Monday, June 23, 2008

Management Tips: Creativity for business leaders

Liberalisation, Privatisation and globalisation policies compel industries to compete with the world’s most efficient, innovative, quality-conscious organisations. To survive and thrive in a hyper - competitive environment, individuals as well as organisation should be highly creative.

Creative thinking

Creative thinking involves the ability to find solutions to problems by changing one’s point of view when normal channels fail to give the answers.

Creative abilities

A problem develops when a goal is not achieved. By equipping, developing and sharpening creative abilities, one can solve the problems effectively and efficiently. These abilities are:

Fluency, flexibility, originality, problem sensitivity, ability to elaborate and ability to re-structure.

Steps in creativity

Step - 1: Information Survey

What are we going to achieve?

Have we got right information?

Step - 2: Building a Solution

Once the goal is clear, we can use the idea - generating techniques to come up with possible solutions. A quick use of a technique, perhaps taking 2 or 3 minutes.

Steps - 3: Reality Check

How the suggested solution will affect others in the problem area? That is, bringing the output of the technique into a practical form. Consider the ‘good’ and ‘bad’ points of our idea.

Step - 4: Implementation

Here, we put the solution into practice. This probably the most important stage. Many good ideas have failed due to poor implementation.

Obstacles to creativity

The following aspects, however, hinders creativity:

(1) Our pre-assumption about something leads to convergent thinking.

(2) Structure of brain, which is divided into two halves, is also responsible. The left half handles sequential thought and speech and those functions.

The right half is responsible for holistic thought, images and those functions, generally regarded as artistic.

We give more importance to the left side of the brain than the right. But creativity is a whole brain function.

(3) Obstacles to new ideas uproot originality.

Positive emotions

Positive emotions and creativity go hand in hand. The most obvious reason: Positive emotions leads to stress reduction which improves present mindedness as a result of better blood flow to the brain.

Another suggestion: Keep a problem constantly in your mind. Not in a stressful or anxious way, but enough to impress on your subconscious the importance of working this one through and, in time for you to gather the facts you need to reach a decision.

The following questions are designed to help you to solve any kind of problem in a Creative manner. Try applying them to one or two problems that confront you at present.

Understanding the problem

1. Have you defined the problem or objective in your own words?

2. Are there any other possible definitions of it worth considering? What general solutions do they suggest?

3. Decide what you are trying to perform. Where are you now and what are you trying to achieve?

4. Identify the important facts and factors. Do you need to spend more time on obtaining more information? What are the relevant policies, rules or procedures?

5. Have you reduced the complex problem to its simplest terms without over-simplifying it?

Towards solving the problem

6. Have you checked all your main assumptions?

7. Ask yourself and others several questions. What? Why? How? When? Where? Who?

8. List the obstacles that seem to block your path to a solution.

9. Work backwards. Imaging for yourself the end state, and then work from there to where you are now.

10. List all possible solutions, ways forward or courses of action.

11. Decide upon the criteria by which they must be put into action.

12. Narrow down the list to the feasible solutions, that is, the ones that are possible given the resources available.

How to be more creative

Creative thinking cannot be forced. It has to be discovered! It is often best to leave if for a while and let your subconscious mind take over.

Your subconscious and unconscious part of the brain - could open the door for you to this second key habit of mind.

Many people are still not even aware that their depth minds can carry out important mental functions for them, such as synthesising parts into new wholes or establishing new connections while they are engaged in other activities. Therefore they don’t listen with their inner ears.

Imaging your mind is like a personal fax machine. It would be good if you could sit down for an hour each morning before breakfast and receive inspired fax messages from your depth mind.

How to tap your mind power and brain power

1. There is a grat deal of untapped power within us. Creative thinking is exploring an unknown hinterland.

2. The meta-functions of the mind at work - analysing, valuing and synthesising - resonate in the whole mind.

Your depth mind - your subsequent and unconscious mind - replicates these functions.

3. Your depth mind is capable of more than analysis. It is the seat of your memory, at lest a part of it, and it’s also the repository of values that lie too deep for words. It is also a workshop where creative syntheses can be made by an invisible workmanship.

4. You most probably have experienced the beneficial effects of sleeping on a problem, and awakening to find that you mind has made itself up. Use that principle by programming your dept mind for a few minutes as you lie in the dark before you go to sleep.

5. Your dreams may occasionally be directly relevant. It is much more likely, however, that some indication, clue or idea will occur to you after ‘sleeping on it’. Perhaps during your waking hours for instance while you are shaving or washing the dishes, the idea will flash into your mind.

6. Follow Francis Bacon’s sound advice: A person would do well to carry a pencil in their pocket and write down the thoughts of the moment.

Those that come unsought are commonly the most valuable and should be secured, because they seldom return.

7. Remember: presentmindedness, using you mind power and brain power positive emotions, stress reduction, and creativity enhancement go together. You will discover many useful ways to enhance your creative power with your newfound enthusiasm.

By Dr. K. Kuhathasan, CEO: Cenlead

Friday, April 18, 2008

Convert unix time to normal time from while copying data from mysql data files to sql server 2005

Follow the steps mention in posting,


Sunday, March 23, 2008
Copy data from mysql data files to sql server 2005

Until “Again next and write sql query to get data. (table by table)

This step when you select data you can use “FROM_UNIXTIME and convert unix time to normal time.

