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: Monday, 8:00-11:00AM.

 

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

 

PREREQUISITE(S): MBA299

 

CLASS FORMAT: Cases and lecture/discussions by the Instructor

 

REQUIRED READINGS: Course reader (on study.net) and three recommended texts:

-David Teece’s, Dynamic Capabilities and Strategic Management: Organizing for Innovation and Growth (Oxford University Press, 2009).                 The seminal book on the topic, though it is directed more to academics than to working managers.

-Constance Helfat, et al, Dynamic Capabilities: Understanding Strategic Change in Organizations (Wiley-Blackwell Publishing, 2007). This book is a collection of somewhat scholarly articles on the course topic.

-Robert M. Grant, Contemporary Strategy Analysis, 7th Ed. (John Wiley & Son, 2010). A very comprehensive and well written primer on strategy as it is generally practiced by managers today.  While not focused on the “dynamic capabilities approach,” it is an excellent overview of the field as it is traditionally perceived. 

 

BASIS FOR FINAL GRADE: Class attendance and Participation (20%), two case write-up (40%), and group project (40%)

 

ABSTRACT OF COURSE'S CONTENT AND OBJECTIVES:

This course 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 this is so remains controversial: 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 ultimately 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 described by its creator, Professor D. Teece of Haas). Traditional strategic management concepts, e.g., the “Porter model” of competitor analysis or “blue ocean strategy” as advocated by Kim and Mauborgne are under stress for their difficulty in resolving problems presented by the global, technologically driven, knowledge-based, and extremely dynamic marketplace that characterizes many if not most 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 supply 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, blind adherence to it may be the reason for the strategic failure of so many firms when confronted with market change.

 

An evolution in thinking is perhaps inevitable in how business firm managers approach their task in the new and dynamic 21st Century economy.  While some firms appear to have grasped this call, many are still either in denial about the need to change or they encounter strong internal resistance to a recalibration of both the means and ends of the organization.  The emerging concept of “dynamic capabilities” is designed to address these shortcomings.

 

We will utilize a number of pedagogical approaches in this course, including lecture/discussions sessions, case studies, and participant exercises.  Students should be prepared to engage 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.

 

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