I’ve had a few responses to my request for input into a SWOT analysis which are summarised here along with my own analyses.
**Remember project team you can still contribute to the SWOT survey and you don’t have to fill out the whole form – any Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities or Threats you can think of are welcome throughout the project lifecycle. N.B. The survey has been modified to reflect PESTLE for external factors (I’ve missed out Environmental partly because I can’t think of any but mainly because I only having a basic, free PollDaddy account!)**
Internal factors:
People:
Strengths: Experienced and skilled programmer on team (Mike Taylor) / Experienced project team who have worked together previously / Good working relationship established with commercial partner / Strong buy in from senior staff within University.
Weaknesses: One member of staff on the team is on a temporary contract; however, this does not expire until after the end of this project / lack of specific skill set required (Java) resulted in early difficulties in basic implementation of API.
Opportunities: Project team has access to necessary skill sets internally.
Threats: Other commitments within project team interfere with short project lifecycle.
Resources:
Strengths: Resources in place – no need to wait for any subscriptions, to go through any kind of purchasing process.
Threats: Actually not yet clear what the extent of the ‘free’ service will be from Thomson Reuters – there may, in fact, be additional subscription costs.
Innovation & Ideas:
Strengths: The ideas behind the project are timely, fit in with University objectives, and will be of value to the wider community / Bibliosight is one of 3 projects working in this area and this is an opportunity to share ideas and maybe even code so that we can get further along then we would on our own.
Weakness: Whilst the original project idea is a strength, other project teams are working in this area, and there is a risk that our work may be superceded either by the commercial developer (Thomson Reuters) or other projects in the sector.
Opportunities: Bibliosight represents a fertile area in current developments in research metrics and innovation & ideas should continue to evolve throughout the project.
Marketing:
Strengths: The project blog is set up, and is linked to by an existing and well visited blog, so the project should attract attention. Ditto for Twitter. / There is a real advocacy benefit to be reaped if this service fits closely with the users’ workflows.
Weaknesses: Difficult to market a potential service before a working prototype is available.
Opportunities: Possibility of engaging with user community recruited by JournalTocsApi project.
Threats: Lack of local and wider community engagement.
Operations:
Strengths: Project managed / outputs will be implemented by established repository team responsible for overall development of repository infrastructure.
Weaknesses: The 6 month funding structure is a threat in terms of sustainability. What happens if we don’t have a finished service at the end of 6 months, and even if we do, how is ongoing development funded?
Opportunities: As the repository infrastructure itself is still in development there is the opportunity to integrate project outputs more easily into the evolving infrastructure.
Threats: (As yet unseen) difficulties in appropriate integration with developing repository infrastructure.
External factors:
Political:
Strengths: Potential to fit in with broader political zeitgeist in HE – contribute to developing processes for REF.
Threats: Conflict with commercial interests of Thomson Reuters.
Economic:
Strengths: Low cost project with the potential to deliver a flexible product with wide opportunity for reuse accross the sector.
Threats: Not yet clear what the extent of the ‘free’ service will be from Thomson Reuters – there may be additional, unforseen costs.
Social:
Strengths: Well established (within) #jiscri community utilising Twitter/blogs.
Opportunities: Possibility of engaging with user community recruited by JournalTocsApi project.
Threats: Lack of engagement of wider HE communities.
Technological:
Strengths: Third party API should result in robust application.
Weaknesses: Early question marks around API / documentation – current documentation out of date; revised documentation expected by the end of August 2009.
Threats: Revised documentation won’t be available in line with project lifecycle.
Legal:
Threats: Thomson Reuters commercial model not fully defined – potential implications for reuse
