SWOT analysis is important for any business. Although this type of analysis is helpful for businesses or companies in general, it is also helpful for employees in particular. The great thing about SWOT analysis is that it studies both internal and external factors, making it a very effective business tool.
To help you create an effective SWOT analysis, we have provided some examples that can help you formulate your own employee SWOT analysis.
The SWOT in SWOT analysis stands for strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. As previously mentioned, SWOT analyzes both the internal and external environment of a business organization. Strengths and weaknesses focus on the internal environment while opportunities and threats focus on the external environment. You may also see SWOT analysis worksheet examples.
The reason why strengths and weaknesses are used for the internal environment is that a company cannot control the external environment, and although the external environment cannot be fully controlled, it can nonetheless provide opportunities and threats. You may also like personal SWOT analysis examples.
When done correctly, detailed SWOT analysis is very helpful as it provided a very detailed and comprehensive analysis. SWOT analysis is a tried and tested strategic tool used not only by large corporations but also public institutions such as schools or universities, government offices or bureaus, and hospitals, to name a few.
Every company, even the largest (i.e., Microsoft, Google, Amazon, etc.), has a finite supply of manpower, production capacity, and capital. Finding and evaluating the company’s strengths helps it determine how to allocate these resources that will result in the highest possible potential for profitability and sustainability. You may also check out hospital SWOT analysis examples.
When the management team looks at the company’s weaknesses, it is not to blame people in the company (or who have worked for the company) for past mistakes.
Identifying weaknesses specifically deals with fixing critical areas that need to be improved in order for the business to operate on a daily basis. A general assessment of weaknesses also prevents problems such as the business entering the market with products that are clearly inferior to what other companies are currently selling.
Growth in business requires finding new opportunities (these opportunities include new customer groups, broader product distribution, developing new categories of products and services, geographic expansion, etc.).
In SWOT analysis, the management team (or individuals creating the analysis) identifies opportunities that they can take advantage of in the future while also forecasting long-term opportunities through formulating long-term planning. If the forecast is right, they will be more prepared to enter the market. You might be interested in marketing SWOT analysis examples.
In regards to threats, business organizations face threats that are mostly caused by direct competitors. Changes in the regulatory environment can also have an adverse impact on performance. A threat in SWOT analysis is also classified as risk—a situation that occurs outside the company’s control which certainly has a negative impact on performance. You may also see manager SWOT analysis examples.
SWOT analysis is not meant to be simply conducted by organizations and corporations alone. SWOT analysis can be conducted by individuals as well, in this case an employee SWOT analysis. Listed below are some essential tips in creating an employee SWOT analysis. Don’t forget to check our personal SWOT analysis so that you can be easily guided.
The first tip in creating an employee SWOT analysis is to determine the objective in creating the said analysis. You are not only creating a SWOT analysis just for the sake of it. The objective also acts as the goal on what you want to achieve after conducting the general analysis. Since you are creating an employee SWOT analysis, your objectives would likely center around becoming a more efficient and productive employee.
Listing down objectives helps you create a road map or blueprint for the SWOT analysis. These objectives should not be lengthy, but short and concise similar to a company vision statement and mission statement. Listed below are some objective samples:
A SWOT analysis always follows a standard format: grid or matrix. This aids in the easier writing or inputting of items listed in the SWOT analysis. Since the items are all placed in a box-like figure, there is definitely no need to write long sentences or paragraphs, just bullet-form phrases. Explanation for each item in the SWOT analysis can be done later, in which there is no limit on the length of the explanation or discussion. You may also see internal audit SWOT analysis examples.
Identifying problems in a SWOT analysis is not enough, you need to solve it. That is the reason why conclusions are very important in a SWOT analysis. Conclusions are basically the solutions that result from identifying problems in the said simple analysis. Conclusions can also be called “recommendations” in other business studies.
Listed below are sample conclusions for an employee SWOT analysis:
We created a sample employee SWOT analysis that can serve as a reference when you will be creating your own SWOT analysis. An employee SWOT analysis can be created from two perspectives: perspective of the employer/immediate supervisor or perspective from the employee himself (self-assessment). This employee SWOT analysis is written from the vantage point of the employer. You may also see how to prepare SWOT analysis for business.
This SWOT analysis has been created to discuss the performance of Employee A in his one year of working in this company. The basic analysis mainly aims to identify areas that he needs to improve for better productivity and efficiency.
We hope you found this article to be informative as well as helpful when you will be creating your own employee SWOT analysis. We also provided some free to download examples that you can use as reference when you will be creating your professional SWOT analysis.
As previously mentioned, SWOT analysis is important for any business. Although this type of analysis is helpful for businesses or companies in general, it is also helpful for employees.