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Overview
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PrefaceThis 11th edition, coming on the heels of the milestone 10th edition published last year, represents a continuing response to the market’s unrelenting appetite for freshly researched cases of top-notch quality. While the pace of new developments in the literature of strategic management doesn’t warrant an ultrashort text revision cycle, keeping users supplied with a stream of the latest and best cases satisfies a legitimate and growing market need. With so many business schools offering the strategic management course every term, the case collection in any one edition wears out after a few terms—we’ve all experienced the speed with which case files sprout and circulate. Moreover, fast-changing industry and company circumstances can prematurely render an otherwise good case obsolete. Growing interest among adopters for fresh cases, together with an expanding supply of first-rate cases being written annually, has again prompted us to institute a short case revision cycle and provide a second collection of 36 cases to choose from. Only the classic two-page Robin Hood case in carried over from the 10th edition; the remaining 35 cases are all different from those in the 10th edition. Aside from the new cases, however, the content of the 11th edition matches that of the 10th edition; the 11 chapters of text material remain untouched except for minor editing. If you are a user of the 10th edition, shifting to the 11th edition merits consideration (1) as soon as you deem it’s time to incorporate a new case collection in your course offering or (2) if you are intrigued with the pedagogical possibilities of having your students utilize the Strat-Tutor chapter self-tests and case preparation exercises, which they can now access free at the publisher’s Web site for the text (www.mhhe.com/thompson). If you haven’t been an adopter of the 10th edition, we suggest first exploring this 11th edition and looking into the value that full-scale use of the Strat-Tutor courseware can add to students’ understanding of the concepts and tools of analysis. There’s also a newly published upgraded edition of The Business Strategy Game (version 6.0) for use with either the 10th or 11th edition. The case collection in the 11th editionThe 36 cases in this edition include 29 new cases not appearing in any of our previous editions, 5 thoroughly updated and revised cases appearing in the 9th edition, one carryover case from the 9th edition, and one carryover case from the 10th edition. To highlight the close linkage between the cases and strategic management concepts, we have grouped the cases under five chapter-related and topical headings. In the Section A grouping are four cases spotlighting the role and tasks of the manager as chief strategy-maker and chief strategy-implementer; these cases—Starbucks Corporation, "Chainsaw Al" Dunlap and Sunbeam Corporation, Caribbean Internet Café, and KUVO Radio—provide convincing demonstration of why the discussions in Chapters 1 and 2 are relevant to a company’s long-term market success. Section B contains 15 cases whose central issues deal with analyzing industry and competitive situations and crafting business-level strategy; these cases call upon students to apply the text material in Chapters 3 through 6. In Section C are four cases involving strategy assessments and strategy-making in diversified companies that make nice follow-ons to the coverage of Chapters 7 and 8. There are 10 cases in Section D, all revolving around the managerial challenges of implementing strategy and giving students an opportunity to apply the concepts presented in Chapters 9, 10, and 11. Section E contains three cases highlighting the links between strategy, ethics, and social responsibility. The case lineup in this 11th edition, as in prior editions, reflects our steadfast preference for cases that feature interesting products and companies and that are capable of sparking both student interest and lively classroom discussions. At least 24 of the cases involve high-profile companies, products, or people that students will have heard of, know about from personal experience, or can easily identify with. The Dell Computer Corporation, Acer in Canada, Bro/derbund Software Inc., and Competition in the Electronic Brokerage Industry cases will provide students with insight into the special demands of competing in "high velocity" industry environments where technological advances are an everyday event, product life cycles are short, and competitive maneuvering among rivals comes fast and furious. At least 19 of the cases involve situations where company resources and competitive capabilities play as much a role in the strategy-making, strategy-implementing scheme of things as industry and competitive conditions. Indeed, we made a special effort to ensure that the cases selected for this edition demonstrated the relevance of the resource-based view of the firm. Scattered throughout the lineup are 10 cases concerning non-U.S. companies, globally competitive industries, and/or cross-cultural situations; these cases, in conjunction with the globalized content of the text chapters, provide ample material for linking the study of strategic management tightly to the ongoing globalization of the world economy—in proper keeping with AACSB standards. You’ll also find three cases on nonprofit organizations, three cases where the central figures are women (plus one where the central issue is reverse sex discrimination), 10 cases dealing with the strategic problems of family-owned or relatively small entrepreneurial businesses, and 19 cases involving public companies about which students can do further research in the library or on the Internet. Six of the cases (Starbucks Corporation, "Chainsaw Al" Dunlap and Sunbeam Corporation, Competition in the Video Game Industry, Outback Steakhouse Goes International, Herb Kelleher and Southwest Airlines, and Stew Leonard’s Dairy) have videotape segments that either are available from the publisher or can be ordered from other sources. The case researchers whose work appears in this edition have done an absolutely first-class job of preparing cases that contain valuable teaching points, that illustrate the important kinds of strategic challenges managers face, and that allow students to apply the tools of strategic analysis. We believe you will find the 11th edition’s collection of 36 cases exceptionally appealing, eminently teachable, and very suitable for drilling students in the use of the concepts and analytical treatments in Chapters 1 through 11. It is an unusually attractive and stimulating case lineup from beginning to end. Company Web Site Addresses and Use of the Internet Following Chapter 11 and prior to Case 1, we have once again included "A Guide to Case Analysis," which gives students positive direction in what case method pedagogy is all about and offers suggestions for approaching case analysis. The guide incorporates a section on how to use the Internet and various on-line services to (1) do further research on an industry or company, (2) obtain a company’s latest financial results, and (3) get updates on what has happened since the case was written. The amount of information available on the Internet is exploding at a rapid-fire pace. We think students will find our list of information-laden Web sites and the accompanying suggestions on how to use the various search engines a time-saving and valuable asset in running down the information they are interested in. And to further facilitate student use of the Internet, we have included company Web site addresses at appropriate locations in the cases themselves. Content features of the text chaptersTenth and eleventh editions are milestones in the evolution of a textbook. For potential adopters they signal effective pedagogy and sustained market acceptance, but for authors they impose a responsibility to reflect on how the presentation can be recast in ways that add disciplinary coherence and that move the subject matter to a new plateau of clarity and understanding. We’ve tried to live up to this responsibility, endeavoring to include in the 11 chapters of text a teaching/learning package that squarely targets what every student needs to know about crafting, implementing, and executing business strategies. New concepts, analytical tools, and methods of managing continue to surface at rates that mandate important edition-to-edition changes in content and emphasis. One of the most important new developments in the strategy literature concerns advances in the conceptual underpinning and articulation of the resource-based view of the firm. While SWOT analysis and evaluation of core competencies have always pointed to the importance of careful internal strength–weakness assessment in crafting strategy, recent contributions to the literature make it clear that there’s much more to the resource-based view of the firm than is implied in a simple weighing of company strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. We have made a concerted attempt throughout the 11 text chapters to drive home the strategy-making, strategy-implementing relevance of strengthening a company’s resource complement and upgrading its competencies and competitive capabilities to match market realities and create competitive advantage. The 10th and 11th editions give balanced treatment to the thesis that a company’s strategy must be matched both to its external market circumstances and to its resources and competitive capabilities. Hence, you’ll find the resource-based view of the firm prominently integrated into the coverage of crafting business strategy (Chapters 2 and 4) and crafting diversification strategies (Chapters 7 and 8). You’ll also find that Chapters 9 and 10 have a strong resource-based perspective as concerns the role of building and nurturing core competencies, competitive capabilities, and organizational resources in implementing and executing strategy. In addition to the exceptionally thorough resource-based orientation, we’ve incorporated important new material on cooperative strategies, collaborative alliances, and competing in "high-velocity" market environments where the pace of change (from whatever source) places special demands on a company to adapt its strategy and its resource capabilities to rapidly unfolding events. Once again, there’s front-to-back coverage of global issues in strategic management, prominent treatment of ethical and social responsibility issues, and margin notes in every chapter that highlight basic concepts, strategic management principles, and kernels of wisdom. Extensive rewriting to sharpen the presentations in every chapter has allowed us to include the new material and still cover everything in less than 350 pages—something that readers and adopters ought to welcome, given the jam-packed content of the course. |
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