Internal Analysis

Question 1

-Q: According to the Internal Analysis how can the firm be seen?

Answer 1

The firm can be seen as a bundle of resources under common ownership/governance.
Firms need core competencies to obtain a competitive advantage and sustain it

Question 2

Q: What are core competencies?

Answer 2

Q: What are core competencies?

capabilities that serve as a source of competitive advantage for a firm over its rivals

the activities the company performs especially well compared with competitors and through which the firm adds unique value to its goods or services over a long period of time.

Question 3

Q: What is the criteria you should evaluate resources to determine potential for a sustainable competitive advantage?

Answer 3

aluable (help a firm exploit opportunities or neutralize threats)

Rare (are not possessed by other firms)

Costly-to-imitate (like interpersonal complexity, ambiguous cause, or historial like organizational culture or reputation)

Non-substituable

Question 4

Q: What does the value chain do?

Answer 4

It’s an alternative way to analyze resources

Value chain analysis (VCA) refers to the process whereby a firm determines the costs associated with organizational activities from purchasing raw materials to manufacturing product(s) to marketing those products.

aims to identify where low-cost advantages or disadvantages exist anywhere along the value chain from raw material to customer service activities

Question 5

Q: What are the steps in the value chain analysis and identifying core competencies?

Answer 5

identify the VC activities

identify strenghts and weaknesses in the value chain activities

analyze whether any of the strenghts are core competencies are core competencies and the potential basis for a sustainable competitive advantage suing the 4 criteria

Assess the strategic implications of your analysis

Relatively to the weaknesses:

• How can you obtain the resources and caoabilities you need to overcome your weaknesses?
• Can you outsource something?

Relatively to the strengths in the value chain:

• In case it is temporary advantage, how can you extend it?
• In case it is a sustainable competitive advantage, how can you best exploit and reinforce?

Question 6

Q: Name the primary activities of value chain analysis?

Answer 6

• Inbound logistics: used to receive, store and disseminate inputs to a product like warehousing, inventory control and materials handling.
• Operations: necessary to cover the inputs into the products like machining, assemply, packaging and equipment maintenance.
• Outbounds logistics: include collecting storing and physically distributing the final product to customers like finished-goods warehousing, order processing
• Marketing and sales: Activities completed to provide means through which customers can purchase products and to induce them to do so, like through advertising and promotional campaigns, select appropriate distribution channels, and select, develop, and support their sales force.
• Service Activities designed to enhance or maintain a product’s value like installation, repair, training, and adjustment.

Question 7

Q: What are the support activities of value chain?

Answer 7

Q: What are the support activities of value chain?

• Procurement: purchase the inputs needed to produce a firm’s products. Purchased inputs include items fully consumed during the manufacture of products (e.g., raw materials and supplies, as well as fixed assets— machinery, laboratory equipment, office equipment, and buildings).
• Technological Development: improve a firm’s product and the processes used to manufacture it (process equipment, basic research and product design, and servicing procedures)
• Human Resources Management: recruiting hiring, deveoping, training,

Firm Infrastructure: activities such as general management, planning, finance, accounting, legal support, and governmental relations that are required to support the work of the entire value chain.