flynn019

If you are preparing a business or project plan , it is likely that you will be requested to perform some type of S.W.O.T. analysis, which is a very simple, subjective and qualitative analysis of the Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats to which your business, strategy, project or team shall be subject. You may also perform a periodic self- SWOT analysis on a personal level, wherein you evaluate yourself as a leader or performer. If you know your own SWOT, it can be a fabulous self-education tool. While its use in presentations to outside parties is principally as an additional selling opportunity (i.e., you enhance your S and O, while you show how you will mitigate your W and T through intelligent, anticipatory risk mitigation and containment). You generally use it as a tool to show that your research has been thorough and that you have made contingency plans to offset or contain any problems. It is seen by evaluators as a measure of your thoroughness and possibility th...

We recently discussed the notion of Breakeven Analysis, and actions of increasing contribution margin (price less variable costs ) per unit; increasing the number of units sold, and trying to reduce fixed costs (our minimum hurdle) without injuring the profit-producing mechanism. Nonproductive fixed costs are purely wasteful and they accumulate in the business budget like dust over time. Productive fixed costs (those costs which are in some form or fashion related to or necessary to the production of revenues and/or the production of the business' product or service have to be separated from non-productive fixed costs. If we try to eliminate a productive fixed cost, we will damage our business - perhaps irreversibly. If we take the time to cull out all of those non-productive business costs, we will reduce our breakeven point and increase our potential possibility. Cost containment is the key to success at this surgical trimming. It begins with evaluating a proposed expendit...