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The purpose of this paper is to increase our understanding of why firms, specifically small to medium‐sized enterprises (SMEs), participate in a programme for competence development and why firms use different strategies for competence development.

A study of 17 SMEs that all received support from the European Social Fund, Objective 3 programme. The collection of data is based on semi‐structured interviews with management/owners, internal project leaders, employees and union representatives, feedback seminars with representatives from the studied enterprises, and on analysis of documents.

The findings demonstrate that all SMEs reported driving forces for competence development relating to both external organizational conditions and internal organizational conditions, to at least a certain degree. Furthermore, there appears to be a strong relationship between observed patterns of driving forces and the strategy for competence development used by the firm.

The SMEs that experience a relatively stronger driving force for competence development initiate problem‐solving efforts to design and implement more elaborated strategies for competence development. The SMEs that experience a lesser degree of driving force for competence development implement less elaborated strategies for competence development.

The paper finds that both external and internal organizational conditions are important in understanding why SMEs undergo competence development programme. Furthermore, the importance of external and internal organizational conditions is not only limited to why the companies participate in a programme for competence development, but also for how they participate, i.e. the strategies used for competence development.

Emerged from a theoretical contradiction, the purpose of this paper is to investigate whether perceptions and behaviors toward new brands depend on the priority assigned to promote the company’s intentions (warmth) vs its abilities (competence).

The research uses a two-level single factor experiment to test the effects of launch communication strategy (warmth-competence vs competence-warmth) on people’s perceptions and behavioral intents, and applies partial least squares structural equation modeling to explore the collected data.

Results offer valuable insights into the usage of communication strategy with a view to favor brand perception, referrals, and sales, laying stress on the underlying mechanisms. Research finds that warmth-competence communication strategy has a higher positive influence on brand perception than the reversed strategy. Revealing people’s proneness to promote the new companies perceived as warm and competent, results indicate that perception of warmth mediates word-of-mouth propensity.

The present study brings novel insights for corporate communication, showing that people’s propensity to advocate on behalf of new brands is driven by the perception of company’s warmth. Explaining connections between communication strategy, brand perception, and WOM propensity (supportive or denigrating), the current study adds contributions to the previous findings on warmth and competence stereotypes applied to consumer-brand interactions.

From a managerial perspective, findings offer practical hints about how to use launch communication to improve brand perception and consumer supportive behaviors.

The present study brings novel insights for corporate communication, showing that people’s propensity to advocate on behalf of new brands is driven by the perception of company’s warmth. Explaining connections between communication strategy, brand perception, and word-of-mouth propensity, the current study adds contributions to the previous findings on warmth and competence stereotypes applied to consumer-brand interactions.

The purpose of this paper is to increase understanding of the relationships among the workplace as a learning environment, strategies for competence development used by SMEs and learning outcomes. Specifically, there is a focus on a distinction between formal and integrated strategies for competence development, the conditions under which these strategies are likely to be used, and their effects in terms of individual learning outcomes.

The study was based mainly on questionnaire data collected through a survey of 14 SMEs that had received support from the European Social Fund's Objective 3 programme. In addition, data collected through interviews and analyses of documents were used.

The results indicate interactions between the strategy of competence development used by the firms (formal vs integrated) and the type of learning environment in the workplace (constraining vs enabling). The use of an integrated strategy in an enabling learning environment was the most successful combination in terms of learning outcomes, while the use of an integrated strategy in a constraining learning environment was the least successful combination.

There is a need to elaborate the theoretical and empirical basis of the distinction between formal and integrated strategies for competence development, and to study the effects of the two types of strategy, not only for individual learning outcomes, but also for effects at an organisational level.

HRD practitioners need to question a traditional reliance on formal training, as the presented results indicate the importance of using competence development strategies that are based on an integration of formal and informal learning.

The study indicates that the effects of competence development efforts are likely to be a function not only, nor primarily, of the training methods and strategies that are used, but also of the characteristics of the learning environment of the workplace.

Part I of this chapter applies the principles of the philosophy of science and the derived scientific method to analyze the foundational concepts and core proposition of the Resource-Base View (RBV) as popularized by Barney (1986, 1991, 1997). This analysis identifies seven fundamental conceptual deficiencies and logic problems in Barney's conceptualization of “strategically valuable resources” and in Barney's VRIO framework for identifying strategically valuable resources that can be sources of sustained competitive advantage. Three problems – the Value Conundrum, the Tautology Problem in the Identification of Resources, and the Absence of a Chain of Causality – relate to the RBV's and VRIO's failure to provide an adequate conceptual basis for identifying strategically valuable resources. The Uniqueness Dilemma, the Cognitive Impossibility Dilemma, and an Asymmetry in Assumptions about Resource Factor Markets result in an inability of the VRIO framework to support identification of resources that can be sources of sustained competitive advantage. More fundamentally, the core proposition of the RBV – that resources that are strategically valuable, rare, inimitable, and organizationally embedded are sources of sustainable competitive advantage – is argued to result directly in the Epistemological Impossibility Problem that precludes use of the scientific method in RBV research. This chapter argues that until these conceptual deficiencies and logic problems are recognized and remedied, the RBV – in spite of its current popularity – is and will remain theoretically sterile and incapable of contributing in any systematic way to the development of strategy theory.

Part II of this chapter then suggests how foundational concepts developed within the competence perspective on strategy provide essential remedies for the identified deficiencies and problems in the RBV – and thereby provide a more conceptually adequate basis for representing the nature of firms in the scientific study of their interactions and competitive outcomes.

