Business Administration: Competitive Strategy, Organization, and Human Resource Management

Comprehensive vocabulary flashcards covering competitive strategy analysis, organizational structures, change management models, and human resource management principles from the lecture notes.

Competitive Strategy

A strategy aimed at building a profitable position and defending it against competitive forces within a specific industry.

Porter's Five Forces

A framework for analyzing industry attractiveness based on: Internal Rivalry, Power of Buyers, Power of Suppliers, Threat of New Entrants, and Threat of Substitutes.

Profit Equation ($G$)

$G = (p - k)Q$ where $G$ is Profit, $p$ is unit price, $k$ is unit cost, and $Q$ is production and sales quantity.

Economics of Scale

Cost advantages where unit costs decrease as production volume increases by distributing fixed costs (like factories and machines) across many units.

Economics of Scope

Cost advantages gained when a company uses shared resources (e.g., Marketing, Logistics) to produce multiple different products.

Experience Curve Effects

Efficiency gains where costs typically drop by $20$ to $30\%$ with every doubling of output due to routines and error reduction.

Inspection Goods

Products whose quality can be assessed by the customer before the purchase, such as furniture.

Experience Goods

Products whose quality only becomes apparent after use or over time, such as cars.

Vertical Foreclosure

A barrier to entry where new competitors face difficulty accessing resources due to established, exclusive supplier relationships.

Network Externalities

A phenomenon where a product's utility increases as more people use it, creating a barrier to entry for newcomers (e.g., Facebook).

Value Creation (Wertschöpfung)

The difference between Consumer Valuation ($B$) and Production Costs ($K$), expressed as $B - K$.

Consumer Surplus

The difference between what a consumer is willing to pay and the actual price, expressed as $B - P$.

Producer Surplus

The difference between the price charged and the cost of production, expressed as $P - K$.

Cost Leadership

A strategy focusing on the cost side ($K$) to achieve the largest $B - K$, providing protection against price competition.

Value Leadership (Differentiation)

A strategy focusing on the valuation side ($B$) to achieve the largest $B - K$, isolating the firm from price competition through uniqueness.

Capabilities

The organizational skills required to utilize Resources in a superior way; they are typically embedded in organizational routines.

Isolation Mechanisms

Factors like patents, reputation, and network externalities that prevent competitors from neutralizing a company's competitive advantage.

Average Cost ($DK$)

Total costs ($TK$) divided by the output quantity ($Q$), represented as $DK(Q) = \frac{TK(Q)}{Q}$.

Marginal Cost ($GK$)

The slope of the total cost curve, representing the cost of producing one additional unit of output.

High Price Elasticity

A market condition where customers are highly sensitive to price; even small price increases cause many customers to stop purchasing.

Functional Organization

An organizational structure focused on specific tasks (vocation-oriented) like Purchasing, Production, and Marketing.

Divisional Organization

An organizational structure divided by products or regions, allowing for higher flexibility and decentralized decision-making.

Leitungsintensität ($Li$)

A measure of management density calculated as $Li = \frac{\text{sum of leading and supporting positions}}{\text{sum of executing positions}}$.

Matrix Organization

A structure that overlaps two lines of authority with equal competencies to promote flexibility and innovation.

Levels of Culture (Schein)

The three components of organizational culture: Basic Assumptions (invisible), Norms/Standards (partially visible), and Symbol Systems (visible).

Not-Invented-Here (NIH) Syndrome

An organizational resistance factor where changes are rejected simply because they originated from outside the company.

Lewin's Triad

The cyclic three-phase model of change management: Unfreezing, Moving, and Freezing.

Survey Feedback Approach

A method using employee surveys to diagnose problems and motivation gaps by comparing the current state with an ideal state.

Process Consultation

A method where consultants act as 'system therapists' to help organizations identify and solve their own communication and conflict problems.

Halo Effect

A perceptual bias where a general judgment of a person is based on a single specific characteristic.

Affective Events Theory

A theory stating that workplace events trigger emotional reactions which influence behavioral patterns and overall job satisfaction.

Cognitive Dissonance

The unpleasant psychological feeling that occurs when an individual's behavior and their attitude do not match.