COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE introduces a whole new way of understanding what a firm does. Porter's groundbreaking concept of the value chain disaggregates a company into 'activities', or the discrete functions or processes that represent the elemental building blocks of competitive advantage. Now an essential part of international business thinking, COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE takes strategy from broad vision to an internally consistent configuration of activities. Its powerful framework provides the tools to understand the drivers of cost and a company's relative cost position. Porter's value chain enables managers to isolate the underlying sources of buyer value that will command a premium price, and the reasons why one product or service substitutes for another. He shows how competitive advantage lies not only in activities themselves but in the way activities relate to each other, to supplier activities, and to customer activities. That the phrases 'competitive advantage' and 'sustainable competitive advantage' have become commonplace is testimony to the power of Porter's ideas. COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE has guided countless companies, business school students, and scholars in understanding the roots of competition. Porter's work captures the extraordinary complexity of competition in a way that makes strategy both concrete and actionable.

Competitive advantage: creating and sustaining superior performance

Theorists in various fields have discussed characteristics of top managers. This paper attempts to synthesize these previously fragmented literatures around a more general “upper echelons perspective.” The theory states that organizational outcomes—strategic choices and performance levels—are partially predicted by managerial background characteristics. Propositions and methodological suggestions are included.

Upper Echelons: The Organization as a Reflection of Its Top Managers

The primary purpose of this article is to clarify the nature of the entrepreneurial orientation (EO) construct and to propose a contingency framework for investigating the relationship between EO and firm performance. We first explore and refine the dimensions of EO and discuss the usefulness of viewing a firm's EO as a multidimensional construct. Then, drawing on examples from the EO-related contingencies literature, we suggest alternative models (moderating effects, mediating effects, independent effects, interaction effects) for testing the EO-performance relationship.

Clarifying the Entrepreneurial Orientation Construct and Linking It To Performance

It is argued that (a) social identification is a perception of oneness with a group of persons; (b) social identification stems from the categorization of individuals, the distinctiveness and prestige of the group, the salience of outgroups, and the factors that traditionally are associated with group formation; and (c) social identification leads to activities that are congruent with the identity, support for institutions that embody the identity, stereotypical perceptions of self and others, and outcomes that traditionally are associated with group formation, and it reinforces the antecedents of identification. This perspective is applied to organizational socialization, role conflict, and intergroup relations.

Social Identity Theory and the Organization

计量经济分析 = Econometric analysis

Selection Processes inside Organizations: The Self-Reinforcing Consequences of Success

Visualising Facebook: A Comparative Perspective

Reply to Michel Callon.

There is ample discussion of MBA self-serving values in the corporate social responsibility literature, and yet empirical studies regarding the corporate manifestations and consequences of those values are scant. In a comprehensive study of major US public corporations, we find that MBA CEOs are more apt than their non-MBA counterparts to engage in short-term strategic expedients such as positive earnings management and suppression of R&D, which in turn are followed by compromised firm market valuations.

MBA CEOs, Short-Term Management and Performance

This paper examines some sources of strategic simplicity: the tendency of strategies to focus on a few competitive tactics or methods. Simple strategies can be contrasted with those that are comprehensive and multifaceted. An empirical study of four Canadian industries revealed that environmental uncertainty and environmental scanning are both negatively related to simplicity. This supports a functional rationale that more comprehensive strategies are demanded by uncertain environments, and that scanning helps managers design such strategies. It also supports a cognitive rationale that uncertainty and scanning help combat tunnel vision and broaden managerial mental models. However, uncertainty and scanning were also found to interact negatively in their impact on simplicity: paradoxically, scanning is especially likely to reduce simplicity if the environment is stable, and uncertainty is especially likely to reduce simplicity in the absence of scanning. This finding is difficult to interpret using a functional rationale. Managerial responses thus may be quasi-rational in that seemingly functional main effects appear less so upon exploration of the interaction effects and performance implications. Resume Cette recherche examine quelques sources de simplicite strategique : la tendance des strategies de se concentrer sur quelques tactiques ou methodes competitives. Les strategies simples peuvent etre comparees aux strategies exhaustives et complexes. Une etude empirique de quatre industries canadiennes revele que l'incertitude et l'exploration environnementales sont toutes deux reliees de fa,con negative i la simplicite. Cela appuie une argumentation selon laquelle certains environnemertts requi*rent des strategies plus exhaustives et l'exploration aide les administrateurs a concevoir de telles strategies. Cela suppose egalement un resultat anterieur qui veut que l'incertitude et l'exploration aident a contrer la vision simpliste et a elargir les schemas conceptuels des gestionnaires. Toutefois, nous avons demontre que l'incertitude et l'exploration inter-agissent de faeon negative par rapport a leur impact sur la simplicite : de fa,con paradoxale, l'exploration semble particulierement apte a reduire la simplicite lorsque l'envirortent est stable tandis que l'incertitude est plutot sujette it riduire la simplicite lorsque l'exploration est absente. Cette decouverte est difficile a interpreter it l'aide d'un e comprehension fonctionnelle des organisations. Les reponses des gestionnaires apparaissent donc quasirationnelles dans le sens oil des effets principaux, fonctionnels en apparence, sent perdre cette particularite lorsqu'on explore les effets de l'interaction et ceux de la performance. Recent research has begun to explore the issue of strategic simplicity-the tendency of many companies to employ a very narrow range of competitive methods in their business strategies (Lumpkin & Dess, 1995; Miller, 1990, 1993, 1996; Miller & Chen, 1996; Miller, Lant, Milliken, & Korn, 1996). Here we employ a content definition of strategy-strategy is simply the repertoire of methods used to develop, produce, and sell actual products or services (Porter, 1985, 1996). Strategies that are simple are usually dominated by one or two methods or bases for competing: operational efficiency or high product quality, for example. Simple strategies are to be contrasted with those that are more comprehensive-that incorporate a broader range of methods and tactics. More comprehensive strategies might be indicated by efficiency-seeking activities being complemented, say, by good advertising, responsive customer service, and strategic alliances. Strategic simplicity is attractive to many top managers because it allows them to concentrate on their favourite activities, presumably those they are most adept at or most comfortable with (Miller, 1990, 1993; Treacy & Wiersema, 1995a). Some have argued that in the absence of significant problems or challenges from the environment, managers will tend naturally to concentrate more and more on their favourite methods of competing, while increasingly neglecting other methods (Miller, 1990, 1993, 1996; Starbuck & Milliken, 1988). …

Danny Miller

Papers

Selection Processes inside Organizations: The Self-Reinforcing Consequences of Success

Visualising Facebook: A Comparative Perspective

Reply to Michel Callon.

MBA CEOs, Short-Term Management and Performance

Quasi‐rational Organizational Responses: Functional and Cognitive Sources of Strategic Simplicity