Strategic analysis of the external environment and its impact on achieving sustainable competitive advantage

Abstract

This study deals with the strategic analysis of the external environment with the dimensions represented by (opportunities, threats), and to highlight the opportunities that are invested to achieve the goals of the organization and reduce the threats to which the organization is exposed and represent an existing danger to reach the goals of the organization, And the role of these external dimensions in achieving, maintaining and sustaining competitive advantage, by using data from a sample of commercial banks in the Middle Euphrates region, knowing the availability of appropriate opportunities in banking organizations, and monitoring and following up on the threats they face, especially since organizations live in a rapidly changing environment with renewed desires to Customers’ tastes, which necessitates achieving a sustainable competitive advantage appropriate to its capabilities and capabilities, which enables the organization to excel in its field of specialization by constantly providing the different and unique to its customers and the best of its competitors, This study started from a problem expressing a number of intellectual and applied questions about the extent of the impact of strategic analysis of the external environment on achieving and confronting competition and its sustainability, Where the study used a set of statistical analyzes and tests using statistical programs (AMOS, Excel, Spss), and a special measuring tool was designed to collect the necessary data that serve the study subjects.

The research has reached a set of conclusions, the most important of which are: Banking institutions are affected by external factors of opportunities and reduce the threats to which institutions are exposed to face competition and competitors, The research concluded with a set of recommendations, the most important of which were: the need to analyze the external environment of institutions to find out the appropriate opportunities and exploit them correctly and to reduce the threats they are exposed to and reduce or confront them to reach the success of the institution and face market competition.