How to Evaluate SWOT Results
A SWOT analysis is a common evaluation tool for businesses. The four letters of SWOT stand for strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. While these qualities may seem like basic components of a business, the evaluation process can produce useful insights to change the way the company operates. Properly evaluating a SWOT analysis may take some time, but dedication from everyone on the team can help a business develop a feasible plan.
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Instructions
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Evaluate the Findings
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Form your planning team. The team should include key members of your operating staff and represent a diverse section of your company.
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Consider conducting a smaller SWOT analysis on a specific aspect of the business to prime your team for the SWOT evaluation that is company-wide.
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Set meeting times. Make sure you schedule plenty of time for the team to look over the SWOT analysis. Planning these meetings for the same time each week will help ensure everyone gets into the routine. Although you could also plan a weekend retreat, spreading the meetings out may help your staff generate new ideas and not get stuck in a rut.
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Make sure everyone is on the same page. Your staff should have trust in each other that their ideas will be respected. Each member should also have the desire to make changes to the company.
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Define goals for the evaluation at the first meeting. Once everyone has a chance to look over the SWOT analysis, definitive goals should be set. For example, "create three new procedures to ensure customer satisfaction" is a more tangible goal than "plan to increase customer satisfaction."
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Look over the analysis. See if any line items can fit into multiple categories. For example, a threat of a competitor opening up shop across the street could be an opportunity to solidify your standing in the community by providing exemplary service.
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Collect data. Although a strength of your business may be your ability to effectively sell to a minority group, that strength will become a weakness if statistics demonstrate a negative growth of the minority group in your community.
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Decide what you need to improve on. Make a list of all of these goals, and then create a SMART objective for each one.
Make SMART Objectives
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Know that SMART stands for specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and time-bound.
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Define specific objectives. You will need to have objectives with tangible results. One goal may have several objectives---for example, improving your customer service may include performing an annual survey, conducting monthly staff meetings on improving service and hiring more friendly candidates.
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Decide what you will use to measure your objective. Without standards, there will be no way of demonstrating success or failure of each objective.
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Brainstorm whether the objective is achievable and how it will be achieved. If your objective is to conduct monthly staff meetings on customer service, then it would be achievable if an appropriate trainer were identified and if time and wages could be allocated to the project.
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Put some realism into it. Your team will need to really look at each objective to determine if it is realistic. Monthly staff meetings may not seem like a big deal in the meeting room, but coming up with a time that everyone can meet may be.
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Come up with a timeline. Objectives should be time-bound with start and end dates.
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Rewrite each objective to take into consideration all of the SMART components. For example, the goal of improving customer service will be transformed into the SMART objective of "Hire a consultant to conduct a staff-wide training on customer service on the first Sunday of each month from January to November of 2010."
Have Some Follow-Through
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Identify who will head up the taskforce on each objective. Someone needs to be responsible for making sure goals are met.
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Continue to hold SWOT meetings to check-in on objective progress.
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Use SWOT analyses to help guide and create your business plan.
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Tips & Warnings
Make SWOT meetings fun for the staff involved to encourage creativity. Use colored markers to write notes on a large notepad, encourage brainstorming and good ideas with small prizes and provide a meal or snacks to demonstrate your appreciation.
