Components of a SWOT Analysis [WLOs: 1] [CLOs: 1, 2, 3, 4]

Guided Response: Respond to at least two of your fellow students’ posts in a substantive manner and provide information or concepts that they may not have considered. Support your position by using information from the week’s readings. You are encouraged to post your required replies earlier in the week to promote more meaningful and interactive discourse in this discussion forum.

ROBERT’S POST:

A SWOT analysis is a tool that businesses often use to analyze where they are and begin answering the question of where they want to go (MindTools, 2019).  A SWOT analysis received its name because it dives into the Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats that can influence or impact the business.  The strengths and weaknesses sections are approached from an internal perspective; asking the questions what are the company’s specific strengths and weaknesses?  The opportunities and threats sections are approached from an external perspective; asking the questions what are the opportunities and threats that impact the company from outside influences or entities?

One of the most helpful elements of doing a SWOT analysis for a business is that it creates the necessity to slow down and take the time to “dive into” the details of the business.  The SWOT analysis requires that the person doing it gains an intimate knowledge of the business and reflects on where the business is going and how they are doing.  If it is executed with honesty and transparency, the SWOT analysis will give the company a great opportunity to pinpoint what they need to work on to accomplish their overall strategy (Mindtools, 2019).   

Often times a SWOT analysis is only done by management.  It would be interesting for a company to have many of the frontline workers fill out a perceived SWOT analysis that the leaders of the organization could analyze to see what their company looks like from a broader frontlines perspective.  One downside to the current SWOT analysis is that it is only the perspective of the individual or team that is creating it and this could include inaccurate or insufficient information (Chron, 2021).  A SWOT should include items that a company is really good at as well as the areas it really needs to improve in.  The opportunities and threats sections will include external factors such as economic issues, political factors, social influences or factors as well as technological issues or advantages that could impact the company (MindTools, 2019).

The SWOT analysis is a great tool and starting point.  The information gleaned from the analysis is great, but it is only useful if something is done with it.  Often this information is put into a strategy or plan of some nature to move the company forward.

References

Chron. (2021, February 16). Drawbacks of a SWOT Analysis. Small Business – Chron.Com. Retrieved March 28, 2022, from https://smallbusiness.chron.com/drawbacks-swot-analysis-22627.html

MindTools. (2019, November 20). SWOT Analysis: Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats. Mindtools.Com. Retrieved March 28, 2022, from https://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newTMC_05.htm#:%7E:text=SWOT%20Analysis%20helps%20you%20to,decide%20on%20any%20new%20strategy.

JAMES POST:

A SWOT analysis is a tool that can be utilized to identify and understand strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. Taylor (2022) states “it is a useful tool for marketing and process planning but can easily be adapted to negotiations” (p. 24). This analysis is often utilized by many organizations to outline factors that have an impact on an idea, product, service, etc. If a firm is looking to expand an offering, they would want to analyze each of these to support or create counteractions. The company can leverage its strengths and opportunities to drive change while building a plan to focus on weaknesses and threats. Once these variables are identified and planned for, the business can make more strategic decisions. A SWOT analysis provides a visual breakdown of factors that are impacting the business or marketplace. Understanding the many elements within a SWOT analysis can aid firms in creating more sustainable approaches.

Competition is fierce in most industries and is accelerating with the entrance of new competitors and technologies. When businesses need to look at factors impacting competitive advantage many turn to a SWOT analysis. The tool allows for a detailed view of specific factors broken out into four modules. A firm can plan or create sustainability by looking at internal and external elements such as market position, operations, financials, manufacturing, supply chain, R&D, employee satisfaction, and raw materials. An example of a generic strength would be a company’s ability to retain tenured employees through a premier workplace. However, being more specific as to what makes a premier workplace like, leading industry pay and benefits, flexible work schedules, promotion opportunities are needed for a SWOT. Firms that analyze their strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and weaknesses, can build strategies around them that will improve their success and competitive advantage.

References

Taylor, K. (2022). Preparing to succeed. Business Spotlight, 1, 22–25. Retrieved from: 

DB: Expressing the Pro and Con of an Issue

Responses

Review your peers’ product responses. Have you ever used the product they are writing about?  Did any of the pros and cons they highlighted persuade you to use or try the product?

JOSEPH’S POST:

The product I will be using is a Jeep Wrangler, The reason I am choosing this product because I owned one for a few years which will make it easier to give my opinion on the Pros and cons of owning a Jeep Wrangler.

