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NEVER TO LATE TO SWOT

By Shai Patel

2020-12-04

NEVER TO LATE TO SWOT

The last article discussed the Marketplace – knowing and determining your target clients, your competition, rationalising your products and services to meet market demands and to focus on your niche.

 

In that article, and hinted in earlier articles, we touched upon SWOT and SWOT Analysis. In this article we dig a little deeper into this tried and tested business and management framework.

What Is SWOT

 

SWOT stands for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats. SWOT Analysis is a technique for assessing theses four qualities in relation to your business and setting business goals. (Assessing Personal traits and goal setting is an alternative application of SWOT).

 

SWOT Analysis is a useful technique for making key business decisions and business strategy development. You can apply the technique to help rationalise the HOW and WHEN and WHERE of business operations (see earlier articles).

 

SWOT Analysis can aid in figuring out your business’s best advantage, find and mitigate areas of risk, highlight traits that distinguish you from your competitors and help decide potential new market offerings or demand for your products and services.

SWOT Matrix

Strengths What does our Arborist company do better than others? What is our Unique Selling Proposition? What do customers and competition see as our strengths?	Weaknesses What are weakest services or skills? What services are we not able to offer but the market wants? What do our customers see as our weakness?
Opportunities What opportunities could come from changes in Environmental law and policies? What arboriculture trends are developing? Can new funding take advantage of a new opportunity?	Threats What Environmental/Employment/Tax law and policies could negatively affect our business? What is our competition doing? How are they doing it? What price are they doing it? What changes in bank interest rates will affect our cashflow?

A SWOT Matrix is a 2x2 grid, with one square for each of the four SWOT qualities.

Brainstorm to build a list of ideas and challenges that your arboriculture business is experiencing. Each time you identify a Strength, Weakness, Opportunity or Threat, jot it down in the proper quadrant.

Envision Strengths and Weaknesses as ‘internal’ aspects relating to your business – assets, people, processes, skills.

 

Envision Opportunities and Threats as ‘external’ aspects relating to your business – legal, financial, social, political, environmental, competition, technology, marketplace and customers.

Strengths

Strengths are things that your arborist business does well, and (or) in a way that distinguishes you from your competitors. It is primarily an examination of the business ‘internally.’

 

Look at HOW you conduct your business, your processes, the way you engage with clients from initial contact, through to supplying estimates, doing the work and after sales service or follow ups. Examine HOW you communicate with your customers and the language you are using – apart from ensuring minimal profanities, are you using simple, no jargon terms. We examined Niche markets in the last article – consider your niche and your Unique Selling Proposition.

 

Consider the advantages your business has over other similar businesses or niche businesses. Remember the WHY of your organisation (see earlier article) and how your WHY and you VALUES give you an upper hand with your customers, employees and partners.

 

Flip your perspective around and ask yourself what your competitors and customers might see as your strengths. What factors mean that you get the sale ahead of them?

 

The key is to consider those aspects of your organisation that bring a clear advantage. For example, if your competitors are using machine tools in their arborist work enabling them to work quicker and cheaper, then your niche traditional manual methods are not a strength in your complete market.

Weaknesses

As with all the SWOT quadrants, be honest when you are considering your weaknesses, but do not be afraid to be harsh on yourself here. The SWOT Analysis will only be valuable if you gather all the information you need. It is best to be realistic now and face any unpleasant truths as soon as possible.

 

Weaknesses, like strengths, are primarily inherent features of your arborist business. Focus on your assets, people, processes and systems. When considering the people aspects, it is an exercise in examining the skillsets you have versus the skillsets needed to sustain and compete. Is more training needed, are specialists necessary to be employed or partnered with?

Again, flip the considerations and find how other people in your market see you. Do they notice weaknesses that you tend to be blind to? Take time to examine how and why your competitors are doing better than you. What are you lacking?

 

In the earlier article, we emphasised why price cannot be the sole distinguisher between you and you competitor. As soon as a cheaper arborist offers their service, you have lost the only competitive edge – so if lowest price is your only distinguisher, it may be a weakness.

Opportunities

Opportunities are openings or chances for something positive to happen. They are primarily external to the business and require an eye to what might happen in the future.

They might arise as developments in the market you serve, or in the technology you use. Being able to spot and exploit opportunities can make an enormous difference to your business's ability to compete and take the lead in your market.

Consider ‘low hanging fruit’ – those opportunities you can spot and exploit at once. Small advantages can increase your business's competitiveness.

What interesting market trends are you aware of, large or small, which could have

an impact? These could be social trends, population trends driving new property developments requiring arborist intervention or advice.

Consider what planned changes in government policy relating to arboriculture, business law, tax, or the natural environment are and how they could be of advantage.

If in your weaknesses you identified a need for extra or new skills, are there government or regional grants that could help towards filling those weak spots or even hiring people with the required skillsets.

Threats

Threats, like Opportunities are primarily external to your business and can include anything that can negatively affect your business from the outside.

 

As with Opportunities, these Threats could come from legislative, social, economic or political trends and changes.

 

Problems with your supply chain for parts or new cutting machinery, or partners and lack of skilled resources can be threats to the business. It is therefore vital to predict these threats and plan the necessary action steps to mitigate these threats.

 

Consider what your competitors are doing, and whether you should be changing your business's emphasis to meet the challenge. Remember that what they are doing might not be the right thing for you to do and avoid copying them without understanding how it will improve your position.

 

In a world of evolving technology and machinery, is the lack of use of modern facilities affecting how you conduct your business or how your customers perceive your service?

 

Finance and cashflow is key to health and survival of a business. Examine how small and large external factors could affect your cashflow and examine ways to mitigate the risks. Again, investigate the possibility of grants or competitive non-high street finance could help in the short to medium term to sustain and grow the business.

 

Understanding the SWOT Analysis

 

When brainstorming ideas for each of the quadrants, do not hold back on noting small or ‘silly’ ideas. It is all part of the process of understanding and reaffirming the WHY, HOW, WHEN and WHERE of your business (see earlier articles).

 

When you think you have exhausted your ideas it is time to prune or chunk these into categories that will help drive your business strategy.

 

Prioritise and cost the ideas and work with the most usable first – remember those low hanging fruits, those quick wins that may give your business and immediate advantage or position in the marketplace.

 

Apart from costing each of the priorities, ensure they cumulatively for a strategic plan. Each priority or action having a SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic/Relevant and Timebound) target.

 

“Remember, the storm is a good opportunity for the pine and the cypress to show their strength and their stability.”

Ho Chi Minh