- Current projects? Deadlines? Opportunities?
- Anything of interest happening?
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1. Calling the past few years “a little odd” would be a laughable understatement. It’s left many people in a strange limbo where last week feels like both yesterday and six months ago. Maintaining a sense of direction and progression in times like these is exceedingly difficult. A personal SWOT analysis may be just what the doctor ordered.
What Is A Personal SWOT Analysis?
2. If you’ve been in a business setting for any length of time, you’ve undoubtedly heard the term “SWOT analysis.” It’s a tool businesses use to identify their competitive positioning by outlining the elements of the SWOT acronym: strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. But SWOT analysis isn’t just beneficial for businesses. You can also run this exercise for yourself.
3. If you are considering a career change, preparing for new job opportunities or have hit a wall with your development, a personal SWOT analysis could be a perfect tool to help you get unstuck and future-proof your career.
Have you ever considered a change in career or lifestyle? If so, please explain. If not, do you want to in the future?
Creating A Personal SWOT That Will Actually Be Useful
4. Before you jump in, here are a few best practices to make this exercise as impactful as possible.
Be Honest. One major difficulty with a personal SWOT analysis is being honest with yourself. The things we are weak at often get swept under the rug, and the things that come naturally may be the strengths we notice least.
5. Pulling specific examples of strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats is a great way to inspire new ideas and keep you on track. Your ability to be honest and thorough with each section is directly proportional to the value you will get from this exercise.
Get Feedback
6. Getting feedback from two to three people you trust and respect is an excellent way to uncover valuable items you may have overlooked. Try choosing people from within your industry (colleagues, mentors, supervisors and so on) and outside of your industry (friends, family members, et cetera) to get a well-rounded picture. Just make sure to select people who won’t shy away from hard truths and will be objective about your strengths.
Do you have any mentors/teachers who give you guidance in your life now? How have they helped you?
Go Digital
7. With a personal SWOT analysis, a digital format could make it easier to explore different ideas and revise those ideas in the future. Avoid sticky notes that mysteriously vanish a week later. The typical format for SWOT analysis is a two-column, two-row matrix with individual boxes for strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. While that simplified structure may read well in a boardroom, you do not have to follow it for your personal SWOT.
Filling In Your SWOT Analysis
8. Whether you’ve chosen a word document, a mind map or a traditional matrix, here are the different sections you need to include, along with a few helpful questions to get your gears spinning. Feel free to jump around to these different sections as you fill out an exhaustive list for each.
Putting Your Personal SWOT Into Action
9. A personal SWOT analysis really shines as a framework and baseline for goal setting. It gives you a clear snapshot of where you are today so you can develop a plan to capitalize on opportunities, shore up weaknesses and protect yourself against potential threats.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbescommunicationscouncil/2022/06/22/using-a-personal-swot-analysis-to-future-proof-your-career/?sh=5bb015256afa