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

A radio programme which asked how Trinidadians might be spotted wherever they are found unexpectedly highlighted a particular form of anti‐social individualistic behaviour called boldface. This is contrasted with a recent ethnography of its opposite shamefaced behaviour in nearby Guyana. It is suggested that these differences relate partly to differences in the recent history of the two states, but that they also point to a core contradiction in the concept of citizenship as a political ideal.

Spot the Trini

Final Report. Information Society: Emergent Technologiesand Development Communities in the South

The literature on family firms is divided. Some scholars argue that the parochial socioemotional wealth goals of family actors detract from firm financial results; others maintain that family prior...

"Community Values, Family Firm Governance and Performance: An Ecology of Institutional Logics"

The social affiliations of owners appear to affect business conduct and performance in Fortune 1000 enterprises. Family owners' ties to one another relate to entrenchment, resource extraction, and strategic conservatism. "Entrepreneur" owners without family ties in the firm pursue growth priorities, investing more in the firm and reaping higher shareholder returns.

Divided loyalties: governance, conduct and performance in family and entrepreneur businesses.

¼: Early-onset scoliosis (EOS) or kyphosis is common in patients with neurofibromatosis (NF) and is characterized by rapid progression of deformity. ¼: Traditional growing rods provide good functional and deformity outcomes in patients with NF and EOS; magnetically controlled growing rods (MCGRs) also provide good deformity correction, although high rates of revision have been reported after their use. ¼: Among patients with NF type 1 (NF1), morphologic characteristics of the spinal deformity are different in those with paraspinal neurofibromas than in those without paraspinal tumors. ¼: Patients with NF1 are at low risk for developing malignant peripheral nerve sheath tumors during childhood (<1%) and their lifetime (8% to 12%), and routine imaging surveillance for malignancy in the absence of symptoms should be clinically directed. ¼: Further investigation is needed to standardize screening for EOS in children with NF1 and to develop guidelines for ideal imaging modalities, including their frequency and a timeline.

Danny Miller

Papers

Spot the Trini

Final Report. Information Society: Emergent Technologiesand Development Communities in the South

"Community Values, Family Firm Governance and Performance: An Ecology of Institutional Logics"

Divided loyalties: governance, conduct and performance in family and entrepreneur businesses.

Early-Onset Spinal Deformity in Neurofibromatosis Type 1: Natural History, Treatment, and Imaging Surveillance.