Nearly every person realizes that they need to improve in some areas and are quite sufficient in others, but how does one determine where they need to improve the most or how much? This can cause quite a dilemma and suffice it to say that such a challenge often causes procrastination or hesitation in the self-improvement process.
In business schools they teach students to use a SWOT Analysis when sizing up a potential business plan or the validity of a start-up company.
What is SWOT? Well, SWOT is not going and tearing the door down on the company, well hopefully not.
SWOT stands for "strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats.
" In other words, these business students determine their company's strengths, weaknesses, potential opportunities and challenges they may face in the future.
This is a good concept to learn for your self-improvement program, as you custom tailor what you need to move forward in life.
Did you notice that the SWOT Analysis is for judging your company, not someone else's company? So, think about this for a second, you need to judge yourself not try to match yourself against the rest of the world.
Let's face it you are not going to beat Michael Phelp's gold medal count or Lance Armstrong's Tour de France wins.
You must base all your self-improvement progress on you thus, you must start with you, and not worry about how everyone else stacks up.
So, what are your strengths? Surely, you have plenty, and honestly what are your weaknesses? How might you go about reducing these weaknesses? What are your opportunities, what is available to you presently with your strengths or once you shore up your weaknesses? Lastly, what are the threats you face, are they real, or is it just plain fear? This is where you can determine how everyone else factors into the equation, but realize that it is the last item on the list because self-improvement is based on you, not anyone else.
Believe me, they have to deal with problems of their own.