Discussion: Industry’s Government Regulations
Discussion: Industry’s Government Regulations
Information resources. Source: Adapted from G. Piccoli and B. Ives, “IT‐Dependent Strategic Initiatives and Sustained Competitive Advantage: A Review and Synthesis of the Literature,” MIS Quarterly 29, no. 4 (2005), 755.
IT Assets IT Capabilities
IT Infrastructure
• Hardware • Software and company apps • Network • Data • Web site
Information Repository
• Customer information • Employee information • Marketplace information • Vendor information
Technical Skills
• Proficiency in systems analysis • Programming and Web design skills • Data analysis/data scientist skills • Network design and implementation skills
IT Management Skills
• Business process knowledge • Ability to evaluate technology options • Project management skills • Envisioning innovative IT solutions
Relationship Skills
• Spanning skills such as business‐IT relationship management
• External skills such as vendor management
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38 Strategic Use of Information Resources
manager that competitive forces result from more than just the actions of direct competitors. We explore each force in detail from an IS perspective.
Potential Threat of New Entrants Existing firms within an industry often try to reduce the threat of new entrants to the marketplace by erecting bar- riers to entry.
New entrants seem to come out of nowhere; established firms can diversify their business models and begin to compete in the space occupied by existing firms, or an enterprising entrepreneur can create a new business that changes the game for existing firms. Barriers to entry— including a firm’s controlled access to limited distribu- tion channels, public image of a firm, unique relationships with customers, and an understanding of their industry’s government regulations—help the firm create a stronghold by offering products or services that are difficult to dis- place in the eyes of customers based on apparently unique features. Information resources also can be used to build barriers that discourage competitors from entering an industry. For example, Google’s search algorithm is a source of competitive advantage for the search company,
You must proofread your paper. But do not strictly rely on your computer’s spell-checker and grammar-checker; failure to do so indicates a lack of effort on your part and you can expect your grade to suffer accordingly. Papers with numerous misspelled words and grammatical mistakes will be penalized. Read over your paper – in silence and then aloud – before handing it in and make corrections as necessary. Often it is advantageous to have a friend proofread your paper for obvious errors. Handwritten corrections are preferable to uncorrected mistakes.
Use a standard 10 to 12 point (10 to 12 characters per inch) typeface. Smaller or compressed type and papers with small margins or single-spacing are hard to read. It is better to let your essay run over the recommended number of pages than to try to compress it into fewer pages.
Likewise, large type, large margins, large indentations, triple-spacing, increased leading (space between lines), increased kerning (space between letters), and any other such attempts at “padding” to increase the length of a paper are unacceptable, wasteful of trees, and will not fool your professor.
The paper must be neatly formatted, double-spaced with a one-inch margin on the top, bottom, and sides of each page. When submitting hard copy, be sure to use white paper and print out using dark ink. If it is hard to read your essay, it will also be hard to follow your argument.
