Talk:SWOT analysis/Archives/2019

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Broken external link

The external link to "SWOT Analysis: A tool for making better business decisions" is broken. I haven't been able to track down to where the document has been moved. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Mfogar01 (talk • contribs) 16:39, 3 January 2019 (UTC)

I deleted it because it was broken. The link was https://www.rma.usda.gov/pubs/2011/swot_brochure.pdf I also deleted a spurious external link to the wikipedia page on the US Department of Agriculture, which seemed to have nothing to do with SWOT. Lauchlanmack (talk) 09:07, 17 December 2019 (UTC)

Need to address the history and origins of SWOT via the SRI

These are starting points, but you'd need to do some more digging around:

https://www.hotpmo.com/management-models/swot-analysis-strengths-weaknesses-opportunities-threats

"The Origins and History of SWOT Analysis Given how widely used SWOT Analysis is, it is surprising to note that its origins are unclear. Many pages cite Albert S. Humphrey as the originator and state that he devised SWOT analysis whilst working on a research project at Stanford University. However no academic references appear to exist to support this claim. Adrian Haberberg claimed in a 2000 article "Swatting SWOT" that SWOT was widely used at Harvard in the 1960s. Suzanne Turner's book - Tools for success: A Manager's Guide offers up Igor Ansoff (of Ansoff Matrix fame). It is certainly unusual that such a widely used management model cannot be mapped back to an originator or paper.

Albert S. Humphrey developed SWOT analysis whilst working for SRI International during the 1960s

In December 2005, an abstract of an paper by Albert S. Humphrey was published posthumously in the SRI Alumni Association Newsletter. In the paper, Humphrey explicitly refutes claims that SWOT was developed elsewhere, "I'm told that Harvard and MIT have claimed credit for SWOT...not so!". He explains that SWOT analysis came from research conducted at SRI from 1960-1970, and that the original mnemonic was S.O.F.T He explains: "We started as the first step by asking, 'what's good and bad about the operation?' Then we asked, 'What is good and bad about the future?' What is good in the present is Satisfactory, good in the future is Opportunity, bad in the present is a Fault and bad in the future is a Threat." Humphrey goes on to note that SOFT was later changed to SWOT, but provides no further information on who made the change and why.

Whilst the precise origins of SWOT are unclear, it seems plausible that it was developed in parallel by several people before a common mnemonic was agreed. Certainly by 1969 is appears to have been in general use and was mentioned in Business Policy: Text and cases in that same year.

This lack of clear epistemology for SWOT may actually be part of the reason it has been so widely adopted. Several academics have developed and refined SWOT. In their book Strategic Management and Business Policy, Wheelen and Hunger advocated using SWOT as a basis for gap analysis between competencies and resources in the business environment. SWOT has also been adapted as a tool for creating User Stories, adopted as a Marketing tool and advocated as an Icebreaker."'

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/288958760_History_of_swot_analysis

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_S._Humphrey

Lauchlanmack (talk) 09:00, 17 December 2019 (UTC)

Lauchlanmack, I think this is a potentially valuable area to add, and suggest removing the many quotes (use minimal quoting as quotes alone result in things at times being taken out of context) and fix the reference so it points to a DOI article and not within the corporate Researchgate itself. I would also encourage finding at least one or two more high quality, credible references to cite here, as over the years this aspect of SWOT has been a bit controversial, so use them to establish this is a bit controversial as to the beginning, yet it certainly started at some time. FULBERT (talk) 14:02, 17 December 2019 (UTC)

Beef up the strategy side ...

The article could connect more with things like environmental scanning (external):

and on strengths and capabilities (internal)

And contrast with other strategy models

Lauchlanmack (talk) 09:22, 17 December 2019 (UTC)