Improved Global Competitiveness on the Basis of New Business Models Influenced by Dynamic Strategic Thinking

In modern business, dynamic changes in the environment (macro trends) provoke changes within the company. Companies can protect themselves from latent, acute crises. In addition, companies can navigate a turbulent environment while ensuring organizational existence and development. Organizational forms and characteristics, as well as business models to maintain or increase existence and create competitive advantages in the global market, are increasingly sought in a more creative manner. These actions are based on dynamic strategic thinking. Revolutionary methods are often required for the creation and adaptation of competitive business models. The data from companies that face a current crisis show a gap between the need to change business models and the introduction of adapted business models to achieve the desired level of competitiveness.

Business Performance Valuation and Value Creation

The globalization of the economy, the evolution of technology, and the increasing level of competition have imposed constant change to companies, namely on the continuous improvement of their functioning and organization, in the permanent updating of their products, and in the attitude towards the satisfaction of their customers. This pressure for change has led to the emergence of new approaches and management methods. One of these new approaches, called value management, is based on the concept of value, which translates a relationship between the satisfaction of a product or service and the resources necessary for its execution. This study presents the main tools for monitoring performance, highlighting the most expressive indicators of business performance. Before, however, brief reflection will be made on management oriented towards value creation.

Key Strategic Drivers for Business Digital Transformation

The concept of digital transformation (DT) has reached a heightened demand level on the executives' agenda, especially when it is related to elements that influence the development and activities of contemporary firms being prevalent in discussions about industrial and social changes. This theme leads the authors to reflect on the key strategic drivers used by firms to carry out the qualitative process (prior experience) of digital business transformation. It reinforces the purpose of understanding the key strategic drivers used by firms in recent years to guide the digital business transformation process. The systematic literature review was performed in the “WoS database,” according to Boolean logic, aiming to capture the essential properties of the logical operators and sets of statements about the theme presented to compose the study. The results indicate a higher frequency for the big data and digitization drivers, followed by the innovation driver within the analyzed period.

Digital Business Transformation in the Banking Sector

Financial technology companies (fintechs) have gained tremendous importance in the last decade and particularly in the last four years. They have contributed with disruptive technological solutions and provided not only complementary but also substitute products to the traditional banking sector. New incumbents have been challenging banks already established and forced them to innovate in order to remain competitive. Indeed, banks have a heavy burden of slow processes, costly business models, and few innovative solutions. The authors collected 100 articles from Scopus related with the fintech and bank topics. This study adopted a hybrid design comprising a systematic qualitative review methods and narrative, supplemented by semantic network analysis. Based on the results of the systematic literature review, the authors explored the impacts that fintechs have had on traditional banking sector.

Does the Bargaining Power of Vertical Parties Improve or Worsen the Effect of Family Influence on Long-Term Performance?

Grounding in the socioemotional wealth approach, this chapter explores the effect of family influence on long-term performance. Moreover, this study also examines the moderating role of the bargaining power of vertical parties, namely supplier (SBP) and customer (CBP) bargaining power, on the preceding relationship. By utilising a panel dataset of 3,118 observations of Spanish private manufacturing firms in the 2007–2016 period, the chapter finds that family influence negatively impacts long-term performance. The findings also reveal that CBP mitigates the negative effect of family influence on long-term performance. In this light, CBP is found to be a potential environmental factor that enables family influenced firms enhancing their long-term performance.

Competitive Cycles in a Hyper-Connected World

This chapter presents a competitive framework suggesting a circular perspective in analyzing and managing competitive wars in a hyper-competitive and hyper-connected world. The author uses the expression “competitive cycles” to represent a typical journey of a competitive arena. The journey starts with the status quo, characterized by a direct confrontation on specific success factors (War of Position); eventually, this scenario is disrupted by the game-changing strategy of an insurgent (War of Movement). This leads to the next stage of the journey, the War of Imitation, ending up when the new game finally becomes the new status quo, that is, back to the War of Position. Then everything flows, until a new cycle, with its new rules, will start again. The digital tsunami is adding momentum and clock-speed to competitive cycles. In every moment of a firm's life, then, it is vitally important to be fully aware of its different wars. In fact, behind each of them lies distinctive rationales and dynamics, which call for specific strategic approaches.

Young Ideas to Improve Organizational Resilience in Turbulent and Changing Environments

To survive and remain competitive in a constantly changing environment, companies need to develop adaptive capabilities, that is, to become more resilient. Some authors argue that including young employees in the company's decision-making process contributes to enhance their organizational resilience. The present study aims to further investigate this assumption through a case study approach. To this end, 18 Generation Z Business Administration students form several European countries were familiarized with the processes of a luxury goods company and requested to propose solutions to five real challenges that affect the segment. In the presented solutions, they showed potential to enhance each of the dimensions of resilience according to the main conceptualizations of the subject. The findings suggest that companies should invest in attracting, training, and empowering young talents to make decisions in order to enhance their resilience capacity. Future studies should further investigate the topic through explanatory approaches in order to reach a more reliable understanding.

Exploring the Organizational and Technological Implications on Strategic Business Model Change

The purpose of this chapter is to identify and analyze the main organizational and technological factors that play a relevant role in a transformational strategic change inherent in changing the business model supported on the internet. An analysis was made of the different business models, as well as their connection to strategic management and how this is accomplished in the organizational and technological plan. This empirical study, based on the qualitative methodology, focuses on a single case study on a Portuguese company that recently changed its business model. The findings allowed the authors to assess the advantages and challenges posed by the transformation of an initial business based on a website that performs a comparison of prices for an integrated model based on a marketplace, in which customers can make their purchases and access all products, from different stores, in one place.

Business Policy

The purpose of this chapter is to explore improvements in existing corporate governing practices that are currently being implemented through methods that lag behind most of the recent developments taking place in the field of computer science. The authors suggest taking on board systems modeling by adopting a computer-assisted policy design based on system dynamics simulators. Implementing a system thinking approach to business organizations allows the designing of virtuous strategies by simulating organizational behavior. In addition, this approach may also help to mitigate unintended consequences, like risks and outcomes which may surprise the firm, particularly from the board-level perspective. The originality of the present work arrives from merging several approaches that have been around for many years, however not combined in the context of the business policy conceptual framework. Therefore, it brings together recent developments in the fields of business policy, systems thinking, and computer-assisted policy design.

Creating Value From Garbage

We live on a finite planet with scarce resources, which entails major challenges such as the depletion of natural resources, the ecological footprint, and climate change. However, in the continued growth of global economy, the majority of companies' strategies and business models move away from sustainability while facing a big paradox: on one side, companies focus on economic development encouraging consumption, but on the other side, companies could play a key role in environmental issues, enhancing more sustainable consumption patterns. In this context, some companies have adopted marketing strategies that focus on turning garbage into value, as a way to tackle one of the major environmental issues. In this chapter, some of these companies and their marketing strategies are examined through a multiple case analysis. The main purpose of this chapter is to show that some companies are addressing one major environmental issue by turning garbage into value.