SWOT is an acronym commonly used in the analysis of both personal and business circumstances. It helps you remember to scrutinize Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats and will provide the outline for the analysis of your horse business.

The SWOT analysis for your horse business will help you focus on the big picture. The most important factors that influence survival and prosperity lie in the ability to periodically take a step back from everything. SWOT allows you to do that and layout a plan for implementing your Next Action Steps.

Now, please step away from the horse business. Try to be as objective as you can during this exercise. Get a view for the big picture by following this four step process:

1. List Horse Business Strengths - Positive Factors 'Inside' your Horse Business
2. List Horse Business Weaknesses - Negative Factors 'Inside' your Horse Business
3. List Horse Business Opportunities - Positive Factors 'Outside' your Horse Business
4. List Horse Business Threats - Negative Factors 'Outside' your Horse Business

Then, you'll take your SWOT lists and develop a strategy. Don't worry, we're not going anywhere and it will be easier than you think.

Review
The Next-Action-Steps mentioned above were discussed in Part 3 of the Definite Major Purpose Series - How to Take Action in the Horse Business. They are pretty self explanatory, but if you haven't read the series, you should definitely check it out before continuing.

Here is a great graphical representation of a SWOT analysis. As you can see, Strengths are those things within your organization that benefit your horse business. You have control over Strengths.

You also have control over Weaknesses. Weaknesses are the things within your horse business that have a negative effect on operations, employees, your bottom line, etc.

Opportunities are positive factors outside of your horse business that you do not control. These opportunities should be compared to your Strengths and Weaknesses in order to allow the horse business to benefit from them.

Threats, like Opportunities, are outside your horse business in an external environment. You don't have control over Threats, although they are a vital part of the SWOT exercise. Threats will show you the skills, training, people, etc. you will need to stay competitive.

List Horse Business Strengths
As stated above, Strengths are assets your horse business possesses. You have control over Strengths and a couple of examples are your skills and the location of your horse business. We won't list too many here in order to allow you to determine those Strengths that are most relevant to your particular horse business.

Right now, write down 5 Strengths that are unique to your horse business. If you can't get 5 that are unique, that's OK. Include some strengths that other horse businesses benefit from that your horse business also benefits from. The main thing is to write down at least 5 Strengths now.

2. List Horse Business Weaknesses
Weaknesses are always tough. Not because there aren't any ;), but because horse business owners are so far inside the box that it becomes difficult for them to see true Weaknesses. This is sometimes true for Strengths as well since both of these factors are internal environment factors. It will require some thick skin, but before you start writing, visit with your current clients and colleagues about the Weaknesses of your horse business. Ask them about it's Strengths as well so the medicine will be a little easier to swallow.

Now, revise your list of Strengths if necessary and write down at least 5 Weaknesses. Sometimes it helps to think back to a relationship, business deal, etc. that went bad. What happened? Give yourself some tough love and find your Weakness that caused the problem.

3. List Horse Business Opportunities
Well, you've covered the inside. Now, let's move to the outside. Opportunities exist in the external environment of your horse business. Some will arise from time to time that are very similar. Some opportunities will always be available due to particular characteristics of the equine industry. And sometimes they are fleeting – if you don't seize them, they're gone forever.

Always be watching. For now, though, write down 5. What are the 5 most realistic and prospectively beneficial opportunities that exist outside your horse business right now? Right them down.

4. List Horse Business Threats
Threats, also outside of your control, seem to consume most of our time. So it probably will not be too difficult listing 5 Threats to your horse business. However, what's important to remember about Threats is that they can monopolize your time. They scream for a response. Do not focus on Threats. Be aware of potential threats in order to manage them and minimize their effect on your horse business – not to eliminate them.

Write down 5 Threats to your horse business. Remember, these are external to your horse business. A bad employee is a Weakness, not a Threat.

Strategy
Managing Threats was briefly mentioned in 4. List Horse Business Threats. How can you accomplish threat management?

This is the key to an effective SWOT analysis – using the information. The information you gathered in your lists is completely useless if you don't put it to work. The following diagram illustrates the relationships within your SWOT analysis that make it possible for you to:

1. Make the most of your Strengths
2. 2.Circumvent your Weaknesses
3. 3.Capitalize on Opportunities
4. 4.Manage Threats

Strategies for improving your horse business will now start to magically appear. Write down the answer to these questions and then start taking action. Here we go:

What can you do tomorrow that will...

1. Use your strengths to maximize your opportunities
2. Minimize your weaknesses by taking advantage of your opportunities
3. Use your strengths to minimize threats
4. Minimize weaknesses by avoiding threats

Developing strategies that you can take action on is the most important part of a SWOT analysis. Take your time to develop good strategies for each of the above four questions. Then break them down into Next Action Steps as discussed in Part 3 of the Definite Major Purpose Series. As always, comment below if you have any questions or comments about this post.