استفاده از روش تحلیلی کمیتی SWOT

In this paper we present a Quantified SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats) analytical method which provides more detailed and quantified data for SWOT analysis. The Quantified SWOT analytical method adopts the concept of Multiple-Attribute Decision Making (MADM), which uses a multi-layer scheme to simplify complicated problems, and thus is able to perform SWOT analysis on several enterprises simultaneously. Container ports in East Asia are taken as a case study in this paper. Quantified SWOT analysis is used to assess the competing strength of each port and then suggest an adoptable competing strategy for each.

Strategic management has been widely used by all enterprises to withstand fierce market competition. The strategic management process consists of three stages: strategy formulation, strategy implementation, and strategy evaluation [1]. SWOT analysis of external opportunities and threats as well as the internal strengths and weaknesses of the enterprises is important for strategy formulation and development. The purpose of the analysis of external opportunities and threats is to evaluate whether an enterprise can seize opportunities and avoid threats when facing an uncontrollable external environment, such as fluctuating prices, political destabilization, social transition, change in the rule of law, etc. The purpose of the analysis of internal strengths and weaknesses is to evaluate how an enterprise carries out its internal work, such as management, work efficiency, research and development, etc. If used correctly, SWOT can provide a good basis for successful strategy formulation. A review of past documents on SWOT analysis reveals that most presented a literal description of the analysis and few conducted quantified analysis. As planning processes are often complicated by numerous criteria and interdependencies, it may be that utilization of SWOT is insufficient. A study by Hill and Westbrook [2] found that none of the 20 case companies prioritized individual SWOT factors, one grouped factors further into subcategories, and only three companies used SWOT analysis as an input for a new mission statement. In addition, the expression of individual factors was of a very general nature and brief. Thus, it can be concluded that the result of SWOT analysis is too often only a superficial and imprecise listing or an incomplete qualitative examination of internal and external factors [3]. Some related documents have put forward methods of quantified analysis, such as the following methods generalized by David [1]: the External Factor Evaluation Matrix (EFE), Internal Factor Evaluation Matrix (IFE) and Competitive Profile Matrix (CPM) methods. However, the following shortcomings are inevitable: (1) all the key factors’ scores are measured subjectively (e.g., 1–4 points), so objective and quantified data (such as business volume) is lacking; (2) non-uniformity may occur when answering the same question because the key factors’ weights are scored subjectively by the evaluation group without a consistency test. Thus, Kurttila et al. [3] and Stewart et al. [4] combined the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) with SWOT to provide a new hybrid method for improving the usability of SWOT analysis. Although a consistency test is used to ensure the weights are scored objectively by the evaluation group, carrying out SWOT analysis comparison on several enterprises simultaneously is difficult.

SWOT analysis is very important in the process of strategy formulation. Analysis of external opportunities and threats is mainly to evaluate whether an enterprise can seize the opportunities and avoid the threats when facing an uncontrollable external environment. Analysis on internal strengths and weaknesses is mainly to evaluate how an enterprise carries out its internal work, such as management, work efficiency, research and development. SWOT analysis is able to help the enterprises evaluate their position in the competition and can be used as a foundation for the development of policies. In this study, a Quantified SWOT analysis pattern has been built which shows similarities to the GSM concept. Therefore, the Quantified SWOT analysis could be combined with the GSM for strategy formulation and selection. SWOT analysis of the main container port in East Asia was originally very complicated. However, it can be simplified and sorted using the Quantified SWOT analysis pattern. Further, the evaluation index in this paper includes a quantified and qualified index, thus, in addition to eliciting information about ports’ performance from international carriers, the ports are compared using actual statistics. Therefore, the result is relatively objective. In terms of the weights of the evaluation index, these are mainly obtained using the AHP method, and this is the function of the consistency test. As a consequence, inconsistencies are avoided when interviewees answer the questionnaire, and the weights are obtained precisely. In order to show ports’ positions in the competition, by benchmarking, the ordinate is prescribed to stand for the external environment (opportunities, threats) while the abscissa is prescribed to stand for the internal environment (strengths, weaknesses). From the coordinate value of the SWOT analysis of the ports their position in the competition can be clearly realized, and this helps enterprises learn about themselves as well as competitors and can be used as the foundation for developmental strategies.