For Eg:

Without considering the unix time here is the SQL script,

select`id`,`time`,`userid`,`ip`,`course`,`module`,`cmid`,`action`,`url`,`info`

from mdl_log_sem1

Considering the unix time here is the SQL script,

select `id`,FROM_UNIXTIME(`time`),`userid`,`ip`,`course`,`module`,`cmid` ,`action`,`url`,`info`

from mdl_log_sem1

Here simply use as FROM_UNIXTIME(`time`)

time- name of the field



then other steps are same as in the previous posting.

convert unix_timestamp to normal date value

mysql>

SELECT FROM_UNIXTIME(875996580);

Result=>
FROM_UNIXTIME(875996580)
1997-10-04 13:23:00



SELECT FROM_UNIXTIME(875996580) + 0;

Result=>
FROM_UNIXTIME(875996580) + 0
19971004132300.000000



SELECT FROM_UNIXTIME(UNIX_TIMESTAMP(),'%Y %D %M %h:%i:%s %x');

Result=>
FROM_UNIXTIME(UNIX_TIMESTAMP(),'%Y %D %M %h:%i:%s %x')
2007 22nd July 07:46:11 2007

Sunday, March 23, 2008

Copy data from mysql data files to sql server 2005

Download “mysql-connector-odbc

Then open ODBC data source administrator in Administrative Tools.

Select user DNS tab and Add button.

Then select mysql odbc driver and finish.

Then,

DNS as export

Server as localhost if it’s same machine

User as user name of mysql server and password of it.

Then you can select the appropriate database from the drop down.

You will successfully create connection with mysql database.

Then open sql server 2005 and create new database.

Right click on that select tasks and then select import data.

Click next then select data source as .Net framework data provider for odbc

Type Dsn as export and driver as myodbc

Click next and select destination database(default it will select no need to do any changes simply click next)

Again next and write sql query to get data. (table by table)

Like “select * from grades

Then next, next and next and finished.

You will see that particular table will copy to sql server database..

Sunday, March 9, 2008

BI applications

BI applications include the activities of decision support systems, query and reporting, online analytical processing (OLAP), statistical analysis, forecasting, and data mining.

Business intelligence applications can be:

  • Mission-critical and integral to an enterprise's operations or occasional to meet a special requirement
  • Enterprise-wide or local to one division, department, or project
  • Centrally initiated or driven by user demand

BI with Microsoft products

Introduction

Microsoft® SQL Server™ 2005 is a complete business intelligence (BI) platform that provides the features, tools, and functionality to build both classic and innovative kinds of analytical applications. This paper provides an introduction to the tools that you will use to build an analytical application, and highlights new functionality that makes it easier than ever to build and manage complex BI systems.

The SQL Server 2005 Business Intelligence toolset delivers end-to-end BI application integration,

Design:
Business Intelligence Development Studio is the first integrated development environment designed for the business intelligence system developer. Built on Visual Studio® 2005, the Business Intelligence Development Studio delivers a rich, integrated, professional development platform for BI system developers. Debugging, source control, and script and code development are available for all components of the BI application.



Integrate:
Integration Services has been rewritten to perform complex data integration, transformation, and synthesis at high speed for very large data volumes. The Business Intelligence Development Studio makes building and debugging packages positively fun. Integration Services, Analysis Services, and Reporting Services work together to present a seamless view of data from heterogeneous sources.



Store:
SQL Server 2005 blurs the lines between relational and multidimensional databases. You can store data in the relational database, in the multidimensional database, or use the new Proactive Cache feature to get the best of both worlds.



Analyze:
Data Mining in SQL Server has always been easy to use. Now it's even better with the addition of important new algorithms, including Association Rules, Time Series, Regression Trees, Sequence Clustering, Neural Nets, and Naïve Bayes. Important new analytical capabilities have been added to Analysis Services cubes as well: Key Performance Indicator framework, MDX scripts, and other built-in advanced business analytics. The Reporting Services report delivery and management framework enables easy distribution of complex analytics to the widest possible audience.



Report:
Reporting Services extends the Microsoft Business Intelligence platform to reach the business user who needs to consume the analysis. Reporting Services is an enterprise managed reporting environment, embedded and managed using web services. Reports can be personalized and delivered in a variety of formats and with a range of interactivity and printing options. Complex analyses can reach a broad audience through the distribution of reports as a data source for downstream business intelligence. New in SQL Server 2005 is Report Builder. Report Builder provides for self service ad hoc reporting by the end user. Ad hoc query and analysis tools from Microsoft and their partners will continue to be a popular choice for accessing data in Analysis Services and relational databases.



Manage:
The SQL Server Management Studio integrates the management of all SQL Server 2005 components. Through Management Studio, BI platform components gain enhanced scalability, reliability, availability, and programmability. These enhancements provide significant benefits to the business intelligence practitioner.

Business Intelligence and Data Warehousing in SQL Server 2005

Microsoft® SQL Server™ 2005 is a complete business intelligence (BI) platform that provides the features, tools, and functionality to build both classic and innovative kinds of analytical applications. This paper provides an introduction to the tools that you will use to build an analytical application, and highlights new functionality that makes it easier than ever to build and manage complex BI systems.

