Ch01 Discussion Light

Editor's Notes

• #2: Note to Instructors We have included extra discussion notes for the I/O Model of Above-Average Returns. These notes include additional materials that cover McDonalds and Starbucks and their strategies. These notes are spread over the first few lecture notes pages where the model is first presented. We have also included extra discussion notes for the Resource-Based Model of Above-Average Returns. These notes include additional material that discusses two axiomatic assumptions. First, resources are distributed heterogeneously across firms, and second, these resources cannot be transferred between firms without cost. Research references are included and extensive discussion here may help you present this concept. There is also discussion regarding “inventions” as an example of a resource that is valuable, rare, hard to imitate and not substitutable. The notes are spread over the first few lecture notes pages, beginning where the model is first presented.
• #18: I/O Model: McDonalds and Starbucks Respectively, in both cases the CEOs Ray Crock and Howard Schultz were examining the industry in which they worked. Crock was a sales rep for a firm that built malted milkshake machines. Schultz was a sales rep for a company that made home espresso machine accessories. Both noticed that there was a customer that was purchasing a large volume of these machines. They made trips to the locations of these stores and noticed that each was in an emerging industry that had high-growth potential and higher-than-average profit margins. McDonalds is in fast-food and drive-thru restaurants and Starbucks is in specialty coffee retail.
• #19: Four Assumptions of the I/O Model Both Crock and Schultz identified the strategy that allowed their companies to achieve high profits: McDonalds through the “assembly line” of their burgers  and Starbucks with product marketing that created ambiance and consistency, a value perception that allowed them to charge high premium for their coffee.
• #20: Four Assumptions of the I/O Model (cont.) Both McDonalds and Starbucks then spent time and capital to acquire and develop the skills needed to implement the business strategy. Crock became a business partner of the McDonald brothers and sold franchise agreements for them. Schultz took a position in the marketing department of Starbucks. Each later purchased the firm and used what they had learned to rapidly expand the company. Crock was able to use McDonalds quality, consistency, rapid assembly system, and drive-thru concepts to continue to realize high profits. Schultz was able to use the Starbucks image, ambiance concept, and marketing strengths to rapidly expand. One interesting note: Initially, Schultz started a Seattle coffeehouse chain (Il Giorande) that competed with Starbucks. His marketing manager was so adamant that Starbucks was a better concept capable of “going global” that Schultz sold his original coffeehouse chain and purchased Starbucks.
• #28: Resource-based model: Patents and Inventions The resource-based view (RBV) of the firm is hedged on two axiomatic assumptions. First, resources are distributed heterogeneously across firms, and second, these resources cannot be transferred between firms without cost. These axioms lend themselves to two additional tenets (cf., Barney, 1991): (a) Resources that simultaneously enhance a firm’s market effectiveness (valuable) and are not widely dispersed (rare) can produce competitive advantage; and (b) when such resources are concurrently expensive to imitate (inimitable) and costly to substitute (nonsubstitutable), the competitive advantage is sustainable. Thus, value and rarity are each necessary before inimitability and nonsubstitutability might yield a sustainable competitive advantage (Priem & Butler, 2001).
• #29: Resource-based model: Patents and Inventions (cont.) Despite its face validity and rapid diffusion throughout the management literature, there have only been limited empirical tests of RBV’s tenets (cf., Priem & Butler, 2001). To echo Miller and Shamsie (1996, p. 519), “the concept of resources remains an amorphous one that is rarely operationally defined or tested for its performance implications in different competitive environments.” Many managers use RBV’s terms with little specificity or attention to causal relationships. Researchers have identified several types of valuable and rare resources that could generate rents. Some examples include information technology (Powell, 1997), strategic planning (Powell, 1992), organizational alignment (Powell, 1992a), human resources management (Lado & Wilson, 1994; Wright & McMahan, 1992), trust (Barney & Hansen, 1994), organizational culture (Oliver, 1997), administrative skills (Powell, 1993), expertise of top management (Castanias & Helfat, 1991), and even Guanxicomplex networks (Tsang, 1998).
• #30: Resource-based model: Patents and Inventions (cont.) The degree to which RBV is likely to help managers depends on the extent to which it can be used to achieve competitive advantage. Hence, recently, Markman and his colleagues have attempted to clarify three basic questions: (1) Can a single resource be simultaneously valuable, rare, inimitable, and nonsubstitutable? (2) Can an inimitable and nonsubstitutable resource be measured? And (3) To what extent is an inimitable and nonsubstitutable resource associated with competitive advantage? Using five-year data from 85 large, publicly traded pharmaceutical companies, Markman and his colleagues advance the view that a single resource-patented invention could qualify as simultaneously valuable, rare, hard to imitate, and difficult to substitute. In other words, the answer to the first question is yes; some patents are valuable, rare, inimitable, and nonsubstitutable resources. The answers to the second and third questions are “yes” as well. That is, controlling for assets, sales, and investment in R&D, they found that a patent’s quality and scope are significantly related to competitive advantage as captured by new products and, to some extent, to profitability.
• #31: Four Attributes of Resources and Capabilities (Competitive Advantage) Despite these findings and the intuitive appeal of RBV, challenges remain. Priem and Butler (2001) noted that a resource that is valuable, rare, hard to imitate, and not substitutable is also difficult to assess, manipulate, or deploy, and therefore difficult to exploit. Their analytical assessment spurred an important debate regarding RBV’s practical utility. For example, tacit knowledge, organizational learning, workflow, time, interorganizational ties, communications, and human interactions might be seen as hard to imitate and nonsubstitutable resources, but such resources are neither necessarily rare nor inevitably valuable. Thus, while many “things” might be classified as resources, intangibles are less amenable to managerial manipulation, rendering their associations with competitive advantage tenuous. For example, tacit knowledge is frequently conceptualized as a source of competitive advantage, yet we don’t know how (and at what rate) managers create and use that which is inherently unknowable. Personnel, machinery, land, technical procedures, and financial capital are relatively easy to quantify resources. Brand names, however, and organizational knowledge, learning, and culture are extremely difficult to craft, use, measure, and manage. In sum, the practical utility of RBV to managers remains weak as long as we fail to explicitly parameterize and measure the extent to which certain resources are valuable, rare, inimitable, and nonsubstitutable.