COMM1170 Flashcards

Course Overview

  • COMM1170: Organisational Resources.

  • Part of the First Year BCom program at UNSW Sydney.

  • Themes:

    • Business.

      • Financial Management.

      • Organisational Resources.

      • Value Creation.

      • Data, Insights, and Decisions.

    • Business Ecosystem.

    • Skills and Capabilities.

      • Business Decision Making.

      • Global Business Environments.

      • Evidence-based Problem Solving.

      • Collaboration and Innovation in Business.

  • Focus areas:

    • Internal operations of an organisation.

    • Broader environment in which the organisation operates.

    • Equipping students with skills and capabilities.

Teaching Staff

  • Lecturer Yichelle Zhang: Accounting, Auditing & Taxation.

  • Course Coordinator and Lecturer Pascale Frické: Management and Governance.

  • Lecturer Natalie Oh: Banking and Finance.

  • Lecturer Yunfei Shi: Information Systems & Technology Management.

  • Associate Course Coordinator Jacinta Quattrocchi.

Course Structure and Assessments

  • Understanding People Resources: Weeks 1-2.

    • RBV of the firm, organisation lifecycle, strategic approaches (Week 1).

    • HCM, people resources and capabilities (Week 2).

  • Understanding Technology Resources: Weeks 3.

    • "As-is to-be", 5 IS component framework (Week 3).

  • Understanding Budgeting: Weeks 4-5.

    • The Budgeting Process (Week 4).

    • Costing Systems and Capital raising (Week 5).

  • Understanding the Required Investment: Weeks 6-7.

    • Capital structure, business risk (Week 7).

  • Integration: Weeks 8-11.

    • Achieving CA in mid-size organisations (Week 8).

    • Achieving CA in late growth and mature orgs (Week 9).

    • Achieving CA in start-ups & early growth (Week 10).

  • Assessments:

    • Reflective Learning Portfolio 1: 20% (Weeks 1-3, Due Week 4).

    • Reflective Learning Portfolio 2: 40% (Weeks 4-8, Due Week 9).

    • Business Case Video Presentation: 40% (Individual, Week 11).

Week 1 Lecture Agenda

  1. Internal Strategic Focus

    • Resource-based view (RBV) of the firm.

    • Three strategic approaches to achieving competitive advantage.

    • Leadership – strategic and operational.

  2. Resource and Capability Management

    • Resources & capabilities.

  3. COMM1170 Toolkits

    • Overall/people/technology/finance and accounting (measuring).

  4. COMM1170 Analysis Tools

    • Capability and resource analysis; the 5 “Ws”, and SWOT.

  5. Business Case: Netflix.

Resource Based View (RBV) of the Firm

  • Focus on an organisation’s internal resources.

  • Organisations utilise their internal resources to implement value-creating strategies.

  • An organisation’s resources and capabilities are competitive assets and a source of competitive power in the marketplace. (Barney 1991)

  • Organisational Resources:

    • Include all assets, capabilities, organisational processes, firm attributes, information, knowledge etc. controlled by a firm that enable the firm to conceive of and implement strategies that improve its efficiency and effectiveness (Daft, 1983, p. 539).

    • People.

    • Technology.

    • Capital.

    • Accounting.

  • HRTech Ecosystem:

    • HRTech general ‘ecosystem’.

    • HCM tech (more specific to the course).

    • Organisational Performance Integration: People resources + IS/tech = HRtech Term 3.

Sustained Competitive Advantage

  • A firm is said to have a sustained competitive advantage when it is implementing a value creating strategy not simultaneously being implemented by any current or potential competitors and when these other firms are unable to duplicate the benefits of this strategy (Barney 1991, p. 102).

Competitive Advantage - 3 Strategic Approaches (Treacy & Wiersema 1993)

  • Companies that have taken leadership positions in their industries have typically done so by narrowing their business focus, not broadening it.

  • Operational Excellence

    • Providing customers with reliable products or services, at competitive prices and delivered conveniently.

  • Customer Intimacy

    • Personalisation of service/ customisation of products to meet differing customer needs.

    • Includes: detailed customer knowledge with operational flexibility so they can respond quickly to almost any need, and/or customizing a product to fulfil special requests.

  • Product/Service Leadership

    • Firms strive to produce a continuous stream of innovative products and services and permanently look for new solutions to their customers' problems.

Strategic and Operational Leaders

  • Strategic

    • Make decisions that shape competitive strategy, resource allocation priorities, market entry or exit decisions, mergers, acquisitions, and partnerships.

    • Broader, longer-term focus (typically, 3-5 years for planning).

    • Identify, acquire and develop the resources. Explore opportunities to create new resources or capabilities that can provide a competitive edge.