The following table presents an overview of the components of a business intelligence system, and the corresponding Microsoft SQL Server 2000 and SQL Server 2005 components.

Component

SQL Server 2000

SQL Server 2005

Extract, transformation, and load

Data Transformation Services (DTS)

SQL Server 2005 Integration Services

Relational data warehouse

SQL Server 2000 relational database

SQL Server 2005 relational database

Multidimensional database

SQL Server 2000 Analysis Services

SQL Server 2005 Analysis Services

Data mining

SQL Server 2000 Analysis Services

SQL Server 2005 Analysis Services

Managed reporting

SQL Server 2000 Reporting Services

SQL Server 2005 Reporting Services

Ad hoc reporting


SQL Server 2005 Reporting Services

Ad hoc query and analysis

Microsoft Office products (Excel, Office Web Components, Data Analyzer, SharePoint Portal)

Microsoft Office products (Excel, Office Web Components, Data Analyzer, SharePoint Portal)

Database development tools

SQL Server 2000 Enterprise Manager, Analysis Manager, Query Analyzer, various other

SQL Server 2005 Business Intelligence Development Studio (New!)

Database management tools

Enterprise Manager, Analysis Manager

SQL Server 2005 SQL Server Management Studio (New!)


Two components are new for SQL Server 2005: SQL Server Management Studio and SQL Server Business Intelligence Development Studio. The other primary BI components – Integration Services, Analysis Services OLAP, Analysis Services Data Mining, and Reporting Services – are substantially different and improved in SQL Server 2005. The SQL Server 2005 relational database contains several significant new features. Although the Microsoft Office query and portal tools are not part of SQL Server, the current releases will continue to work with SQL Server 2005. The BI functionality in Microsoft Office will evolve with the Office product release cycle.

Business Intelligence Applications

BI systems beneficiaries include a wider and wider group of users starting from specialists in controlling, financial reporting and finance, through salespeople, up to members of the board. Sectors that use BI systems most frequently include trading companies, insurance companies, banks and a financial sector, telecommunications and manufacturing companies,

Retail industry

  • Forecasting. Using scanning data to forecast demand and based on the forecast, to define inventory requirements more accurately
  • Ordering and replenishment. Using information to make faster decisions about items to order and to determine optimum quantities
  • Marketing. Providing analyzes of customer transactions (what is selling, who is buying)
  • Merchandising. Defining the right merchandise for the market at any point in time, planning store level, refine inventory
  • Distribution and logistics. Helping distribution centers manage increased volumes. Can use advance shipment information to schedule and consolidate inbound and outbound freight
  • Transportation management. Developing optimal load consolidation plans and routing schedules
  • Inventory planning. Helping identify the inventory needed level, ensure a given grade of service

Insurance

  • Claims and premium analysis. The ability to analyze detailed claims and premium history by product, policy, claim type, and other specifics
  • Customer analysis. Analyze client needs and product usage patterns, develop marketing programs on client characteristics, conduct risk analysis, improving client service
  • Risk analysis. Identify high-risk market segments and opportunities in specific segments, relate market segments, reduce frequency of claims


Banking, finance and securities

  • Customer profitability analysis. Determinate the overall profitability of individual customer, current and long term, provide the basis for high-profit sales and relationship banking, maximize sales to high-value customers, reduce costs to low-value customers, provide the means to maximize profitability of new products and services
  • Credit management. Establish patterns of credit problem progression by customers class and type, warn customers to avoid credit problems, to manage credit limits, evaluate of the bank’s credit portfolio, reduce credit losses
  • Branch sales. Improve customer service and account selling, facilitate cross selling, improve customer support, strengthen customer loyalty

Telecommunications

  • Customer profiling and segmentation. Determine high-profit product profiles and customer segments, provide detailed, integrated customer profiles, develop of individualized frequent-caller programs, determine future customer needs
  • Customer demand forecasting. Forecast future product needs or service activity, provide basis for churn analysis and control for improving customer retention

Manufacturing industry

  • Sales. Provide analyzes of customer-specific transaction data
  • Forecasting. Forecast demand, define inventory requirements
  • Ordering and replenishment. Order optimum quantities of items
  • Purchasing. Helping distribution centers manage increased volumes.
  • Distribution and logistics. Can use advance shipment information to schedule and consolidate inbound and outbound freight
  • Transportation management. Developing optimal load consolidation plans and routing schedules
  • Inventory planning. Identify the inventory level needed, ensure a given grade of service

Saturday, March 8, 2008

The Strategic Planning Process

In the 1970's, many large firms adopted a formalized top-down strategic planning model. Under this model, strategic planning became a deliberate process in which top executives periodically would formulate the firm's strategy, then communicate it down the organization for implementation. The following is a flowchart model of this process:

The Strategic Planning Process

Mission


V

Objectives


V

Situation Analysis


V

Strategy Formulation


V

Implementation


V

Control

This process is most applicable to strategic management at the business unit level of the organization. For large corporations, strategy at the corporate level is more concerned with managing a portfolio of businesses. For example, corporate level strategy involves decisions about which business units to grow, resource allocation among the business units, taking advantage of synergies among the business units, and mergers and acquisitions. In the process outlined here, "company" or "firm" will be used to denote a single-business firm or a single business unit of a diversified firm.

