, people and the planet. Be sure to reference all SWOT factors that correlate to each of your strategies.
Specifically, you will develop a SWOT matrix consisting of a minimum of six (6) strategies with at least one (1) strategy emerging from each of the following four categories:
- SO (strengths-opportunities) Strategies
- WO (weaknesses-opportunities) Strategies
- ST (strengths-threats) Strategies
- WT (weaknesses-threats) Strategies
SO (strengths- opportunities) strategies use a firm’s internal strengths to take advantage of external opportunities. Organizations generally will pursue WO, ST, or WT strategies to get into a situation in which they can apply SO strategies. When a firm has major weaknesses, it will strive to overcome them and make them strengths. When an organization faces major threats, it will seek to avoid them to concentrate on opportunities.
WO (weaknesses- opportunities) strategies aim at improving internal weaknesses by taking advantage of external opportunities. Sometimes key external opportunities exist, but a firm has internal weaknesses that prevent it from exploiting those opportunities so a firm will work to improve an internal weakness in an effort to turn their weakness into a strength that can then be sued to take advantage of an opportunity.
ST (strengths- threats) strategies use a firm’s strengths to avoid or reduce the impact of external threats.
WT (weaknesses- threats) strategies are defensive tactics directed at reducing internal weakness and avoiding external threats