5 min read

What SWOT analysis actually looks like in the middle of a turnaround

What SWOT analysis actually looks like in the middle of a turnaround
Photo by Kaleidico

We’ve all seen the classic SWOT slide - four neat quadrants, often with vague buzzwords like “agility” or “customer focus,” presented early in a strategic deck to show that the team has “done the homework.” But the most honest, high-impact SWOT I ever worked on didn’t happen in a tidy workshop. It happened inside a deeply anxious company in the middle of a failing turnaround, when people had stopped saying what they actually thought and started fearing for their jobs.

That was when the real strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats finally started to show up - not in a matrix, but in real conversations. Not in a document, but in decisions people were too afraid to make. And the process that unfolded taught me more about how people actually face strategic reality than any framework I’ve ever used.

When I joined the engagement, the company was weeks away from a cash crisis. It was a third-generation consumer goods firm in Southern Europe - heritage brand, strong local loyalty, solid products - but it had grown bloated and cautious over the last decade. Their expansion into private-label goods had quietly failed. Younger customers were drifting away. Internal projects dragged on for months with no clear decisions. Every part of the business felt... stuck.

The board had recently hired a new CEO - someone external, sharp, and operationally tough. She’d done turnarounds before. She had already made some fast moves: cut discretionary spending, flattened part of the hierarchy, replaced three senior leaders. But the deeper problems remained, and privately, she admitted to me, “I don’t know what I’m really looking at anymore. Everyone tells me what I want to hear.”

We agreed the company needed a mirror, not just a microscope. Something to help leadership see themselves - and their environment - more clearly. That’s how we landed on using a SWOT. But we didn’t call it that at first. The word itself felt sterile, and people were already defensive. Instead, we invited the senior team to a series of “strategic clarity sessions” and framed the conversations around three questions:

  • What’s helping us that we don’t talk about enough?
  • What’s holding us back that we haven’t named?
  • What might hit us that we’re pretending isn’t real?

At the first session, I watched the usual choreography unfold. Executives circled safe topics. “Customer expectations are evolving.” “The market is competitive.” “We need better digital capability.” I’d seen this dance before - everyone speaking in abstractions so they couldn’t be blamed for anything.

So I paused and changed course. I asked:
“What’s a strength you wouldn’t want your competitors to know we still have?”

That broke the spell.

The head of operations, a quiet and practical man, spoke up. “Honestly, our relationships with local suppliers in Category B are still better than anyone’s. We just haven’t done anything with it in years.” Suddenly, others chimed in. A brand manager mentioned an underutilized license with major upside. A regional sales lead described a process they’d hacked together during COVID that was still delivering margin.

People started leaning in. The room felt different.

But when we shifted to weaknesses, things got tense. One executive challenged another: “That’s not a weakness - that’s your team underdelivering.” The CFO rolled his eyes. A junior product lead physically recoiled. You could feel the air leave the room. That’s when it hit me again, in a very human way: a SWOT is not about listing facts. It’s about creating permission. Without psychological safety, you get performance, not perspective.

So we changed the format. We broke the sessions into smaller cross-functional groups - mixing people who didn’t normally work together, removing hierarchy from the room. Instead of “strengths” and “weaknesses,” we used more neutral language:

  • “What’s working well that we might be underestimating?”
  • “What’s draining energy?”
  • “What’s fragile, but we’re pretending it’s solid?”
  • “What gives you hope?”
  • “What’s keeping you up at night - even if it feels irrational?”

This language mattered. It allowed people to be honest without feeling exposed. And what came out was far richer than anything you’d find in a textbook quadrant.


One moment I’ll never forget.

In one session, we were reviewing “opportunities.” Most people had listed standard items: market growth in Eastern Europe, product line extensions, influencer campaigns. But something wasn’t sitting right. I asked, “If you had €2 million and total freedom, what would you invest in today?”

A junior logistics analyst said, hesitantly, “Honestly? A better onboarding process for new hires. We’re bleeding talent in their first six months. People come in, feel lost, and leave before they get good.”

Silence.

Then someone from HR quietly added, “He’s not wrong. I’ve been flagging that in exit interviews for two years.”

That comment reframed our understanding of the talent pipeline. It wasn’t a “retention issue.” It was a systems issue - one no one had been allowed to connect to strategy.

That insight didn’t come from a whiteboard. It came from trust, and from asking a question no one had asked before.


Meanwhile, the CEO was watching this unfold. At first, she was skeptical. “Is this just venting?” she asked me after the second round of workshops. But by week three, her tone shifted.

She told me over coffee, “I used to think our biggest problem was cost structure. Now I think it’s courage.”

She saw how her leaders were siloed not just by org chart, but by fear. Some weren’t bad at strategy - they were just afraid of contradicting one another. She started holding weekly “open floor” sessions, where any employee could anonymously surface one concern and one opportunity. Not everything was actionable, but it changed the tone. People started saying what they actually thought.


So, what did our SWOT end up looking like?

It wasn’t a slide. It was a messy, working mural of sticky notes, patterns, and reframed assumptions. Some items were hard-edged and tactical. Others were emotional, political, or even cultural. We didn’t “complete” it. We lived in it for weeks. And it gave us something rare in turnarounds: clarity without oversimplification.

Here’s what I took from that experience - and what I carry with me to every client today:

  • A SWOT is only as valuable as the conversations it unlocks. If people are just repeating known truths, you’re not doing strategy - you’re performing it.
  • Language shapes safety. The words you use for “weaknesses” and “threats” can invite honesty or shut it down.
  • Truth hides in the gaps. If no one mentions a long-touted advantage, ask why. If a weakness feels oddly phrased, ask what’s really behind it.
  • Leadership sets the tone. If your CEO models vulnerability, the organization becomes braver. If not, even the best frameworks fall flat.

In the end, the turnaround didn’t become a perfect success story.
The company still had to divest a legacy unit. Some leaders left. But the recovery plan that followed had teeth - because it reflected what was real, not what was politically safe. The SWOT wasn’t a report. It was a catalyst.