M5-Strategy-S3 - Industry characteristics and Critical Success Drivers

• Industry success drivers or factors that are critical to success may lie in:
  • customers
  • customer value
  • distribution channels
  • activities performed to deliver the value
  • technology that underpins the value and activities
• Examples:
  • In consulting, for example, capacity utilization is critical.
    • So is the ability to create and share knowledge since, when all is said and done, consulting is a knowledge management business.
  • In pharmaceuticals, two industry success drivers are
    • R&D
    • Ability to perform clinical trials quickly and efficiently.
  • In the automobile industry, distribution accounts for 30 percent of the price of a car while an inability to forecast what customers want accounts for most of the cost.