Purpose – The concept of strategic groups is a central theme in the field of strategic management, and over time it has been used by a considerable body of theoretical and empirical literature to examine different aspects of competitive strategy. However, to date, there has been little...

Purpose – This study aims to: identify organizational and environmental factors affecting strategic decision‐making speed; examine the relationship between those factors and innovation performance; and clarify the relationship between strategic decision‐making speed and innovation performance....

Underlines that the development of a new European market for a UK company has to be strategically planned. Examines the introduction to the Dutch market of a particular northern UK beer product, suggesting that the use of strategic tools and a traditional marketing plan is essential while the...

Discusses the death of inter‐firm and intra‐firm competition as we know it and propose an approach beyond competition – “the pursuit of immortality”. Our digital age offers immense and unprecedented opportunities to bring forth the latent potential of organizations, by allowing...

Human resource management’s challenge is to improve the balance among three competing quality targets: equity, flexibility and alignment. Management of these targets has improved through four historical periods: the pre‐industrial, paternalist, bureaucratic and high performance. There always...

Agile manufacturing is a response to competition in environments characterised by unpredictable change, so having the ability to vary capacity, respond to sporadic changes in demand, mass customise at the cost of mass production, and compete in both mass and custom markets is crucial. Empirical...

Presents a practical exploration of business manoeuvre theory, examining the application of a developing military war fighting doctrine and how this can be transferred to the business mindscape in order to influence future planning. Suggests that attackers have strategic advantage over defenders...

Purpose – The purpose of this research is to improve the success rate and quality of outcome when strategy tools are used in practical situations. Design/methodology/approach – Draws on post‐experience teaching and uses conceptual reasoning to propose a typology of tool applications....

Purpose – The purpose of this article is to record an interview with George Stalk of The Boston Consulting Group. Design/methodology/approach – The article cites illustrative examples of a selection of notably successful companies including Toyota, Dell, CarMax, Ford Customer Service...

Purpose – The paper aims to address the following questions: “How is value created within a firm?” and “Is the distinction between competitive and corporate strategy helpful in considering the processes of value creation?” Design/methodology/approach – The paper distinguishes five...