SusBus Flashcards
Outline types of questions that could be used to find out material issues and engage with community
What are the most important concerns for your (community/organization) right now?
- How do our operations affect your (community/organization)?
- What are the most important changes/improvements that you would like to see happen?
- To what extent do you agree/disagree with the statement: “People in our
(community/organization) speak well of the (company/project)” (1-5)
- What do they say about (company/project)?
- Is there anything else that you think should be mentioned or dealt with?
- What are the strengths and resources that your (community/organization) has to contribute to
the achievement of what you would like to see happen?
what are the two basic ways of maintaining competitive advantage
Market power (e.g. presence of a monopoly or a situation where through government regulation/license competition is muted).
Ability to formulate and implement a strategy that uses the firm’s unique strengths.
Need to underestand the industry and internal company value chain.
what are the barriers to imitation fo a competitive advantage ?
Sources:
* Herd behavior
* Risk aversion
Barriers to imitation
Causal ambiguity
(when it’s hard to observe how someone does something…usually because we can’t look into the processes or cultures of other firms)
-
Economies of scale and scope
(makes it hard for someone to enter the market because in order to compete one needs to produce large volumes and that is hard to do when starting from
zero)
-
First mover advantage
Learning
what are the advantages and disadvantages of first mover advantage
Advantages of being first in a market:
* Learning from experience: technology and organizing
* Buyer switching costs
* Brand recognition
* Control of inputs or buyers (back to industry structure…e.g. access to distributors)
* Network effect
Disadvantages
* Premature lockin of technology
* Freeriding of competitors on your earlyminvestments
what is the learning curve and give reasons for it
A learning curve shows the cost reduction (in percentage terms) that occurs for a doubling of output. That is how we calculate how much ‘learning’ takes place.
Reasons include:
* Enhanced human skills
* People to learn to improve their work habits and perform assigned tasks more quickly
* When people gain experience they find ways to simplify
* Better selection of materials
* Understanding which production resources are most appropriate for a given activity
* Coordination
How can you deal with subsitutes to your competitive advantage
Face up to your loss of uniqueness, and reduce price before the substitute gets a foothold
Leapfrog (this can be hard as you are required to “cannibalize” your own
currently successful business)
Threats to competitive advantage
Define hold up and explain hwo to deal with it
Enttieis have barganingl leverage and hence will hold up. it is threatenieng when the entity has specific capabilities that are integral to your company
What to do:
* Contractual arrangements (But the problem is contractual
* incompleteness
* Multiple sourcing (make others dispensable) But investments in relationship specific assets can be important
* Vertical integration
* Negotiation
* Build relationship/trust
Threats to competitive advantage
Define slack and how to deal with it
The extent to which the value appropriated by a firm falls short of the amount potentially available (the firm is inefficient)
Hard to identify.
Worse under forgiving comp environemnt and when managers have discretion of a wide range of productive process
What to do:
* Monitoring of performance
* Benchmarking
* Outsiders on Boards
Managerial incentives
Commitments to return cash to shareholders (dividends)
Appeals to a higher calling, a sense of mission
?
what does corp strategy entail in terms of direction to go
Same business = business growth (v. attractive if there are
economies of scale)
Diversify into a different business or geography
Value chain expansion/vertical integration
summarise the course
you should not vertically integrate unless?
- The input is strategically important
- Transaction costs are high (as input is very complicated)
- High players in the value chain
What are the downsides of vertically integrating?
- Too expensive and reduces flexibility
- High admin and coordination csots
- The ESG issues down or up the chain are now your problem
- You may not have the distinctive capabilities to run the business unit you have acquired
- Govt may have anti-trust laws to stop this
Explain greenwash and SDG washing
Greenwashing: the act of misleading consumers (or other stakeholders) regarding the environmental practices of a company of the environmental benefit for o product or service.
- SDG-washing: when companies are making a profit by doing well on one SDG but are harming the other SDG and are only reporting positive outcomes or when businesses talk about their commitment to SDGS but don’t have any data to back up their claims.
what are the 7 sins of greenwashing
what are the assumptions of transaction costs economics
Market and behavioural assumptions
Combination of uncertainty and bounded rationality makes it impossible to forsee all possible outcomes and hence long term contract cant be formed
combination of small numbers and opportunism, means you can’t trust your partner and there aren’t many other partners
What are the main types and sources of GHG emissions?
CO2
Methane
N2O
outline the impacts of climate change
Ecological paradox
Carbon offset
Contrast removal and abatement
Removal: improves current air quality
Abatement: improves future air quality
what are the 4 criteria needed for a project to be deemed a proper offsetting program
- additionality
- verifiability
- permanence
- Ownership
There are many reasons why implementation of a strategy may fail, so what are the possible solutions/framework
what techniques should you use if you’re managing up, down and across
- Up
- Meets bosses needs and try to get sponsorship
- Down
- Use passion to engage
- Find and enlist the right people (appeal to entrepreneurship)
- Provide escapes if it fails
- Across
- build networks
- trade favours
How should you broadly manage external and internal stakeholders
Outline the main influence tactics
Liking
Reciprocity
Herd Mentality
Commitments
Expertise
Scarcity
