May 8, 2012
Within Michael Porter’s 592-page tome, Competitive Strategy, the Harvard Business School professor describes the foundation of strategy as the processes which an organization elects to excel:
…Ultimately, all differences between companies in cost or price derive from the hundreds of business processes required to create, produce, sell and deliver their products or services.”
…differentiation arises from both the choice of business processes and how they are performed.”
…the essence of strategy is choosing to perform business processes differently from competitors so as to provide a unique value proposition and realize superior return on invested capital (ROIC).
…a sustainable strategic position, in Porter’s view, comes from a system of processes, each of which reinforces the other.
Thus, business processes are the centerpiece of your strategy.