Personal SWOT Analysis: It’s Time You Conducted One

Introduction: Personal SWOT Analysis

Whenever you hear the term SWOT Analysis (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities & Threats), it is usually associated with businesses. But a SWOT Analysis can be very beneficial to individuals because results can help you to position yourself for success. A personal SWOT Analysis highlights information you can use to reposition yourself. The last 18 months has been very tough for everyone. Most people did not expect or want a global pandemic. And one that has lasted for so long.

The new buzzword is pivot. People are talking about making a pivot in their business or career. But how can you pivot when you haven't conducted any kind of personal self-assessment? You need to determine what you're good at. And what you're not so good at. Additionally, you have to look at opportunities and threats that arose because of the pandemic

A great place to start is conducting a personal SWOT Analysis. It will help you to focus on your strengths, minimize your weaknesses, and take the greatest possible advantage of opportunities available to you. And it will help you to eliminate threats that limit your ability to push ahead. You need to fully use your talents if you want to succeed. If you've ever done a SWOT Analysis, this will be very easy for you. It's worth saying that opportunities and strengths are in your external environment.

How to Conduct a Personal SWOT Analysis

SWOT Analysis

Pay close attention to the above table. And answer the questions in it. You'll create an inventory of your Strengths and Weaknesses, and the Opportunities and Threats in your external environment, which will determine possible areas to specialize in, if you are looking for a change in career. Or, you can simply use the information to hone the skills that you are weak in.

Develop ways to use your strengths to exploit opportunities and avoid or defuse threats. In what ways could you exploit your knowledge and wisdom to create a niche that you can dominate? Are you ready to conduct your personal SWOT?

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5 Steps to Get the Most Out of Reading Books (infographic)

You can take your personal SWOT Analysis one step further by working with a SWOT Matrix, which puts your analysis into action.

How to Use a SWOT Matrix

The goal of the SWOT Matrix is to use what you learned from your analysis. You've answered the questions in the table above to discover your strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats in the environment. In the Matrix, as you probably guessed already, S = Strengths, O = Opportunities, W = Weaknesses, and T = Threats.

Your goal is to leverage opportunities and eliminate threats. Let's have some fun now playing with the Matrix. The end game is formulating strategies that you can use to make the pivot.

SO (Strengths/Opportunities):

Look at your strengths and the opportunities that are present in the external environment. How can you use strengths to leverage opportunities. In other words, you're using your strengths to optimize opportunities. For instance, let's say you're a Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion consultant, who has strong writing skills. Because of the death of George Floyd and the subsequent unrest, there are many anti-racism initiatives.

With your skills, you can apply for grants to help nonprofit organizations develop anti-racism policies. Additionally, you can sell your consulting services to companies that want to develop DEI initiatives. Do you see how this works?

WO (Weaknesses/Opportunities):

Develop a strategy that minimizes your weaknesses and maximizes and optimizes the opportunities available to you. For instance, there are lots of grants available, and you know the components of a winning grant proposal. But you are not strong writer. You could partner with someone who is an excellent writer to apply for grants for your clients. It's a three-way win for your clients, your partner, and for yourself.

ST (Strengths/Threats):

You need to develop a strategy that enables you to maximize your strengths, and minimize threats in the environment. Let's say you work for a nonprofit that gets a lot of government funding. You notice that the government has been cutting funding substantially.  However, one of your strengths has always been to maximize resources, finding more efficient ways of doing things. Therefore, you're able to find ways to help the organization to weather the storm until you find new funding sources.

WT (Weaknesses/Threats):

You have to develop a strategy that minimizes both your weaknesses and the threats in your external environment. This usually happens when the organization is operating in an industry that's dying or has two many competitors and there are no development opportunities. One strategy is to partner with other organizations in the field. Or even merge with them to streamline resources.

Conclusion: Personal SWOT Analysis & Matrix

Are you able to use the information included in this article to make a pivot? Another way that I use the SWOT Matrix is to pick big ideas from four or five books and start combining them. That means, instead of having strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats, you only have big ideas. Therefore, you stack up big ideas together to make them stronger. Do you see how that works? If you need me to explain this further, contact me.

The most accomplished people use books as problem solving tools. They carve out the time in their schedule to find solutions in the pages of a book. Let me help you to solve your own problems. Additionally, this program helps you to learn valuable career skills. Click the link MoreReads Success Blueprint Accelerator Program to buy.

Books to Buy

1. The SWOT Analysis: Using your Strength to overcome Weaknesses, Using Opportunities to overcome Threats by Lawrence G Fine
2. SWOT Analysis A Complete Guide – 2021 Edition

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