Presents a framework of manufacturing competence, and tests its theoretical validity using empirical data from a large‐scale survey. Interesting findings include: the regression analysis shows that manufacturing competence is better represented when low‐priority capabilities are not explicitly considered; the manufacturing competence index appears to have more significant statistical relationships with some performance measures (such as the return on assets and return on sales) than with others – manufacturing matters, but not equally to all the financial and market performance; the concept of manufacturing competence is found to be more influential in determining the business performance in the electronics sector than in the machinery industry. Does manufacturing competence matter equally in all industries, or does it matter more in a specific industry? If so, what makes manufacturing competence so important? Advocates further study to answer these questions and to complete the theory of manufacturing competence.

The purpose of this paper is to identify how human competences are associated with sustainable strategic management (SSM) within organisations.

This is a qualitative study in two phases: first, a theoretical phase is developed, resulting in a proposal for the role of human competences in organisational sustainability; second, an empirical phase including instrumental case studies of two large, sustainability-oriented Brazilian companies. Data were obtained from interviews and companies’ reports. The authors used Atlas.ti software to perform the thematic content analysis.

Despite the importance of human competences in SSM, the authors find evidence that this concept has not been developed, even for companies with a consolidated position in sustainability. Human competences are a requirement for effective SSM.

Coexisting elements within an organisation, often referred to as elements of organisational and human behaviour, can influence the dynamics of the expected interrelationships between human competences and sustainability management, in addition to the influencing factors presented in this study.

In general, studies advocate that the relationships among organisational competences, human competences and organisational strategies must be aligned and reinforced. Nevertheless, these relationships are not that solid as they should be as stated in both the literature and the conventional discourse of practitioners.

This paper aims to examine how organisational values affect diversity in terms of different competencies in rural family Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs). Recruiting a diverse workforce in rural family SMEs can be particularly difficult due to the prevalence of internal family values and the lack of available local specialised competencies. A deficiency of diversity in employment and competence acquisition and development can create problems, as it often prevents rural family SMEs from recruiting employees with a wide variety of qualifications and skills.

The study takes on a multi-case method of Swedish rural family SMEs, applying a qualitative content analysis approach. In total, 20 in-depth structured interviews are conducted with rural family SME owners and 2 industries were investigated and compared – the tourism and the manufacturing industries.

Rural family SMEs lack long-term employment strategies, and competence diversity does not appear to be a priority for rural family SMEs, as they often have prematurely decided who they will hire rather than what competencies are needed for their long-term business development. It is more important to keep the team of employees tight and the family spirit present than to include competence diversity and mixed qualifications in the employment acquisition and development.

Contrary to prior research, our findings indicate that rural family SMEs apply short-term competence diversity strategies rather than long-term prospects regarding competence acquisition and management, due to their family values and rural setting, which strictly narrows the selection of employees and competencies. Also, a general reluctance towards competence diversity is identified, which originates from the very same family values and rural context.

This paper aims to investigate the moderation effect of customer orientation variable on the influence of professional competence toward the quality of strategy implementation.

This research is quantitative explanative associative, which is trying to explain the causality relationship between exogenous and endogenous variables. The research was conducted in the Shariah banking office in Central Java Province. The population of this research is all top and middle levels of Shariah Commercial Bank in Central Java region. The sampling technique used in this research is non-probability sampling, that is, purposive sampling, which is the method of determining the sample based on certain criteria and the research sample obtained is 113 respondents. The research approach used is quantitative with the analysis tool of Generalized Structure Component Analysis.

There is influence of professional competence variable and customer orientation on quality of implementation strategy. The higher the professional competence and customer orientation, the higher the quality of strategy implementation. It is also found that customer orientation moderates the influence of professional competence variables, which are quasi-moderating and reinforcing.

This research has two sources of problems, which are research gap and business phenomenon. Research on Drucker’s business purpose (1954) is realized when a firm identifies the relationship between strategic methods and its ability to generate profits. This research attempts to solve the problem or gap between market orientation and business performance, which has been widely researched by marketing experts, but still shows controversial results. In this research, the researcher takes the definition of Narver and Slater (1990) to examine market orientation because the mostly found empirical research on market orientation and innovation (Han, et.al. 1998; Subin and Workman, 2004; Ferrel and Luke, 2000) has used this conceptualization and its associated operations. Therefore, to compare and distinguish the results of this research with the results of previous research, this research uses the definition of Narver and Slater (1990). No previous study has comprehensively studied the moderating effects of customer orientation on the relation between profesional competence toward quality of strategy implementation, especially in a commercial bank in Central Java region.

The purpose of this paper is to look into production competence theory by proposing and validating a multidimensional construct, and offering additional empirical evidence regarding the contribution of production competence to business performance.

Production competence is defined as a second‐order factor/construct in terms of five underlying dimensions: cost, flexibility, quality, delivery and environmental protection competence. Different scales are used to measure the construct, validated by a multi‐step process. Data from 274 manufacturing firms and structural equation modelling as the main technique are used for the analysis.

The paper suggests that manufacturing capabilities and their alignment with the competitive priorities pursued must be considered to explain the contribution of manufacturing to business performance. The provided evidence suggests that the manufacturing function significantly contributes to business performance, and enables us to conclude that production competence is a determinant of business performance.

Firms should focus on the development of manufacturing capabilities that are key for the market (and consistent with the business strategy). To achieve this, the production function should be integrated into the strategic planning process of the overall business strategy.

Most research works to date deal with production competence as a one‐dimensional construct and reduce its measurement to a single index, fussing variables of different types. This paper provides a valid multidimensional operationalisation of production competence, considering environmental protection as a fifth manufacturing objective. It also offers additional empirical evidence regarding the positive link between production competence and business performance.