Mission

A company's mission is its reason for being. The mission often is expressed in the form of a mission statement, which conveys a sense of purpose to employees and projects a company image to customers. In the strategy formulation process, the mission statement sets the mood of where the company should go.

Objectives

Objectives are concrete goals that the organization seeks to reach, for example, an earnings growth target. The objectives should be challenging but achievable. They also should be measurable so that the company can monitor its progress and make corrections as needed.

Situation Analysis

Once the firm has specified its objectives, it begins with its current situation to devise a strategic plan to reach those objectives. Changes in the external environment often present new opportunities and new ways to reach the objectives. An environmental scan is performed to identify the available opportunities. The firm also must know its own capabilities and limitations in order to select the opportunities that it can pursue with a higher probability of success. The situation analysis therefore involves an analysis of both the external and internal environment.

The external environment has two aspects: the macro-environment that affects all firms and a micro-environment that affects only the firms in a particular industry. The macro-environmental analysis includes political, economic, social, and technological factors and sometimes is referred to as a PEST analysis.

An important aspect of the micro-environmental analysis is the industry in which the firm operates or is considering operating. Michael Porter devised a five forces framework that is useful for industry analysis. Porter's 5 forces include barriers to entry, customers, suppliers, substitute products, and rivalry among competing firms.

The internal analysis considers the situation within the firm itself, such as:

  • Company culture
  • Company image
  • Organizational structure
  • Key staff
  • Access to natural resources
  • Position on the experience curve
  • Operational efficiency
  • Operational capacity
  • Brand awareness
  • Market share
  • Financial resources
  • Exclusive contracts
  • Patents and trade secrets

A situation analysis can generate a large amount of information, much of which is not particularly relevant to strategy formulation. To make the information more manageable, it sometimes is useful to categorize the internal factors of the firm as strengths and weaknesses, and the external environmental factors as opportunities and threats. Such an analysis often is referred to as a SWOT analysis.

Strategy Formulation

Once a clear picture of the firm and its environment is in hand, specific strategic alternatives can be developed. While different firms have different alternatives depending on their situation, there also exist generic strategies that can be applied across a wide range of firms. Michael Porter identified cost leadership, differentiation, and focus as three generic strategies that may be considered when defining strategic alternatives. Porter advised against implementing a combination of these strategies for a given product; rather, he argued that only one of the generic strategy alternatives should be pursued.

Implementation

The strategy likely will be expressed in high-level conceptual terms and priorities. For effective implementation, it needs to be translated into more detailed policies that can be understood at the functional level of the organization. The expression of the strategy in terms of functional policies also serves to highlight any practical issues that might not have been visible at a higher level. The strategy should be translated into specific policies for functional areas such as:

  • Marketing
  • Research and development
  • Procurement
  • Production
  • Human resources
  • Information systems

In addition to developing functional policies, the implementation phase involves identifying the required resources and putting into place the necessary organizational changes.

Control

Once implemented, the results of the strategy need to be measured and evaluated, with changes made as required to keep the plan on track. Control systems should be developed and implemented to facilitate this monitoring. Standards of performance are set, the actual performance measured, and appropriate action taken to ensure success.

Dynamic and Continuous Process

The strategic management process is dynamic and continuous. A change in one component can necessitate a change in the entire strategy. As such, the process must be repeated frequently in order to adapt the strategy to environmental changes. Throughout the process the firm may need to cycle back to a previous stage and make adjustments.

Drawbacks of this Process

The strategic planning process outlined above is only one approach to strategic management. It is best suited for stable environments. A drawback of this top-down approach is that it may not be responsive enough for rapidly changing competitive environments. In times of change, some of the more successful strategies emerge informally from lower levels of the organization, where managers are closer to customers on a day-to-day basis.

Another drawback is that this strategic planning model assumes fairly accurate forecasting and does not take into account unexpected events. In an uncertain world, long-term forecasts cannot be relied upon with a high level of confidence. In this respect, many firms have turned to scenario planning as a tool for dealing with multiple contingencies.

PEST Analysis


A PEST analysis is an analysis of the external macro-environment that affects all firms. P.E.S.T. is an acronym for the Political, Economic, Social, and Technological factors of the external macro-environment. Such external factors usually are beyond the firm's control and sometimes present themselves as threats. For this reason, some say that "pest" is an appropriate term for these factors. However, changes in the external environment also create new opportunities and the letters sometimes are rearranged to construct the more optimistic term of STEP analysis.

Many macro-environmental factors are country-specific and a PEST analysis will need to be performed for all countries of interest. The following are examples of some of the factors that might be considered in a PEST analysis.

