Town of Cochrane Strategic Plan – Final Report October 2014
3.1 Cochrane’s SWOT Analyses: Small Business and Technology
The findings relevant for E-business uptake in Cochrane are presented in Table 2 below.
Table 2: Recurring or Relevant Themes from Phase 1’s technology and SME SWOT analyses
Feature
Cochrane Telecom
Services (CTS)
Board of Trade (BoT)
Local business’ attitude
Partnership Possibilities
ICT skills are lacking
Description of Finding
•
Identified as offering excellent ICT services, including broadband Internet
connectivity with up to 5MB/s download speeds and some fibre
backbone.
•
Viewed by citizens as lacking transparency. This may have implications
for CTS’ ability to spearhead initiatives aimed at promoting E-business
applications and/or skills development.
•
Where the BoT was noted to be successful in some campaigns (downtown
wreaths, job fairs, etc.) it was felt overall to be ineffective. This is due to
the public’s perception of the Board as idle and lacking a proactive drive.
Worse than a negative public perspective, businesses themselves were
noted to see little benefit in the BoT’s activities.
•
Having a proactive capacity-building organisation acting as champion of
the business community will prove essential to facilitation of E-business
activity.
•
Local businesses were identified as lacking an interest in the Internet or
community initiatives, and have only moderately begun to adopt Ebusiness applications.
•
Importantly, Cochrane’s SMEs were noted to believe they needed no
assistance and are resistant to change.
•
The SWOT indicates that opportunities do exist for partnerships among
internal and external partners. Although the BoT was noted to have its
challenges, its close relationship to Council is a positive feature of the
community’s internal capacity.
•
NEOnet was cited by the technology SWOT as a potential partner in
securing funding for E-businesses and for offering ICT skills training in the
community.
•
The SWOT demonstrates that Cochrane is behind the curve in terms of
ICT skills training and interest. Where previous attempts were made to
offer workshops, the business community proved apathetic. This has
resulted in low technology literacy levels.
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