28) The primary activities involved in building an organization’s strategy-supportive resources,
capabilities, and organizational structure are NOT concerned with
A) putting together a strong management team.
B) developing a set of resources and capabilities suited to the current strategy and at the same
time updating resources and capabilities as external conditions and the firm’s strategy change.
C) instituting organizational arrangements that facilitate good strategy execution; establishing
lines of authority and reporting relationships; deciding how much decision-making authority to
delegate.
D) overseeing all strategic activities including: related and unrelated diversification, internal
business development, joint ventures and alliances, mergers and acquisitions, modes of entry into
international markets, ethics training and sustainability programs, and relationships with key
stakeholders.
E) training and retaining company personnel to maintain knowledge-based and skills-based
capabilities.
29) Steps to update a company’s capabilities to match changing market conditions and customer
expectations take place often include
A) staffing the organization.
B) recruiting and retaining talented employees.
C) acquiring, developing, and strengthening key resources and capabilities.
D) organizing value chain activities and business processes.
E) structuring the organization and work effort.
30) Because of the many managerial tasks involved and the role of leadership in strategy
execution, when implementing a strategy
A) it is critical to ensure that all anticipated strategy-supportive resources and capabilities are
already in place.
B) assembling a strong management team is especially important.
C) changing market conditions are likely to throw the entire strategy execution efforts off track.
D) strengthening the firm’s core competencies is the number one priority.
E) an effectively structured organization can lead to higher bureaucratic costs.
31) You are considering a career with Enterprise Holdings, parent of the Alamo, Enterprise, and
National car rental companies. What facets of Enterprise’s talent management strategy are NOT
likely to be strategy-supportive?
A) staffing the organization with managers and employees capable of executing the strategy well
and promoting from within.
B) creating an environment in which employees are made to feel that their views and suggestions
count
C) employing people who have similar management styles, leadership approaches, business
philosophies, and personalities.
D) providing people with opportunities to gain experience in a variety of international settings
E) making the work environment stimulating and engaging so that employees will consider the
company a great place to work
32) Putting together a capable top management team with the right mix of experiences, skills,
and abilities
A) should take top priority in building competitively valuable core competencies.
B) is particularly important when the firm is pursuing unrelated diversification or making a
number of new acquisitions in related businesses.
C) is important in building an organization capable of proficient strategy execution, but is nearly
always less crucial than doing a superior job of training and retraining employees.
D) entails filling key managerial slots with smart people who are clear thinkers, good at figuring
out what needs to be done, and who are skilled in “making it happen” and delivering good
results.
E) is particularly essential for executing a strategy to keep a company’s costs lower than rivals
and become the industry’s low-cost leader.
33) An initial step that companies typically take in launching the strategy execution process is
often to
A) ensure all requirements of the value chain are fulfilled.
B) form a mission statement as a basis for managers to achieve organizational objectives.
C) go on the offensive by employing moves to make its product offering more distinctive and
appealing to buyers.
D) put together a talented management team with the right mix of experiences, skills, and
abilities to get things done.
E) strive to be more profitable than rivals and aim for a competitive edge based on bigger profit
margins.
34) The overriding aim in building a management team should be to
A) ensure oversight of every step of the value chain.
B) assemble a critical mass of talented managers who can function as agents of change, work
well together as a team, and produce organizational results that are dramatically better than what
one or two star managers acting individually can achieve.
C) choose managers experienced in gathering competitive intelligence.
D) select people who have similar management styles, leadership approaches, business
philosophies, and personalities.
E) choose managers who are competent in executing a strategy to keep a company’s costs lower
than rivals and become the industry’s low-cost leader.
35) The process of recruiting and retaining capable employees is
A) more important during periods of rapid growth than during periods of crisis and attempted
turnarounds.
B) always an essential ingredient of successful strategy execution.
C) an essential element of developing a distinctive competence.
D) closely tied to developing strong information capital capabilities.
E) more important than having a good situational fit between the company’s strategy and its
external environment.
36) Recruiting and retaining capable employees is
A) usually much more important to good strategy execution than is assembling a capable top-
management team.
B) important because the quality of an organization’s people is always an essential ingredient of
successful strategy execution.
C) more important during periods of rapid growth than during periods of crisis and attempted
turnarounds.
D) an important organization-building element, particularly when it comes to transforming a
competence into a core competence or distinctive competence.
E) easily the most critical aspect in building competitively valuable core competencies and
capabilities.
37) Recruiting and retaining capable employees does NOT entail
A) the quality of an organization’s people, which is always an essential ingredient if critical value
chain activities are to be performed competently.
B) recruiting and retaining capable employees, which is a particularly important organization-
building task in enterprises where superior intellectual capital is a key resource and also a basis
for competitive advantage.
C) recruiting and retaining capable employees, which is usually much more important to good
strategy execution and the achievement of true operating excellence than is assembling a capable
top management team.
D) a large band of capable employees who are actively engaged in the process of making
ongoing operating improvements.
E) adding to a company’s talent base and building intellectual capital while foregoing
investments in plants, equipment, and capital projects.
