Application Paper: Competitive Advantage

Application Paper: Competitive Advantage
Attached Files:
File Template – Weekly Application Assignments – MGT 4300.docx Template – Weekly Application Assignments – MGT 4300.docx – Alternative Formats (43.947 KB)
You have recently inherited your grandfathers coffee shop, The Broadway Cafe, which is conveniently located in downtown (you select the city and state). The caf has been in business since 1952 and still operates like it is 1952. You need to bring the cafe into the 21st century. The cafe offers many different kinds of specialized coffees, teas, a full service bakery, and homemade sandwiches, soups, and salads.
To survive and thrive, an organization must create a competitive advantage. A competitive advantage is a product or service that an organizations customers place a greater value on than similar offerings from a competitor. Unfortunately, competitive advantages are typically temporary because competitors often seek ways to duplicate the competitive advantage. In turn, organizations must develop a strategy based on a new competitive advantage.

When an organization is the first to market with a competitive advantage, it gains a first-mover advantage. The first-mover advantage occurs when an organization can significantly impact its market share by being first to market with a competitive advantage. As organizations develop their competitive advantages, they must pay close attention to their competition through environmental scanning. Environmental scanning is the acquisition and analysis of events and trends in the environment external to an organization. Information technology has the opportunity to play an important role in environmental scanning.

Michael Porters Five Forces Model is a useful tool to aid organizations facing the challenging decision of entering a new industry or industry segment. The Five Forces Model helps determine the relative attractiveness of an industry and includes:
Buyer Power
Supplier power
Threat of substitute products or services
Threat of new entrants
Rivalry among existing competitors
Write a paper as the owner of the caf that includes the following:
A detailed Porters Five Forces analysis for The Broadway Caf located in your selected city. Be sure to provide the location of the caf in the paper.
Be sure to highlight entry barriers, switching costs, and substitute products.
Determine which of Porter’s Three Generic strategies you will use as you rebuild The Broadway Cafe for the 21st century.
Remember to explain and support your answers within the paper.
Given the above information, write a paper with the body of the paper (not counting the title page, the table of contents, the abstract, the reference page, or the exhibits) at least three full pages in length addressing the items shown above. The paper must follow APA formatting guidelines, including page layout, font, references and citations, tables and figures, etc. University has chosen APA as the formatting guide for written submissions, and they require me to include it in the grading of papers. The Resources and Policies tab in the Blackboard (BB) course shell contains several good references for APA guidelines. Please see the grading rubrics contained in the Start Here and Syllabus section of the course shell. Remember that proper recognition of sources (including the textbook) is required.

If you do not have a template of APA on your computer, I recommend that you use the attached template or find one on the Internet to use in completing your assignment.

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