Part 1:
1. Why is it important for a firm to study and understand its internal organization?
2. What is value? Why is it critical for the firm to create value? How does it do so?
3. What are the differences between tangible and intangible resources? Why is it important for decision makers to understand these differences? Are tangible resources more valuable for creating capabilities than are intangible resources, or is the reverse true? Why?
4. What are capabilities? How do firms create capabilities?
5. What four criteria must capabilities satisfy for them to become core competencies? Why is it important for firms to use these criteria to evaluate their capabilities value-creating potential?
6. What is value chain analysis? What does the firm gain by successfully using this tool?
7. What is outsourcing? Why do firms outsource? Will outsourcing's importance grow in the future? If so why?
8. How do firms identify internal strengths and weaknesses? Why is it vital that managers have a clear understanding of their firms strengths and weaknesses?
9. What are core rigidities? What does it mean to say that each core competences could become a core rigidity?
Part 2:
1. What is a business-level strategy?
2. What is the relationship between a firm's customers and it's business-level strategy in terms of who, what, and how? Why is this relationship important?
3. What are the differences among the cost leadership, differentiation, focused cost leadership, focused differentiation, and integrated cost leadership/differentiation business-level strategies?
4. How can each one of the business-level strategies be used to position the firm relative to the five forces of competition in a way that helps the firm earn above-average returns?
5. What are the specific risks associated with using each business-level strategy?
Part 3:
1. Who are competitors? How are competitive rivalry, competitive behavior, and competitive dynamics defined in the chapter?
2. What is market commonality? What is resource similarity? What does it mean to say that these concepts are the building blocks for a competitor analysis?
3. How do awareness, motivation, and ability affect the firm's competitive behavior?
4. What factors affect the likelihood a firm will take a competitive action?
5. What factors affect the likelihood a firm will initiate a competitive response to the action taken by a competitor?
6. What competitive dynamics can be expected among firms competing in slow-cycle markets? In fast-cycle markets? In standard-cycle markets?