Political Analysis

  • Political stability
  • Risk of military invasion
  • Legal framework for contract enforcement
  • Intellectual property protection
  • Trade regulations & tariffs
  • Favored trading partners
  • Anti-trust laws
  • Pricing regulations
  • Taxation - tax rates and incentives
  • Wage legislation - minimum wage and overtime
  • Work week
  • Mandatory employee benefits
  • Industrial safety regulations
  • Product labeling requirements

Economic Analysis

  • Type of economic system in countries of operation
  • Government intervention in the free market
  • Comparative advantages of host country
  • Exchange rates & stability of host country currency
  • Efficiency of financial markets
  • Infrastructure quality
  • Skill level of workforce
  • Labor costs
  • Business cycle stage (e.g. prosperity, recession, recovery)
  • Economic growth rate
  • Discretionary income
  • Unemployment rate
  • Inflation rate
  • Interest rates

Social Analysis

  • Demographics
  • Class structure
  • Education
  • Culture (gender roles, etc.)
  • Entrepreneurial spirit
  • Attitudes (health, environmental consciousness, etc.)
  • Leisure interests

Technological Analysis

  • Recent technological developments
  • Technology's impact on product offering
  • Impact on cost structure
  • Impact on value chain structure
  • Rate of technological diffusion

The number of macro-environmental factors is virtually unlimited. In practice, the firm must prioritize and monitor those factors that influence its industry. Even so, it may be difficult to forecast future trends with an acceptable level of accuracy. In this regard, the firm may turn to scenario planning techniques to deal with high levels of uncertainty in important macro-environmental variables.


SWOT Analysis

SWOT analysis is a simple framework for generating strategic alternatives from a situation analysis. It is applicable to either the corporate level or the business unit level and frequently appears in marketing plans. SWOT (sometimes referred to as TOWS) stands for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats. The SWOT framework was described in the late 1960's by Edmund P. Learned, C. Roland Christiansen, Kenneth Andrews, and William D. Guth in Business Policy, Text and Cases (Homewood, IL: Irwin, 1969). The General Electric Growth Council used this form of analysis in the 1980's. Because it concentrates on the issues that potentially have the most impact, the SWOT analysis is useful when a very limited amount of time is available to address a complex strategic situation.

The following diagram shows how a SWOT analysis fits into a strategic situation analysis.

Situation Analysis

/

\

Internal Analysis

External Analysis

/ \

/ \

Strengths Weaknesses

Opportunities Threats


SWOT Profile

The internal and external situation analysis can produce a large amount of information, much of which may not be highly relevant. The SWOT analysis can serve as an interpretative filter to reduce the information to a manageable quantity of key issues. The SWOT analysis classifies the internal aspects of the company as strengths or weaknesses and the external situational factors as opportunities or threats. Strengths can serve as a foundation for building a competitive advantage, and weaknesses may hinder it. By understanding these four aspects of its situation, a firm can better leverage its strengths, correct its weaknesses, capitalize on golden opportunities, and deter potentially devastating threats.

Internal Analysis

The internal analysis is a comprehensive evaluation of the internal environment's potential strengths and weaknesses. Factors should be evaluated across the organization in areas such as:

  • Company culture
  • Company image
  • Organizational structure
  • Key staff
  • Access to natural resources
  • Position on the experience curve
  • Operational efficiency
  • Operational capacity
  • Brand awareness
  • Market share
  • Financial resources
  • Exclusive contracts
  • Patents and trade secrets

The SWOT analysis summarizes the internal factors of the firm as a list of strengths and weaknesses.

External Analysis

An opportunity is the chance to introduce a new product or service that can generate superior returns. Opportunities can arise when changes occur in the external environment. Many of these changes can be perceived as threats to the market position of existing products and may necessitate a change in product specifications or the development of new products in order for the firm to remain competitive. Changes in the external environment may be related to:

  • Customers
  • Competitors
  • Market trends
  • Suppliers
  • Partners
  • Social changes
  • New technology
  • Economic environment
  • Political and regulatory environment

The last four items in the above list are macro-environmental variables, and are addressed in a PEST analysis.

The SWOT analysis summarizes the external environmental factors as a list of opportunities and threats.

SWOT Profile

When the analysis has been completed, a SWOT profile can be generated and used as the basis of goal setting, strategy formulation, and implementation. The completed SWOT profile sometimes is arranged as follows:

Strengths

Weaknesses

1.
2.
3.
.
.
.

1.
2.
3.
.
.
.

Opportunities

Threats

1.
2.
3.
.
.
.

1.
2.
3.
.
.
.

When formulating strategy, the interaction of the quadrants in the SWOT profile becomes important. For example, the strengths can be leveraged to pursue opportunities and to avoid threats, and managers can be alerted to weaknesses that might need to be overcome in order to successfully pursue opportunities.

Multiple Perspectives Needed

The method used to acquire the inputs to the SWOT matrix will affect the quality of the analysis. If the information is obtained hastily during a quick interview with the CEO, even though this one person may have a broad view of the company and industry, the information would represent a single viewpoint. The quality of the analysis will be improved greatly if interviews are held with a spectrum of stakeholders such as employees, suppliers, customers, strategic partners, etc.

SWOT Analysis Limitations

While useful for reducing a large quantity of situational factors into a more manageable profile, the SWOT framework has a tendency to oversimplify the situation by classifying the firm's environmental factors into categories in which they may not always fit. The classification of some factors as strengths or weaknesses, or as opportunities or threats is somewhat arbitrary. For example, a particular company culture can be either a strength or a weakness. A technological change can be a either a threat or an opportunity. Perhaps what is more important than the superficial classification of these factors is the firm's awareness of them and its development of a strategic plan to use them to its advantage.