  • Operational

    • Make decisions to optimise resource allocation and implement operating procedures, e.g., streamline processes, control costs and increase productivity.

    • Short-term focus (days to months) on execution of the organisation’s operations.

    • Managing and deploying the existing resources effectively.

Resource and Capability Management

  • Types of resources and capabilities, management throughout the organisational life-cycle.

Resources

  • What an organisation owns.

  • Tangible.

  • Intangible.

  • Examples:

    • Financial Resources.

    • Proprietary Codebases.

    • Highly Trained Service Agent.

    • Company Culture.

    • Machinery.

    • Copyright and Trade Secrets.

Capabilities

  • What an organisation can do.

  • Cross-functional and multi-dimensional.

  • Arise over time.

  • Harder for competitors to duplicate.

  • e.g., excellent customer service.

Organizational Performance

  • Competitive Advantage.

Five Phases of Organizational Life Cycle

  1. Startup Phase

  2. A growth stage

    • The organization either grows or fails.

  3. A maturity stage

    • The dangers are stagnation, bureaucracy, and failure to innovate.

  4. A decline stage

    • Growth and innovation slows and the organization becomes a self-perpetuating bureaucracy that creates diminishing returns.

  5. Renewal

    • It can take many forms: a change or reorganization in the right direction, merger, acquisition, or sale.

Resource and Capability Management Across the Organizational Lifecycle

  • Structuring

    • Acquiring.

    • Developing (accumulating).

    • Divesting.

  • Bundling

    • Stabilising.

    • Enriching.

    • Pioneering.

  • Leveraging

    • Mobilising.

    • Coordinating.

    • Deploying.

Amazon – Logistics Capability Management

Structuring

  • Acquiring.

  • Developing (Accumulating).

  • Divesting.

    • Strategically established a network of distribution centers and warehouses.

    • Invested heavily in technology, including advanced logistics management software, automation, and robotics.

    • Acquired logistics assets, including delivery trucks, aircraft and ‘last-mile’ delivery providers.

    • Shutdown Amazon Restaurants (food delivery service) in 2019.

Bundling

  • Stabilising.

  • Enriching.

  • Pioneering.

    • By combining its vast distribution network, advanced software, and real-time data analytics, Amazon has built a sophisticated supply chain management capability.

    • Amazon has been actively pioneering drone delivery through its Amazon Prime Air program; aiming to provide even faster and more efficient deliveries, especially in rural areas.

    • Uses predictive analytics and ML algorithms to optimise inventory placement, forecast demand etc. enabling data-driven logistical decision-making capability.

Leveraging

  • Mobilising.

  • Coordinating.

  • Deploying.

    • Mobilised its resources by investing heavily in its logistics infrastructure and developing its own logistics software and tools.

    • Uses sophisticated algorithms to coordinate its delivery resources and minimise shipping times.

    • Implemented innovative delivery methods such as Prime Now which offers 2-hour delivery on some items.

    • Combination of own delivery vehicles and third-party carriers for fast, reliable package delivery.

COMM1170 Toolkits

  • Overall, people, technology and capital, and accounting toolkit for budgeting and measurement.

The COMM1170 toolkit

  • Environment (business trends, geo political, legal, etc.).

  • Leaders as architects

    • Strategic.

    • Operational.

  • Structuring.

  • Bundling and leveraging.

  • Measure Organisational Performance.

People Toolkit

  • Environment (e.g., legal, business trends, global environment).

  • Formal Organisation

    • Strategy and structure.

    • Systems: Recruitment & onboarding, training & development, total rewards.

  • Workforce planning

    • Workforce analysis, identify skills gaps.

    • Develop & implement action plan (work design, capital resources).

  • Intangible people resources

    • Employee engagement.

    • Performance behaviours.

  • Leaders as architects of organisational resources

    • Strategic.

    • Operational.

  • Culture.

  • Measure Organisational Performance.

Technology Toolkit

  • Environment (e.g., legal, business trends, global environment).

  • Information Systems

    1. Hardware

    2. Software

    3. Data

    4. Procedures

    5. People

  • Business Processes Implementation.

    • Technological Feasibility.

    • Organisational Feasibility.

    • Economic Feasibility.

  • Organisational Performance.

Capital Toolkit

  • Environment (e.g., legal, business trends, global environment).

  • Characteristics of the firm: Size, life cycle, nature of operations, cost structure …

  • Identify

    • Identify capital needs, evaluate possible sources of capital and identify appropriate capital structure for the firm’s requirements.

