The Usefulness of the SWOT Analysis

Discover new opportunities. Manage and eliminate threats. That's what SWOT is all about.

SWOT Analysis is a powerful technique for understanding your strengths and weaknesses, and for looking at the opportunities and threats you face.

The purpose of looking at strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats in Discipline VI. Step Back, is to get your leadership team to use their experience and judgement to begin narrowing the focus of planning toward the most important strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. The year's strategy should be based upon these.

BOTTOMLINE: The resulting SWOT statement is one of the primary input to Discipline I. Decide What's Important, where the same leadership team will begin to update the goals of the company for the next year -- as the Six Disciplines cycle begins again.