SWOT offers professional managers an effective evaluative technique to aid the decision making process.

It can not find the solution for you, but it will ensure that issues are identified, classified and prioritised clearly, showing the problem in terms of key underlying issues. Decision makers can then see the answer.

How does SWOT analysis work?

The strategy is to look at the organisations current performance (strengths and weaknesses) and factors in the external environment (opportunities and threats) that might affect the organisations future.

Once the attributes for each section have been identified it is possible to determine the point of balance. Eventually the points of balance of strengths versus weaknesses and opportunities versus threats can be plotted together.

strengths	versus	weaknesses
	and
opportunities	versus	threats

The results will show the optimal direction to take to progress, by building on strengths and taking opportunities, whilst eliminating weaknesses and threats.

Why use the SWOT software?

Achieve a higher standard of managerial performance by using it to:

• assess a situation and provide a clear formulation of the problem
• compare alternatives
• identify opportunities which can be ‘maximised’ to make the most of the organisations resources
• analyse past failures
• identify the relevant key facts to focus on and prioritise issues
• take you through the whole decision making process in an orderly way
• take a complex problem through to a new level of sophistication and professional analysis
• ensure complex ideas are stored and presented logically