Title: An intuitionistic fuzzy DEMATEL methodology for prioritising the components of SWOT matrix in the Iranian insurance industry

Authors: Amin Vafadar Nikjoo; Mahdi Saeedpoor

Addresses: Department of Management and Accounting, Allameh Tabataba'i University, Valiasr Avenue, 1434863111, Tehran, Iran ' Department of Management and Accounting, Allameh Tabataba'i University, Valiasr Avenue, 1434863111, Tehran, Iran

Abstract: Strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats (SWOT) analysis is one of the most significant analytic tools for defining corporate strategies. In spite of its popularity and common use, it has many drawbacks such as lack of quantitative basis for identifying the most important internal and external factors. In this paper, we propose a methodology based on decision-making trial and evaluation laboratory (DEMATEL) technique which can deal with the causal relationships among factors to overcome this problem. Also, in order to embrace the vagueness of human's subjective judgments we take advantage of intuitionistic fuzzy sets (IFS) theory. Finally, we applied our methodology in one of the Iranian insurance company to determine the most important components of SWOT matrix. The results determined 15 prioritised components of SWOT matrix out of 23 elements which were previously identified by our expert team. The resulting components can be utilised for defining effective strategies of the case company.

Keywords: SWOT analysis; intuitionistic fuzzy set theory; DEMATEL; Iran; insurance industry; fuzzy logic; causal relationships; subjective judgments; vagueness.

DOI: 10.1504/IJOR.2014.063152

International Journal of Operational Research, 2014 Vol.20 No.4, pp.439 - 452

Received: 30 Oct 2012
Accepted: 17 Dec 2012
Published online: 29 Jul 2014 *

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