—- **FOR NEW STUDENTS**————————————————

1. 🔊 What industry do you work in and what is your role?
2. 🔊 What are your responsibilities in your role/position?
3. 🔊 Can you describe to me the function of your workplace/company?
4. 🔊 How many departments, how many offices. National or International?
5. 🔊 What is the Minimum requirements for employment i.e Education or Experience?
6. 🔊 How many opportunities are there to ‘move up the ladder’?
7. 🔊 What is the process for changing job roles i.e Interview? Test?

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🔊 General discussion about your workweek:

1. 🔊 Current projects? Deadlines? Opportunities?
2. 🔊 Anything of interest happening?

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Listening

1. 🔊 Every person needs career what?
2. 🔊 Which question was “really important”?
3. 🔊 Opportunities and threats often relate to ‘what’ Factors?

Script

1. 🔊 Every organization needs a clear strategy in place for growing its business, and every person needs a career focus and direction. But how do you know where to start? This is where SWOT Analysis comes in useful. SWOT stands for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats. By analyzing these four areas of your business, or career, you’ll be able to cut through the noise, and focus on what really matters. You can use SWOT Analysis to identify a niche in the market, or to help you develop your career. When you understand your strengths and weaknesses, you can exploit the most relevant opportunities, and manage threats that may otherwise have surprised you.
2. 🔊 To start your SWOT Analysis, you’ll need a piece of paper, or you can print off the free worksheet at MindTools.com. Give yourself time to consider each of the four areas in depth, and try to be as realistic and rigorous as you can. Starting with Strengths, ask yourself some key questions. What advantages do you or your organization have? What do you do better than anyone else? What do people in your market see as your strengths?
3. 🔊 Moving onto Weaknesses, ask yourself what could you improve? What should you avoid? What factors lose you sales? What do outsiders see as your weaknesses? Next, you’ll want to consider where your best Opportunities lie. What interesting trends are you aware of? What advantages might arise from changes in technology, government policy, social patterns, and the like? And – this is really important – what options do your strengths open up for you?
4. 🔊 Finally, Threats. Ask yourself what obstacles you or your organization face. What is your competition doing that you should be worried about? Do you have bad debt or cash–flow problems? And what threats do your weaknesses expose you to? When you’re making your lists, be precise and prioritize, so the most important points are at the top. You’ll find that your strengths and weaknesses are often internal, while opportunities and threats often relate to external factors. This is why SWOT Analysis is often called “Internal/External Analysis.”
5. 🔊 When you’ve finished, you’ll have made a good start on creating an effective strategy for success and you’ll have a better understanding of how you can move up the career ladder. For more information about SWOT Analysis, see the article that accompanies this video.

Key Words and Phrases

1. 🔊 Clear strategy= well-defined plan
2. 🔊 ‘Cut through the noise’ = “The idiom cut through the noise means that you are able to communicate in a way that grabs people’s attention. It is often used in business to refer to ways of marketing that will help a company stand out from its competition”
3. 🔊 Identify a niche in the market = find products, services, or interests that appeal to a small, specialized section of the population in the market
4. 🔊 Exploit = 2 meanings. Make full use of and get benefit from a resource. OR make use of (a situation) in a way considered unfair.
5. 🔊 Relevant = closely connected to what is being done or considered. OR appropriate to the current time, period, or circumstances; of interest.
6. 🔊 Manage threats
7. 🔊 Realistic = sensible and practical idea of what can be achieved or expected.
8. 🔊 Rigorous =extremely thorough and careful. Strictly adhering to the rules
9. 🔊 Social patterns
10. 🔊 ‘and the like’ = Similar things
11. 🔊 Obstacles= a thing that blocks one’s way or prevents or hinders progress.
12. 🔊 Face. (Face fears, face directly) = confront and deal with or accept.
13. 🔊 Expose = make something visible OR reveal the true, often of things that are questionable.
14. 🔊 Internal / external – interior / exterior.

Discussion

1. 🔊 Have you ever used The SWOT analysis before? For yourself or for a company?
2. 🔊 Have you heard of a similar analysis? Explain….
3. 🔊 Do you have a written plan or a clear goal for your career? Discuss…
4. 🔊 Let’s use this swot analysis for a hypothetical business of your own or as a Directional goal within your company as we have done in the past (to a lesser extent). This is an excellent opportunity to use the business language you have developed so far.
5. 🔊 1. STRENGTHS. – What advantages do you/ your future business have? – what can you/ your product do better than anyone else (what areas are you most confident in)? What do other people see as your strengths? Discuss …
6. 🔊 2. WEAKNESSES – What areas could you improve? What should you avoid? What factors lose you sales? What do other people see as your weaknesses? Discuss …
7. 🔊 3. OPPORTUNITIES – What trends are you aware of (maybe more specifically ones that relate to your work/field of interest/ potential new business)? What advantages could there be from the rapid changes in technology or other external factors i.e Government Policy, Social Patterns?
8. 🔊 4.THREATS – what is the current state of your industry/ Business (for your company or future business) is it growing / decline .. other? How much competition is there for your business? What threats do your weaknesses create for you…