Strategic Management: How Exceptional Managers Realize a Grand Design

SWOT Analysis

You are making a good point in that companies might be using a SWOT analysis to leverage their strengths to take advantage of opportunities, but also they need to assess where they need to improve their weaknesses and what steps are needed to mitigate risks from threats. The strengths and weaknesses are internally generally through a detailed analysis of how the company uses its resources to develop its capabilities and core competencies so that it can create a sustained competitive advantage. If the company does not have the internal capabilities that are rare, valuable, costly-to-imitate, and non-substitutable, then they might experience difficulty in succeeding long-term. The internal organization is what the company can control. The various functions within the company are where the value is created but do they represent a core competence? So what do we mean by being a core competence?