Competitor Analysis

In formulating business strategy, managers must consider the strategies of the firm's competitors. While in highly fragmented commodity industries the moves of any single competitor may be less important, in concentrated industries competitor analysis becomes a vital part of strategic planning.

Competitor analysis has two primary activities, 1) obtaining information about important competitors, and 2) using that information to predict competitor behavior. The goal of competitor analysis is to understand:

  • with which competitors to compete,
  • competitors' strategies and planned actions,
  • how competitors might react to a firm's actions,
  • how to influence competitor behavior to the firm's own advantage.

Casual knowledge about competitors usually is insufficient in competitor analysis. Rather, competitors should be analyzed systematically, using organized competitor intelligence-gathering to compile a wide array of information so that well informed strategy decisions can be made.

Competitor Analysis Framework

Michael Porter presented a framework for analyzing competitors. This framework is based on the following four key aspects of a competitor:

  • Competitor's objectives
  • Competitor's assumptions
  • Competitor's strategy
  • Competitor's capabilities

Objectives and assumptions are what drive the competitor, and strategy and capabilities are what the competitor is doing or is capable of doing. These components can be depicted as shown in the following diagram:


Competitor Analysis Components

What drives the competitor

What the competitor is doing
or is capable of doing

Objectives


Strategy


Competitor
Response Profile

Assumptions

Resources
& Capabilities




Adapted from Michael E. Porter, Competitive Strategy, 1980, p. 49.


A competitor analysis should include the more important existing competitors as well as potential competitors such as those firms that might enter the industry, for example, by extending their present strategy or by vertically integrating.

Competitor's Current Strategy

The two main sources of information about a competitor's strategy is what the competitor says and what it does. What a competitor is saying about its strategy is revealed in:

  • annual shareholder reports
  • 10K reports
  • interviews with analysts
  • statements by managers
  • press releases

However, this stated strategy often differs from what the competitor actually is doing. What the competitor is doing is evident in where its cash flow is directed, such as in the following tangible actions:

  • hiring activity
  • R & D projects
  • capital investments
  • promotional campaigns
  • strategic partnerships
  • mergers and acquisitions

Competitor's Objectives

Knowledge of a competitor's objectives facilitates a better prediction of the competitor's reaction to different competitive moves. For example, a competitor that is focused on reaching short-term financial goals might not be willing to spend much money responding to a competitive attack. Rather, such a competitor might favor focusing on the products that hold positions that better can be defended. On the other hand, a company that has no short term profitability objectives might be willing to participate in destructive price competition in which neither firm earns a profit.

Competitor objectives may be financial or other types. Some examples include growth rate, market share, and technology leadership. Goals may be associated with each hierarchical level of strategy - corporate, business unit, and functional level.

The competitor's organizational structure provides clues as to which functions of the company are deemed to be the more important. For example, those functions that report directly to the chief executive officer are likely to be given priority over those that report to a senior vice president.

Other aspects of the competitor that serve as indicators of its objectives include risk tolerance, management incentives, backgrounds of the executives, composition of the board of directors, legal or contractual restrictions, and any additional corporate-level goals that may influence the competing business unit.

Whether the competitor is meeting its objectives provides an indication of how likely it is to change its strategy.

Competitor's Assumptions

The assumptions that a competitor's managers hold about their firm and their industry help to define the moves that they will consider. For example, if in the past the industry introduced a new type of product that failed, the industry executives may assume that there is no market for the product. Such assumptions are not always accurate and if incorrect may present opportunities. For example, new entrants may have the opportunity to introduce a product similar to a previously unsuccessful one without retaliation because incumbant firms may not take their threat seriously. Honda was able to enter the U.S. motorcycle market with a small motorbike because U.S. manufacturers had assumed that there was no market for small bikes based on their past experience.

A competitor's assumptions may be based on a number of factors, including any of the following:

  • beliefs about its competitive position
  • past experience with a product
  • regional factors
  • industry trends
  • rules of thumb

A thorough competitor analysis also would include assumptions that a competitor makes about its own competitors, and whether that assessment is accurate.

Competitor's Resources and Capabilities

Knowledge of the competitor's assumptions, objectives, and current strategy is useful in understanding how the competitor might want to respond to a competitive attack. However, its resources and capabilities determine its ability to respond effectively.

A competitor's capabilities can be analyzed according to its strengths and weaknesses in various functional areas, as is done in a SWOT analysis. The competitor's strengths define its capabilities. The analysis can be taken further to evaluate the competitor's ability to increase its capabilities in certain areas. A financial analysis can be performed to reveal its sustainable growth rate.

Finally, since the competitive environment is dynamic, the competitor's ability to react swiftly to change should be evaluated. Some firms have heavy momentum and may continue for many years in the same direction before adapting. Others are able to mobilize and adapt very quickly. Factors that slow a company down include low cash reserves, large investments in fixed assets, and an organizational structure that hinders quick action.

Competitor Response Profile

Information from an analysis of the competitor's objectives, assumptions, strategy, and capabilities can be compiled into a response profile of possible moves that might be made by the competitor. This profile includes both potential offensive and defensive moves. The specific moves and their expected strength can be estimated using information gleaned from the analysis.

