Purpose:

A consideration of an organization's strengths and weaknesses can lead to an identification of its "distinctive competencies", more recently termed "core competencies" or "capabilities." These consist of an organization's strongest abilities and most effective actions and strategies, or the resources (broadly conceived) on which it can draw routinely to perform well. An absence of performance information may create, or harden, major organizational conflicts.
 

Approaches:

1. The planning team should explore the environment outside the organization to identify both opportunities and threats. Opportunities and threats can be discovered by monitoring a variety of political, economic, social, technological, educational, and physical environmental forces and trends. 

2. It should explore the environment inside the organization to identify both strengths and weaknesses. To identify internal strengths and weaknesses, the organization might monitor its resources (inputs), its present strategy (process), and its performance (outputs). 
 

John M. Bryson, Strategic Planning for Public and Nonprofit Organizations:  A Guide to Strengthening and Sustaining Organizational Achievement, rev. ed. (San Francisco:  Jossey-Bass, 1995), 28-30.