Strategic Management

Using SWOT Analysis To Understand The Institutional Environments: A Guide For Can Tho University Luu Nguyen Quoc Hung Can Tho University, Vietnam Abstract Strategic planning has become the practical approach to organizational management in most of organizations in the new era, when the world has undergone major social, political, economic, technological and demographic changes. Like other organizations, in this hyper-competitive world, universities have to analyze their environments both internally and externally to identify their strengths and weaknesses as well as to optimize their opportunities and reduce the threats to their institutions. The purpose of this article is two fold. Firstly, the concept of SWOT analysis as a strategic tool to help universities to adapt to changes is discussed. Secondly, a SWOT framework to analyze Can Tho University is also presented. Of many management concepts, strategic planning has received much attention since the early 1960s (Delahaye, 2000). Business management literature has provided complex insights into the philosophies, processes and techniques of strategic planning. As Micklethwait and Wooldridge (1996 cited in Delahaye, 2000) commented: ‘For most of this century, strategic planning was regarded as the very kernel of management thought: indeed it often had a department devoted to it. Planning – a neat, definite, military concept – was adapted and required into what seemed to be an even more precise science’. There are a number of definitions of the term from different perspectives. Generally, strategic planning is considered as a complex and ongoing process of organizational change (Lerner, 1999). According to Olsen and Eadie (1982 cited in Hughes, 1994), ‘strategic planning is a disciplined effort to produce fundamental decisions shaping the nature and direction of governmental activities, within constitutional bounds.’ Bell (2002) stated ‘at its simplest strategic planning may be understood as an approach to

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