Competitive advantage

About: Competitive advantage is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 46689 publications have been published within this topic receiving 1542774 citations. The topic is also known as: competitive edge & edge up.

Exploring internal stickiness: Impediments to the transfer of best practice within the firm

Abstract: The ability to transfer best practices internally is critical to a firtn's ability to build competitive advantage through the appropriation of rents from scarce internal knowledge. Just as a firm's distinctive competencies tnight be dificult for other firms to imitate, its best prczctices could be dfficult to imitate internnlly. Yet, little systematic attention has been pcrid to such internal stickiness. The author analyzes itlterrzal stickiness of knowledge transfer crnd tests the resulting model using canonical correlation analysis of a data set consisting of 271 observations of 122 best-practice transfers in eight companies. Contrary to corzverztiorzrzl wisdom that blames primarily motivational factors, the study findings show the major barriers to internal knowledge transfer to be knowledge-related factors such as the recipient's lack oj absorptive capacity, causal anzbiguity, and an arciuous relationship between the source and the recipient. The identification and transfer of best practices cally are hindered less by confidentiality and legal is emerging as one of the most important and obstacles than external transfers, they could be widespread practical management issues of the faster and initially less complicated, all other latter half of the 1990s. Armed with meaningful, things being equal. For those reasons, in an era detailed performance data, firms that use fact- when continuous organizational learning and based management methods such as TQM, bench- relentless performance improvement are needed to marking, and process reengineering can regularly remain competitive, companies must increasingly compare the performance of their units along resort to the internal transfer of capabilitie~.~ operational dimensions. Sparse but unequivocal Yet, experience shows that transferring capaevidence suggests that such comparisons often bilities within a firm is far from easy. General reveal surprising performance differences between Motors had great difficulty in transferring manuunits, indicating a need to improve knowledge facturing practices between divisions (Kerwin and utilization within the firm (e.g., Chew, Bresnahan, Woodruff, 1992: 74) and IBM had limited suc

A Natural-Resource-Based View of the Firm

Abstract: Historically, management theory has ignored the constraints imposed by the biophysical (natural) environment. Building upon resource-based theory, this article attempts to fill this void by proposing a natural-resource-based view of the firm—a theory of competitive advantage based upon the firm's relationship to the natural environment. It is composed of three interconnected strategies: pollution prevention, product stewardship, and sustainable development. Propositions are advanced for each of these strategies regarding key resource requirements and their contributions to sustained competitive advantage.

Strategic Factor Markets: Expectations, Luck, and Business Strategy

Abstract: Much of the current thinking about competitive strategy focuses on ways that firms can create imperfectly competitive product markets in order to obtain greater than normal economic performance. However, the economic performance of firms does not depend simply on whether or not its strategies create such markets, but also on the cost of implementing those strategies. Clearly, if the cost of strategy implementation is greater than returns obtained from creating an imperfectly competitive product market, then firms will not obtain above normal economic performance from their strategizing efforts. To help analyze the cost of implementing strategies, we introduce the concept of a strategic factor market, i.e., a market where the resources necessary to implement a strategy are acquired. If strategic factor markets are perfect, then the cost of acquiring strategic resources will approximately equal the economic value of those resources once they are used to implement product market strategies. Even if such strategies create imperfectly competitive product markets, they will not generate above normal economic performance for a firm, for their full value would have been anticipated when the resources necessary for implementation were acquired. However, strategic factor markets will be imperfectly competitive when different firms have different expectations about the future value of a strategic resource. In these settings, firms may obtain above normal economic performance from acquiring strategic resources and implementing strategies. We show that other apparent strategic factor market imperfections, including when a firm already controls all the resources needed to implement a strategy, when a firm controls unique resources, when only a small number of firms attempt to implement a strategy, and when some firms have access to lower cost capital than others, and so on, are all special cases of differences in expectations held by firms about the future value of a strategic resource. Firms can attempt to develop better expectations about the future value of strategic resources by analyzing their competitive environments or by analyzing skills and capabilities they already control. Environmental analysis cannot be expected to improve the expectations of some firms better than others, and thus cannot be a source of more accurate expectations about the future value of a strategic resource. However, analyzing a firm's skills and capabilities can be a source of more accurate expectations. Thus, from the point of view of firms seeking greater than normal economic performance, our analysis suggests that strategic choices should flow mainly from the analysis of its unique skills and capabilities, rather than from the analysis of its competitive environment.

How information gives you competitive advantage

Abstract: Most general managers know that the revolution is under way, and few dispute its importance. As more and more of their time and investment capital is absorbed in information technology and its effects, executives have a growing awareness that the technology can no longer be the exclusive territory of EDP or IS departments. As they see their rivals use information for competitive advantage, these executives recognize the need to become directly involved in the management of the new technology. In the face of rapid change, however, they don’t know how.