My synopsis of "What is strategy?" -Michael Porter .

Operational effectiveness is not a strategy

Often we confuse one with the other, opening a window for mistakes and misunderstood. OE does not fulfill the variety of problems to explore in the efficiency of a business. This is because when we speak of operations it translates to the activities that our company embraces for producing, that said, managers often believe that making operations effectively will assure their position in a competitive markets. The quest for productivity, quality and speed has spawned a number of tools and techniques (total quality management, identifying milestones, time-based competition, new resources ,associations, reengineering, change management, learning organization, etc..) oriented operational efficiency, have been gradually taking the place of strategy.

In the process of making OE companies frequently try to copy one and another process, innovate technologies and so on, in a way that they can be one step ahead and accelerate process or increase quality by the thought that this will gain them more profitability which it does but on the other hand this makes companies too much alike, then this move isn’t strategic at all. Costumers look for difference not only in price, but in quality, which to me in particular is directly related to creating comparable value at lower cost because is the best way of giving the costumer what they want faster without risking quality . 

This difference is what distinguishes companies, establishing this, the company can outperform rivals.

In fact, these differences were the essence of Japanese success in 80. If it is necessary to continuously improve the OE, this is not enough to sustain high yields, as the "best practice" operational fast spread rivals are all doing same.

Strategy rest on unique activities

Competitive strategy is about being different, deliberately choosing different activities to deliver a unique mix   value.

A Sustainable Strategic Position Requires Trade-offs

Strategic positions have three sources, not mutually exclusive and often simultaneous:

1.      Positioning based on the variety:  where instead of being in all products segments you focus in one in particular this has much more to do with the choice of variety and lees client segmentation. For Example in a company that is dedicated only to sell books for school and no other school tools, clients will be divided between different providers like variety stores.

2.      Positioning based on needs: Is directed to a particular segment of customers, which satisfies all or majority of their needs. It can occur when different customers (or a client) require different features in the products, different levels of information, service, or have different price sensitivity. Additionally, these requirements must be sufficient to satisfy different sets of different activities. For example IKEA  furniture company   targets young buyers that work, without much time to shop, but looking for a modern furniture  low prices . 

3.      Positioning based on access:  in better words this is different costumer segmentation, but their needs are quite similar. May be my company is directed to a segment A but segment C will have probably same need of one product or another. For example Bon Ice-cream, anyone can buy their product because they have a variety price menu, at first it wasn’t this way, it was the town’s ice-cream shop , but they recognized that they had potential to open their client segments not only to class B or C but to class A so  they developed a new line of ice cream called “Black Label” .

In conclusion , strategy involves the creation of unique and valuable position involving a number of different activities. A sustainable strategic position requires making trade-offs between strong.

Fit drives competitive advantage and sustainability.

Fit are the activities in a company’s system that reinforce and complement one another, there are three types of fits :

·         First Order: Simple consistency

·         Second order: Activities are reinforcing each other. Example: position or branding lower marketing cost

·         Third order: Optimization of effort

Knowing where your company is position will determine the activities that your company will eventually be forced to rely on.  Sustainability will soon rise by your company power to link its activities in a way that rivals are unable to copy them.

Rediscovering Strategy

 Failing in choosing right is the most common reason for lack of strategy; while managers are looking for efficiency they frequently lose the sight of the need of a strategy. This also occurs when companies don’t chose an specific customer needs to satisfy and try to satisfy ALL of them, this major threat comes from the inside when manager are not willing to make or keep tradeoffs.

Managers should be very careful when the company is growing too, as I said before when I spoke of BON , they were forced to create a complete new line of products, in this specific area managers should be aware  of what the strategy path is and stay focused on it because if they go way off the road then some of this new acquisitions could lead to a reduction of their company’s competitive advantage by amplifying their client segmentation and ending in a possible reduction of the product quality

La relación entre conocimiento, ciencia y su importancia en la investigación en los negocios

Siempre he creído que el conocimiento es un conjunto de ideas sobre algo en específico. Este algo debe ser verdad para nosotros, al pensar en esto llegue a la conclusión de que el conocimiento es entonces aceptar y conocer la verdad, no podemos entonces hablar de conocimiento sin antes hablar de la verdad. Y que es la verdad exactamente?

Según Aristóteles, la verdad es la correspondencia entre la realidad y el pensamiento. Realidad?  Pensamiento?  Se puede pensar en algo por ejemplo, pensar que la escuela no es parte fundamental   del desarrollo del ser humano y esto convertirse en realidad? Claro, para la persona que lo piense será la realidad. Este tema siempre ha sido muy debatido por grandes filósofos, y cada quien tiene una perspectiva diferente, ya que como dije anteriormente si piensas en algo y lo crees esto será la verdad para ti aunque para otros no lo sea (aquí se da el error).

El conocimiento y la ciencia han ido siempre de la mano y entre ellas existen similitudes considerables. Estas similitudes se hacen aparentes cuando consideramos por muestra el desarrollo científico y la evolución intelectual del ser humano, aunque no siempre el conocimiento dentro de la ciencia sea  objetivo.  También debe tomarse en consideración el rol que ambas toman en la investigación la ciencia aporta el proceso, el régimen, la autoridad, el conocimiento por su parte ayuda a la comprensión y la búsqueda de la verdad absoluta del problema planteado.

Investigar es la mejor manera de “encontrar” la verdad, y si encontramos la verdad estamos conociendo pero para poder encontrar la verdad hay que guiarse por un proceso , este proceso lo desarrolla la ciencia. Ambas se utilizan en la investigación de una forma u otra. Al investigar demos plantear un problema a resolver, el problema llega cuando conocemos la existencia del mismo sin embargo la solución/respuesta a este problema llega después de haber pasado por el sendero del método científico estos pasos como todos en alguna etapa de nuestras vidas hemos experimentado sabemos que son: Observar, Inducción, Hipótesis, Probar la hipótesis por experimentación, Demostración, Tesis o teoría científica (conclusiones).

La ciencia y el conocimiento son parte esencial de la investigación, todos buscan la verdad, la solución, la respuesta exacta. Buscan credibilidad, demostrar lo expuesto y mucho mas importante convencer. Por ende corroboro con Mario Bunge cuando concluye diciendo;

“De acuerdo con la filosofía científica, el peso de los enunciados —y por consiguiente su credibilidad y su eventual eficacia práctica— depende de su grado de sustentación y de confirmación. Si, como estimaba Demócrito, una sola demostración vale más que el reino de los persas, puede calcularse el valor del método científico en los tiempos modernos. Quienes lo ignoran íntegramente no pueden llamarse modernos; y quienes lo desdeñan se exponen a no ser veraces ni eficaces.” –Bunge

Trabajos Citados: 

Bunge, M. (s.f.). La ciencia. Su método y su filosofía.

Canela, T. (s.f.). El conocimiento, la verdad, la certeza, la evidencia, el error.