38) Glassdoor is a California-based social media company that provides a space for employees
and former employees to anonymously review companies and their management. You have
recently had a job offer to relocate and work for Glassdoor. Based on what you have learned
about strategy-supportive talent management practices, what might be a good reason NOT to
accept Glassdoor’s offer?
A) Glassdoor provides careful screening and evaluation of job applicants, along with continuous
training and retraining programs for employees that continue throughout their careers
B) Glassdoor has a policy of rotating people through jobs that not only have great content but
also span functional and geographic boundaries
C) Glassdoor has a track record of eliminating the bottom 10 percent of the lowest-performing
employees each year to increase the overall quality performance metrics to above-average
industry standards
D) Glassdoor has developed a culture in which it encourages employees to challenge existing
ways of doing things, to be creative and innovative in proposing better ways of operating, and to
push their ideas for new products or businesses
E) Glassdoor is dedicated to fostering a stimulating and engaging work environment such that
employees will consider the company a great place to work
39) Companies that depend upon and highly value the contribution of intellectual capital to good
strategy execution, generally do NOT
A) provide their employees with challenging, interesting, and skill-stretching assignments and
also rotating them through jobs that not only have great content but also span functional and
geographic boundaries.
B) implement rewards and benefits programs such as promotions, salary increases, performance
bonuses, stock options, and other perks.
C) invest time and money into coaching underperformers and benchwarmers to improve their
skills and capabilities.
D) encourage their employees to challenge existing ways of doing things, to be creative and
innovative in proposing better ways of operating, and to push their ideas for new products or
businesses.
E) foster a stimulating and engaging work environment so that their employees will consider the
company a great place to work.
40) The implementation process is likely to be hampered by missed deadlines, misdirected
efforts, and managerial ineptness if
A) a capable results-oriented management team is not in place.
B) the personnel have different management styles.
C) top managers start asking tough, incisive questions.
D) important details require attention.
E) an additional investment in capital projects is required.
41) Who is most likely to have strong strategy implementation capabilities?
A) Valery typically probes with tough, incisive questions.
B) Greg is often sympathetic to his team members’ problems and shortcomings.
C) Maria can complete a job in half the time as her colleagues.
D) Jorge prefers to launch, manage, and complete projects by himself.
E) Chong advocates promoting qualified people from within the firm.
42) It is ideal for key management slots to be filled from outside
A) in turnaround and rapid-growth situations.
B) when problems with the old strategy are obvious.
C) in a worst-case scenario.
D) when the managerial whole is greater than the sum of individual efforts.
E) in a centralized structure.
43) Good strategy execution requires which of the following?
A) putting those resources and capabilities into place, strengthening them as needed, and then
modifying them as market conditions evolve
B) a universal business model to raise profits and lower costs
C) strengthening the competitive environment arena outside the company’s operating territory
D) a planned budget to protect the company’s financial condition and eliminate wasteful use of
cash
E) passive pressures stemming from the dominance of outside market buyers
44) A dynamic capability is the
A) ongoing capacity to modify existing resources and capabilities to create new ones.
B) improvement evaluation process for eliminating waste in the firm.
C) functional and operating resources management process.
D) ongoing capability to understand and establish a rival commitment to resource alignment.
E) most compelling product or service in a firm.
45) The most common approaches to capability building include all of the following, EXCEPT
A) developing capabilities internally.
B) acquiring capabilities through mergers and acquisitions.
C) accessing capabilities via collaborative partnerships.
D) renewing capabilities to align with customer expectations.
E) divesting underperforming units.
46) Imagine you have been asked to present a strategy implementation plan to the top
management of Didrickson, a Swedish multidomestic manufacturer and marketer of outdoor
activewear. Your presentation would NOT likely include which implementation option as a
means of building and strengthening its competitively valuable resources and capabilities?
A) Didrickson needs to engage in experience-building activities such as collaborative efforts in
R&D engineering and design
B) Didrickson needs to shift from decentralized to centralized decision-making so as to give
senior executives more authority and control in driving cultural change
C) Didrickson needs to acquire capabilities through mergers and acquisitions
D) Didrickson needs to enter into collaborative partnerships with suppliers, competitors, or other
companies that possess needed expertise.
E) Didrickson needs to select and assemble a team of people with the requisite skills and
experience, upgrading or expanding individual abilities as needed, and then molding the efforts
of individuals into a collaborative effort to create an organizational ability.
47) The capability building process entails
A) developing the ability to do something, however imperfectly or inefficiently, and molding
these efforts into an organizational ability, and as experience grows and personnel perform the
activity consistently well and at an acceptable cost, it is transformed into a tried-and-true
competence and as they continue to polish and refine their know-how into further improvements,
they then create a real competitive capability.
B) deciding which value chain activities to perform internally and which ones to outsource; and
deciding how much authority to centralize at the top and how much to delegate to down-the-line
managers and employees.
C) creating the needed capability internally when industry conditions, technology, or competitors
are moving at such a rapid clip that time is of the essence.
D) a wait-and-see attitude, because companies often implement strategy inefficiently or
imperfectly.
E) appropriate coordinating mechanisms, and those networking and communications
arrangements considered necessary to support effective execution of the firm’s strategy.