The result of the competitor analysis should be an improved ability to predict the competitor's behavior and even to influence that behavior to the firm's advantage.

The Experience Curve

In the 1960's, management consultants at The Boston Consulting Group observed a consistent relationship between the cost of production and the cumulative production quantity (total quantity produced from the first unit to the last). Data revealed that the real value-added production cost declined by 20 to 30 percent for each doubling of cumulative production quantity:

The Experience Curve

The vertical axis of this logarithmic graph is the real unit cost of adding value, adjusted for inflation. It includes the cost that the firm incurs to add value to the starting materials, but excludes the cost of those materials themselves, which are subject the experience curves of their suppliers.

Note that the experience curve differs from the learning curve. The learning curve describes the observed reduction in the number of required direct labor hours as workers learn their jobs. The experience curve by contrast applies not only to labor intensive situations, but also to process oriented ones.

The experience curve relationship holds over a wide range industries. In fact, its absence would be considered by some to be a sign of possible mismanagement. Cases in which the experience curve is not observed sometimes involve the withholding of capital investment, for example, to increase short-term ROI. The experience curve can be explained by a combination of learning (the learning curve), specialization, scale, and investment.

Implications for Strategy

The experience curve has important strategic implications. If a firm is able to gain market share over its competitors, it can develop a cost advantage. Penetration pricing strategies and a significant investment in advertising, sales personnel, production capacity, etc. can be justified to increase market share and gain a competitive advantage.

When evaluating strategies based on the experience curve, a firm must consider the reaction of competitors who also understand the concept. Some potential pitfalls include:

  • The fallacy of composition holds: if all other firms equally pursue the strategy, then none will increase market share and will suffer losses from over-capacity and low prices. The more competitors that pursue the strategy, the higher the cost of gaining a given market share and the lower the return on investment.

  • Competing firms may be able to discover the leading firm's proprietary methods and replicate the cost reductions without having made the large investment to gain experience.

  • New technologies may create a new experience curve. Entrants building new plants may be able to take advantage of the latest technologies that offer a cost advantage over the older plants of the leading firm.

The Value Chain

To better understand the activities through which a firm develops a competitive advantage and creates shareholder value, it is useful to separate the business system into a series of value-generating activities referred to as the value chain. In his 1985 book Competitive Advantage, Michael Porter introduced a generic value chain model that comprises a sequence of activities found to be common to a wide range of firms. Porter identified primary and support activities as shown in the following diagram:


Porter's Generic Value Chain

Inbound
Logistics

>

Operations

>

Outbound
Logistics

>

Marketing
&
Sales

>

Service

>

M
A
R
G
I
N

Firm Infrastructure

HR Management

Technology Development

Procurement




The goal of these activities is to offer the customer a level of value that exceeds the cost of the activities, thereby resulting in a profit margin.

The primary value chain activities are:

  • Inbound Logistics: the receiving and warehousing of raw materials, and their distribution to manufacturing as they are required.

  • Operations: the processes of transforming inputs into finished products and services.

  • Outbound Logistics: the warehousing and distribution of finished goods.

  • Marketing & Sales: the identification of customer needs and the generation of sales.

  • Service: the support of customers after the products and services are sold to them.

These primary activities are supported by:

  • The infrastructure of the firm: organizational structure, control systems, company culture, etc.

  • Human resource management: employee recruiting, hiring, training, development, and compensation.

  • Technology development: technologies to support value-creating activities.

  • Procurement: purchasing inputs such as materials, supplies, and equipment.

The firm's margin or profit then depends on its effectiveness in performing these activities efficiently, so that the amount that the customer is willing to pay for the products exceeds the cost of the activities in the value chain. It is in these activities that a firm has the opportunity to generate superior value. A competitive advantage may be achieved by reconfiguring the value chain to provide lower cost or better differentiation.

The value chain model is a useful analysis tool for defining a firm's core competencies and the activities in which it can pursue a competitive advantage as follows:

  • Cost advantage: by better understanding costs and squeezing them out of the value-adding activities.

  • Differentiation: by focusing on those activities associated with core competencies and capabilities in order to perform them better than do competitors.

Cost Advantage and the Value Chain

A firm may create a cost advantage either by reducing the cost of individual value chain activities or by reconfiguring the value chain.

Once the value chain is defined, a cost analysis can be performed by assigning costs to the value chain activities. The costs obtained from the accounting report may need to be modified in order to allocate them properly to the value creating activities.

Porter identified 10 cost drivers related to value chain activities:

  • Economies of scale
  • Learning
  • Capacity utilization
  • Linkages among activities
  • Interrelationships among business units
  • Degree of vertical integration
  • Timing of market entry
  • Firm's policy of cost or differentiation
  • Geographic location
  • Institutional factors (regulation, union activity, taxes, etc.)

A firm develops a cost advantage by controlling these drivers better than do the competitors.

A cost advantage also can be pursued by reconfiguring the value chain. Reconfiguration means structural changes such a new production process, new distribution channels, or a different sales approach. For example, FedEx structurally redefined express freight service by acquiring its own planes and implementing a hub and spoke system.

Differentiation and the Value Chain

A differentiation advantage can arise from any part of the value chain. For example, procurement of inputs that are unique and not widely available to competitors can create differentiation, as can distribution channels that offer high service levels.