  • Mobilize

    • Raise capital via

      • Internal sources

      • Equity

      • Debt

  • Manage

    • Managing via numbers and narrative

      • Costs and benefits

      • Financial leverage & Optimal Capital Structure

      • Managing risks

  • Chief Financial Officer and Corporate Treasury

  • Organisational Performance.

Accounting Toolkit

  • Environment (e.g., legal, business trends, global environment).

  • Chief Financial Officer.

  • NOW: Measuring and allocating resources

    • Costing for decision making

    • Direct and indirect cost classification

    • Job costing and process costing

  • FUTURE: Planning for resource usage

    • Operating budget and cash budget

    • Budgeting for decision making

    • Linkages to capital resources

  • Organisational Performance.

COMM1170 Analysis Tools

  • Models and frameworks for analysis in COMM1170 – resource and capability analysis, the 5Ws tool, SWOT analysis.

Resource and Capability Analysis

  • Sizing up Competitive Assets and Competitive Advantage.

  • Identify the company’s resources and capabilities.

  • Examine them for potential CA – the four tests of a competitive power (VRIO).

5Ws Tool

  • What?

  • Why?

  • Who?

  • When?

  • Where?

  • What?

    • …is the issue?

    • …is the organisation’s competitive advantage?

    • …resources and capabilities are needed to achieve that competitive advantage? Are they at risk?

    • …is competitive advantage being achieved? Now, and/or in the future?

  • When?

    • …did the issue arise and is it likely to last?

  • Where?

    • …in the organisation are the resources helping or hindering the achievement of competitive advantage? e.g., a specific technology, a department, a type of employee?

    • …in the organisation needs to change resources to enhance competitive advantage? e.g., operational staff or strategic (C-suite managers) staff.

  • Who?

  • Why?

    • …why is the organisational issue occurring? What are the main causes of the issue? Are there systemic factors that need to be addressed?

SWOT Analysis

  • Strengths

  • Weaknesses

  • Opportunities

  • Threats

Action Items

  • Choose a potential organisation to trial in the Week 1 tutorial for use in Assessment 3.

    • The organisation must be publicly listed on the NYSE/ASX, etc. This will enable you to source financial information more easily.

    • The information and evidence about the organisation must be available in the English language.

    • No more than two students in the same tutorial can choose the same organisation and the students choosing the same organisation must choose different issues to work on for the assessment task. The exception is large conglomerates with subsidiary companies, students may choose different subsidiaries (e.g., Walt Disney Co. – has the theme parks business, and the entertainment business).

    • The organisation is not utilised in major class examples, e.g., Netflix, Amazon Logistics Management (you could choose other Amazon businesses), Star Aviation, ELMO Software.

  • Attend your tutorial where you will work on your potential organisation as part of your Reflective Learning Portfolio 1.

Re-cap W1

  • Organisations need competitive advantage: operational excellence, product/service leadership & customer intimacy.

  • Organisational resources – people, technology, capital – need to be innovatively combined and accounted for, in order to change with the business environment.

  • The change process is: Identify an issue, structure, bundle and leverage resources, then measure the organisational feasibility.

Next Week

  • Lecturer Dr Pascale Frické.

  • In Week 2 we will look at:

    • The People toolkit, including:

      • Human Capital Management (HCM).

      • Organisational culture and structure.

Contact Details

  • Course Coordinator: Helen Parker, comm1170@unsw.edu.au

  • If you have any questions about the course, please email: comm1170@unsw.edu.au

  • The lecture recording will be made available in your Moodle course site.

References

  • Barney, J 1991, ‘Firm resources and sustained competitive advantage’, Journal of Management, Vol. 17, No. 1, pp. 99- 120.

  • Daft, R L 1983, Learning the craft of organizational research. Academy of Management Review, Vol. 8, No. 4, pp.539- 546.

  • Prahalad, C. K. & Hamel, G. 1994. Competing for the Future, Harvard Business School Press Boston.

  • Sirman, D J Hitt, M A & Ireland, D R 2007. ‘Managing firm resources in dynamic environments to create value: Looking inside the black box’, The Academy of Management Review, Vol. 32, No. 1, pp. 273-292

  • Thompson Jr, A A , Peteraf, M, Gamble, J E & Strickland III, A 2022. Crafting and Executing Strategy: Concepts and Cases, McGraw Hill.

  • Treacy, M & Wiersema, F 1993. ‘Customer Intimacy and Other Value Disciplines’. Harvard Business Review, Vol 71, No 1, pp. 84-93.

  • Tushman, M L & O’Reilly III, C 2007. Managerial Problem Solving: A Congruence Approach. In: Tushman, M. L. & O’Reilly III, C. (eds.) Winning through innovation: A Practical guide to leading organizational change and renewal. Harvard Business Publishing