Strategic management: Be competitive

This week you will be introduced to the strategy framework that captures the components of competitive strategy. The components of competitive strategy are: strategy content, internal strategy context, and external strategy context. You will develop an understanding of how those components contribute to value creation and value capture. You will gain understanding of the key characteristics of competitive strategy, starting with two foundational topics: First, we will establish that organisations are all about value creation. You will understand what value means, and also how value creation has become a central topic in organisations. Second, you will learn about what strategy actually is and what the characteristics of competitive strategy are.

This week you will learn to analyse the aspects of the external strategy context directly related to your business: customers and competitors. You will learn how to conduct customer segmentation and targeting, assess the competitive landscape in an industry, and know which factors affect the degree of competition in an industry.

This week you will continue to look at the external strategy context, this time analysing the industry and the broader macro-environment. You will learn how to discover the stakeholders that affect your industry, know which industry forces affect competitive strategies,and identify which macro-environmental factors affect competitive strategies. You will develop understanding of the Porter's 5 Forces framework to analyse the forces in the industry context. You will also learn how to conduct a PESTEL analysis to assess the impact of Political, Economic, Social, Technological, Environmental/physical and Legal (PESTEL) factors on business.

This week, you will focus on the competitive strategy content. you will learn about the so-called generic competitive strategies, which are also often called positioning strategies. After conducting customer segmentation, competitor analysis, and a macro-environmental scan, you have to decide which competitive strategy and strategic positioning is most promising in your industry and for the respective segments: differentiating your products based on provided benefits or following a low cost strategy?You will develop skills to help you understand how to position your organisation as a value for money provider by being a cost leader in the market, and how to become a differentiated provider.