Differentiation stems from uniqueness. A differentiation advantage may be achieved either by changing individual value chain activities to increase uniqueness in the final product or by reconfiguring the value chain.

Porter identified several drivers of uniqueness:

  • Policies and decisions
  • Linkages among activities
  • Timing
  • Location
  • Interrelationships
  • Learning
  • Integration
  • Scale (e.g. better service as a result of large scale)
  • Institutional factors

Many of these also serve as cost drivers. Differentiation often results in greater costs, resulting in tradeoffs between cost and differentiation.

There are several ways in which a firm can reconfigure its value chain in order to create uniqueness. It can forward integrate in order to perform functions that once were performed by its customers. It can backward integrate in order to have more control over its inputs. It may implement new process technologies or utilize new distribution channels. Ultimately, the firm may need to be creative in order to develop a novel value chain configuration that increases product differentiation.

Technology and the Value Chain

Because technology is employed to some degree in every value creating activity, changes in technology can impact competitive advantage by incrementally changing the activities themselves or by making possible new configurations of the value chain.

Various technologies are used in both primary value activities and support activities:

  • Inbound Logistics Technologies
    • Transportation
    • Material handling
    • Material storage
    • Communications
    • Testing
    • Information systems

  • Operations Technologies
    • Process
    • Materials
    • Machine tools
    • Material handling
    • Packaging
    • Maintenance
    • Testing
    • Building design & operation
    • Information systems

  • Outbound Logistics Technologies
    • Transportation
    • Material handling
    • Packaging
    • Communications
    • Information systems

  • Marketing & Sales Technologies
    • Media
    • Audio/video
    • Communications
    • Information systems

  • Service Technologies
    • Testing
    • Communications
    • Information systems

Note that many of these technologies are used across the value chain. For example, information systems are seen in every activity. Similar technologies are used in support activities. In addition, technologies related to training, computer-aided design, and software development frequently are employed in support activities.

To the extent that these technologies affect cost drivers or uniqueness, they can lead to a competitive advantage.

Linkages Between Value Chain Activities

Value chain activities are not isolated from one another. Rather, one value chain activity often affects the cost or performance of other ones. Linkages may exist between primary activities and also between primary and support activities.

Consider the case in which the design of a product is changed in order to reduce manufacturing costs. Suppose that inadvertantly the new product design results in increased service costs; the cost reduction could be less than anticipated and even worse, there could be a net cost increase.

Sometimes however, the firm may be able to reduce cost in one activity and consequently enjoy a cost reduction in another, such as when a design change simultaneously reduces manufacturing costs and improves reliability so that the service costs also are reduced. Through such improvements the firm has the potential to develop a competitive advantage.

Analyzing Business Unit Interrelationships

Interrelationships among business units form the basis for a horizontal strategy. Such business unit interrelationships can be identified by a value chain analysis.

Tangible interrelationships offer direct opportunities to create a synergy among business units. For example, if multiple business units require a particular raw material, the procurement of that material can be shared among the business units. This sharing of the procurement activity can result in cost reduction. Such interrelationships may exist simultaneously in multiple value chain activities.

Unfortunately, attempts to achieve synergy from the interrelationships among different business units often fall short of expectations due to unanticipated drawbacks. The cost of coordination, the cost of reduced flexibility, and organizational practicalities should be analyzed when devising a strategy to reap the benefits of the synergies.

Outsourcing Value Chain Activities

A firm may specialize in one or more value chain activities and outsource the rest. The extent to which a firm performs upstream and downstream activities is described by its degree of vertical integration.

A thorough value chain analysis can illuminate the business system to facilitate outsourcing decisions. To decide which activities to outsource, managers must understand the firm's strengths and weaknesses in each activity, both in terms of cost and ability to differentiate. Managers may consider the following when selecting activities to outsource:

  • Whether the activity can be performed cheaper or better by suppliers.

  • Whether the activity is one of the firm's core competencies from which stems a cost advantage or product differentiation.

  • The risk of performing the activity in-house. If the activity relies on fast-changing technology or the product is sold in a rapidly-changing market, it may be advantageous to outsource the activity in order to maintain flexibility and avoid the risk of investing in specialized assets.

  • Whether the outsourcing of an activity can result in business process improvements such as reduced lead time, higher flexibility, reduced inventory, etc.

The Value Chain System

A firm's value chain is part of a larger system that includes the value chains of upstream suppliers and downstream channels and customers. Porter calls this series of value chains the value system, shown conceptually below:

The Value System

...

>

Supplier
Value Chain

>

Firm
Value Chain

>

Channel
Value Chain

>

Buyer
Value Chain



Linkages exist not only in a firm's value chain, but also between value chains. While a firm exhibiting a high degree of vertical integration is poised to better coordinate upstream and downstream activities, a firm having a lesser degree of vertical integration nonetheless can forge agreements with suppliers and channel partners to achieve better coordination. For example, an auto manufacturer may have its suppliers set up facilities in close proximity in order to minimize transport costs and reduce parts inventories. Clearly, a firm's success in developing and sustaining a competitive advantage depends not only on its own value chain, but on its ability to manage the value system of which it is a part.