COURSE NUMBER: MBA299E.1

 

COURSE TITLE: Competitive and Corporate Strategy: The “Dynamic Capabilities” Approach

 

UNITS OF CREDIT: 2 Units

 

INSTRUCTOR: Paul Tiffany

 

E-MAIL ADDRESS: tiffany@haas.berkeley.edu

 

CLASS WEB PAGE LOCATION: none

 

MEETING DAY(S)/TIME: Mondays, 8:00-11:00 AM.

 

Ten non-consecutive meetings across the 15-week semester.

 

PREREQUISITE(S): First year core courses

 

CLASS FORMAT: Cases and lecture/discussions by the Instructor

 

REQUIRED READINGS: Course reader (on study.net) of cases, and a recommended text

 

BASIS FOR FINAL GRADE: Participation (25%), case write-up (25%), and group paper (50%)

 

ABSTRACT OF COURSE'S CONTENT AND OBJECTIVES:

 

This section of MBA299E-1 will focus on COMPETITIVE STRATEGY: THE “DYNAMIC CAPABILTIES” APPROACH. This is a course that deals with the management of strategic adaptation and change within highly competitive markets. We are currently living in one of the most intense eras of market transformation in recent history, and many firms and organizations are having serious difficulty in adapting to new realities, as traditional managerial theories and tools are not working as well as needed. Why is this: does it have to do with the velocity of change in the business environment— the speed with which change is occurring being too rapid for easy adjustment? Or is it ill-equipped managers who are unable or unwilling to understand market dynamics quickly enough to reallocate resources to the new conditions that surround them? Or is it due to a combination of these external environment - internal behavioral and organizational forces?

 

To respond to these questions we will utilize the emerging management construct of “Dynamic Capabilities” to organize the course. Dynamic Capabilities can be described as “the firm’s ability to integrate, build, and reconfigure internal and external competences to address rapidly changing environments” (as stated by Prof. D. Teece of The Haas School, who is credited with the development of this new approach to strategic management). Traditional strategic management concepts, such as the famed “Porter Model” of competitor analysis, are under stress for their difficulty in resolving problems presented by the global, technologically driven, knowledge-based, and extremely dynamic marketplace that characterizes many industries today. As an example, our conventional models of management continue to presume that firms compete primarily in a manufacturing environment in which scale, heavy fixed investment, externalization of production byproducts (such as waste), unlimited supplies of inputs, rigid organizational hierarchies, tightly controlled management-subordinate relationships, and defined industry structures (typically oligopolies) are the order of the day. Clearly, this characterization is becoming less prevalent if not outright obsolete-- and indeed, clinging to it may be the reason for the failure of so many firms in the face of market change. As such, an evolution in thinking is perhaps inevitable in how business firm managers approach their task in the new and dynamic 21st Century economy. The emerging concept of “dynamic capabilities” is designed to address these shortcomings.

We will utilize a number of pedagogical approaches in this course, including case studies and lecture/discussions sessions. Since there will be a case assigned for each class, students should be prepared to engage these course materials with vigor, actively participate in classroom discussions, and embrace your classmates as professional colleagues in our quest for the new truth about business organization management.

 

RECOMMENDED TEXT: We will utilize several “recommended” texts. Robert M. Grant, Contemporary Strategy Analysis, 7th Ed. (John Wiley & Son, 2010) is a very comprehensive and well written primer on strategy today. Any of the editions are acceptable, as the content of each has not changed that much over the past five years. In addition, there are two recommended texts that are more specific to this version of MBA 299E-1. First is C. Helfat, et al, Dynamic Capabilities: Understanding Strategic Change in Organizations (Blackwell Publishing, 2007). This book is a collection of articles, somewhat scholarly, on the topic. Second, you also may wish to review David Teece’s recent book, Dynamic Capabilities and Strategic Management: Organizing for Innovation and Growth (Oxford University Press, 2009). While Professor Teece is the true originator of the concept of “dynamic capabilities,” this book is directed more to academics than to working managers; while there is nothing inherently wrong with this, the book’s concepts do not always translate easily into management action!

In addition, there will be a Course Reader containing various articles, cases, and copies of lecture PowerPoint slides used in the course.

 

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH: See http://www.haas.berkeley.edu/faculty/tiffany.html