The Pros of owning a Jeep Wrangler would be the freedom most definitely. You are able to go anywhere and every you would want to go, it is one of the most capable off road vehicles ever designed. You have the ability to easily take the doors and top off to enjoy the fresh air. They are also one of the most customizable vehicles on the market today.

The cons of owning a Jeep would be the on road driving. It is a slow vehicle, with poor on road handling. With it being a smaller engine it still does not have good gas milage, especially when you start adding bigger tires and heavier bumpers to it. When it rains a lot and creates big puddles on the road the Jeep wrangle can easily hydroplane when driving at higher speeds.

JESSICA’S POST:

In this week's unit discussion board topic, we are to discuss a product that interests us most where we can discuss the pros and cons of that product. The product that I found interesting to talk about is The Roku television. As Roku television has expanded to almost 2.9 million more accounts during the covid pandemic it also has been a wonderful way to stay up to date in movies. television, music, and video/photo sharing. 

The advantage that Roku brings is the fact that the Roku channel is free. While it also offers other free channels it also offers other popular channels that charge small monthly fees if you do not want to pay yearly. All together you have the option to seek the latest movies, shows, and music for free unless you want to experience the other channels such as Netflix and Hulu. Roku also could be controlled through a device or voice command. For example, I lost my Roku remote somehow from my daughter getting her hands on to it. I was able to download the Roku remote app to my phone and control the app through my device. I found that remarkably interesting and quite convenient. One last advantage of the Roku channel would be the ability to manage the app on the go. You are able to download the app on a device and stream your favorite shows, listen to your best music, or listen to your podcast shows all in one place and on any device. Roku can be more affordable than most cable packages and it eliminates the stress of expensive equipment that comes with it. Roku also has their own Televisions where it is already built into smart tv. This is a plus for some people who do not have to worry about what HMDI input is needed for the Roku to work. 

While Roku has many advantages it also has some disadvantages. One being that the app will only work with cellular data or wi-fi. Being that it cannot function without a wireless internet connection. With Roku it does not have program storage. Meaning that you cannot record movies or shows for later use through something like a DVR. Roku also does not have great HD quality. Most channels that Roku also that you can download app usually will automatically offer HD streaming for a fee. Which also leads to another disadvantage of having limited access to Live television without having to pay a monthly fee for access.  The benefit of having Roku beats the disadvantages of having Roku. Although Roku is not meant for everyone it is still a very affordable way to enjoy streaming! 

Steele, J. S. (2021. September 14). What Is Roku – Review of Streaming Digital Media Player. Money Crashers.  

 Dale, A. D. Zecevic. L. Z. (2021, February 8). Pros and Cons of Having a Roku TV. Inquirer.net.  

In response to your classmates, put yourself in the position of team leader and provide advice on how the team can continue to be successful and/or describe what challenges the team could face and how the team can overcome these challenges.

KARA’S POST:

 Everyone knows that Neil Armstrong is famous for being the first man on the moon. Armstrong was the lead astronaut on the Apollo 11 mission. The Apollo 11 team was successful enough, they only needed one launch, the team said "the launch was so successful the other three were not needed." (Loff, 2015). The Apollo 11 team showed some if not all of the characteristics we covered this week. The team has done an outstanding job flying to the Lunar Coordinates: .71 degrees North, 23.63 degrees East (Loff, 2015).

     The information provided in my research does not explain every detail.  "Two types of rockets were used for the Apollo program. The first flights used the smaller Saturn I (1) B rocket. It was about as tall as a 22-story building. This rocket had two stages. That means it was made of two parts. When the first part ran out of fuel, it dropped away from the other and burned up in Earth's atmosphere. The second part continued flying. The Saturn IB rocket was used to test the new Apollo capsule in Earth orbit." (Loff, 2015) They wanted a way to remember and so they aired the launch on television. They had done so well that they had done a few more missions to the moon.

     To ensure that each Apollo mission was successful, they had extensive training processes and you had to be able to complete the mission. Astronauts were trained in the case not only to go to the moon but to be a backup in case the mission did not go according to plan. I do not believe that you have to go through each process to be successful. Everyone has their own personalities and not everyone has to show and tell "to empower team members" (Clement, 2020).