48) Core competencies and competitive capabilities are usually
A) lodged in the narrow skills and specialized work efforts of a single department, as opposed to
the combined expertise and capabilities of specialists scattered across several departments.
B) observed to stem from collaborative efforts with strategic allies.
C) bundles of skills and know-how that most often grow out of the collaborative efforts of cross-
functional work groups and departments performing complementary activities at different
locations in a firm’s value chain.
D) found to result in competitive advantage when they involve highly specific technologies and
are grounded in a company’s own deep technical expertise.
E) built rapidly, usually in conjunction with important product innovations.
49) The traits of the capability-building process involve all of the following EXCEPT
A) evolving changes in customer needs and competitive conditions that often require tweaking
and adjusting a company’s portfolio of competencies and intellectual capital to keep its
capabilities freshly honed and on the cutting edge.
B) a core competence or capability that emerges incrementally out of company efforts either to
bolster skills that contributed to earlier successes or to respond to customer problems, new
technological and market opportunities, and the competitive maneuverings of rivals.
C) core competencies or capabilities that are most often bundles of skills and know-how that
grow out of the combined efforts of cross-functional work groups and departments performing
complementary activities at different locations in a firm’s value chain.
D) the key to leveraging a core competence into a distinctive competence (or transforming a
capability into a competitively superior capability), which concerns concentrating more effort
and talent than rivals on deepening and strengthening a competence or capability so as to achieve
the dominance needed for competitive advantage.
E) saving time by creating capabilities from scratch to remain aligned with external conditions
and company strategy rather than updating and remodeling existing capabilities.
50) The capabilities and core competencies that Zara has developed in the execution of its
strategy, i.e. rapid production processes and new apparel introductions, are NOT concerned with
A) bundles of skills and know-how that grew out of the combined efforts of Zara’s cross-
functional work groups and departments performing complementary activities at different
locations in a firm’s value chain.
B) evolving changes in customer needs and competitive conditions that often required tweaking
and adjusting Zara’s portfolio of competencies and intellectual capital to keep its capabilities
freshly honed and on the cutting edge.
C) acts to bolster skills that contributed to Zara’s earlier successes, or acts to respond to customer
problems, new technological or market opportunities, and the competitive maneuvers of rivals.
D) cost-effectively hiring a cadre of people with the right talent and expertise, putting them
together in a single work group, and then teaming the work group with Zara’s key strategic
allies/partners to mesh the skills, expertise, and competencies needed to perform the desired
capabilities with some proficiency.
E) leveraging Zara’s core competence into a distinctive competence (or transforming a capability
into a competitively superior capability), by concentrating more effort and talent than rivals on
deepening and strengthening the competence or capability so as to achieve the dominance
needed for competitive advantage.
51) What is NOT part of the process of upgrading core competencies and competitive
capabilities?
A) Core competencies can be leveraged into competitive advantage by concentrating sufficient
effort and talent on deepening and strengthening them so that the firm achieves dominating depth
and gains the capability to outperform rivals by a meaningful margin.
B) Core competencies have to be tweaked and adjusted to keep them fresh and responsive to
changing customer needs and market conditions.
C) Core competencies typically are lodged in the combined efforts of different work groups and
departments.
D) Core competencies generally grow out of company efforts to master a strategy-critical
technology or to invent and patent a valuable technology.
E) Core competencies tend to emerge gradually rather than blossom quickly.
52) Firms generally leverage the expertise of their talent pool in building capabilities by
A) updating existing capabilities.
B) establishing a new arsenal of resource capabilities by phasing out existing capabilities.
C) refreshing existing capabilities.
D) augmenting or recombining well-established capabilities with existing resources.
E) building resource capabilities from scratch so it is easy and less time-consuming.
53) Managerial actions to develop core competencies and competitive capabilities internally
generally take one of two forms. What are they?
A) either strengthening the company’s base of skills, knowledge, and experience or coordinating
and integrating the efforts of various work groups and departments
B) either putting in high incentive bonuses to reward individual employees who train hard to
develop the desired capability or launching an extensive training effort to develop the capability
quickly with newly hired employees
C) either using benchmarking and the adoption of best practices to imitate a capability that rivals
have already developed or empowering a team of employees to develop the capability however
they best see fit
D) either using developed dynamic capabilities or acquiring the capability from outside sources
E) either by enforcing close cross-business collaboration or by centralizing the performance of
functions requiring close coordination at the corporate level
54) Which of the following statements is NOT accurate with respect to building a company’s
competencies and capabilities?
A) Building new competencies and capabilities is a multistage process that occurs over a period
of months and years.
B) Core competencies have to be tweaked and adjusted to keep them fresh and responsive to
changing customer needs and market conditions.
C) As experience grows and company personnel learn how to perform the activities consistently
well and at an acceptable cost, the ability evolves into a tried-and-true competence.
D) It is generally much easier and less time-consuming to update and remodel a company’s
existing capabilities as external conditions and company strategy change than it is to create them
from scratch.
E) When a company succeeds in hiring talented employees and training them properly,
competencies and capabilities tend to develop quickly and, once put in place, can last for a
decade or more.