Thank You,

Kara

References

Loff, S. (2015, April 17). Apollo 11 Mission Overview. NASA. Retrieved March 30, 2022, from  Clement, T. (2020, March 25). Proquest Maintenance. Remote Work: 5 Best Practices for Effective Teambuilding. Retrieved March 30, 2022, from 

AUSTIN’S POST:

The team I am choosing for my discussion this week is one I was a part of in High School. For our final project, we as a team, collaborated over 2 weeks to get a 98% on our Gardening Slideshow. We collaborated, set expectations for accountability and commitment, we had clarity of purpose, shared leadership, and positive group dynamics. We, however, lacked in communication at times and also didn't have a positive role in conflict. But we honestly pulled ourselves together to get an awesome grade and that would not have happened if we didn’t share these characteristics.

In my senior year in High School, I was in a college-level Biology class with a handful of peers. I was assigned a group, and we had a few weeks to complete our Final Project which was something of our choosing. Unfortunately, it had to be something related to one of the topics that we covered in Biology. I was assigned to my table as a group (we didn’t get to choose), and it consisted of 5 members me included.

I’m not going to lie, I had no idea what topic to even choose because, to be honest Biology wasn’t even something I enjoyed or even set my attention to, but one of my teammates chose Gardening and its many styles (aquaponics, hydroponics, aeroponics, etc.). I feel like everyone kind of just agreed because nobody wanted to do any research and work too hard to find a good topic, so we all just settled.

First, we set our team goals and priorities. We all chose a type of gardening to do our presentation on, and we all agreed we would be doing a PowerPoint slideshow. We also agreed that we would meet up a couple of times after school to make sure we were all contributing and that everyone was solely responsible for their part of the presentation. We agreed we all had a block of certain days to add our contributions to, and after we were done, or the time to change days came, we would email the file to the next person. Thus, we had great clarity of purpose, set goals and priorities, and we set expectations for accountability and commitment right off the bat.

Everyone did a great job at putting in the effort and doing the research for our project, but unfortunately, we did have one team member who didn’t put any effort in. This team member didn’t tell anyone they got the file, didn’t tell anyone if they were actively working on it or not, and just lacked commitment and communication skills all around. The team member didn’t have anything done when we came to class again, and also wanted others to pull more weight. We ended up talking to our instructor, and that teammate was removed from our team. We definitely could have had a better strategy for resolving conflict, and in hindsight, maybe we could’ve been more understanding and tried to help that teammate succeed. Because, in the end, that teammate was upset and they never spoke to us again.

After that incident though, we all had to pick up the slack, which wasn’t fair, and it put us behind. Thankfully, everyone did their part, everyone communicated and we all shared leadership at different points when needed. We all met on our free time and gave feedback to other teammates, resulting in an amazing project. One feature of our group that made our performance great, was how we made everyone feel like they were equally important and not one of us was greater or lesser of value. I can’t pinpoint when we grasped that element, but I think it had a lot to do with the type of individuals in the group.

I think personally, our team wouldn’t have done as well as we did if we didn’t follow these processes as a team. For instance, we could have not set our goals and priorities, leading to confusion overall. For some reason, we may not have had a clarity of purpose, resulting in conflicts with peers, or confusion in leadership. Most importantly if all of us lacked accountability and commitment, our whole presentation would have failed, and we would have failed the class in return. Teamwork is something I take incredibly seriously whenever it’s presented because I think it shows a lot about who you are. I have been partnered with some pretty questionable teammates, and in all honesty, I have been that questionable teammate. I think teamwork solely relies on successful strategies and processes, and when one element fails the whole team is put at risk.

INSTRUCTOR:

Thank you for your post.

The Ford Motor Company is known globally. Their history is long and storied.

Please define SMART. Does this methodolgy distinguish Ford from their competition?

Best regards,

Steve

FEEDBACK:

Description: This is the discussion board rubric used by the Malcolm Baldrige School of Business.  It is worth 100 points.  Discussion Criteria and Rubric Active participation: 3 or more posts are submitted during the week.  Timely participation: The first post is submitted by 11:59p (EST) Wednesday evening.  Professional communication: Posts are grammatically correct with no spelling, capitalization, or punctuation errors.  Resources are used to validate the information shared and references are provided in the post to these resources. Response to questions: All questions are answered in complete detail in initial post.  Evidence of critical thinking or extending information.  Posts are written using personal experiences and research so that classmates are motivated to continue the conversation and enhance and explore the topics being addressed.

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Raw Total: 70.25 (of 100)

Feedback to Learner

There is a requirement to write formally and professionally. Write carefully, and proofread zealously. Be mindful of grammar, punctuation, and spacing. Please develop the habit of responding to instructor feedback. I am confident in your ability to perform at a higher level. Please use the rubric descriptions to guide your improvement efforts during subsequent units. Best regards, Steve

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