Since the 90s of the 20th century, as global competition intensifies and economic advancement of science and technology continues to develop, the importance of knowledge gained unprecedented show and prove. Organizational learning, knowledge management, organizational capacity to create new knowledge has received considerable attention. With the knowledge of the most important production and strategic resources, organizational success increasingly depends on its production, acquisition, diffusion of knowledge, knowledge management into business to create and maintain a competitive edge in the decisive factor. Core competence lies in the effective management of knowledge is learning and access to business organizations, the knowledge required for sustainable development, in particular the collective tacit knowledge, knowledge with business knowledge are closely related to learning capacity to determine the enterprise's knowledge accumulation to become the key to sustainable competitive advantage. This article will explore how companies manage tacit knowledge resources to create a sustainable competitive advantage.
1, theory of competitive advantage - from concept to business enterprise resource development of the theory of knowledge
Strategic management of the most basic question is how organizations obtain and maintain their competitive advantage. How to get around the company competitive advantage in the 20th century to the mid-80s late 90s, a variety of theoretical perspectives from different angles on the root causes of competitive advantage were discussed.
Relevant theoretical research can be divided into two categories: First, Porter's industry analysis theory of competitive advantage, as represented on exogenous. Second, based view, knowledge of the theory of enterprise and business enterprises represented by the theory of competitive advantage within the Health On the. Porter argued that deciding the primary and fundamental profitability is industry attractiveness factors, industry attractiveness from the five forces - the invasion of competitors, the threat of substitutes, and now the competition between competitors and customers and suppliers to discuss counter-offer ability to decide. Through this comprehensive analysis of five competitive forces, able to determine an industry's profitability, as well as an industry business acquisition exceeds the average cost of capital investments yield capacity. He believes that the stability of the industrial structure, competitive advantage depends on the company's relative position in the industry, therefore, enterprises choose the right industry is a key competitive advantage.
Industry analysis provides a detailed analysis of the development strategy and pointed out specific ways to get the advantage, with good maneuverability. However, it is too much emphasis on corporate external environment, emphasis on "positioning", ignoring Le enterprise's internal differences, the inherent source of enterprises with competitive edge, Youdao high margin business into a number of competitive advantages Dan and 自身 not related industries. In particular, Rumelt's analysis reveals: "different enterprises within the industry profits are greater than the difference between inter-industry profits," sparked the traditional theory of the competitive advantage strategy entirely due to industry structure and market power question More and more people have shifted the focus of strategic analysis within the enterprise.
If we look back 80 years since the 20th century, the focal point of competitive strategy, business competition can be found within the Health On the less experienced from the "resource-based theory of the firm" to "competency-based theory of the firm" to "knowledge-based theory of the firm "three stages. Enterprise resource-based theory of resource allocation from the internal start with the difference that competitive advantage is due to heterogeneous enterprise resources, that competitive advantage depends on the heterogeneous enterprise, but rare, and difficult to imitate, and can not be replaced proprietary resources. Resources within the enterprise there are many, but operators are often puzzled not sure where the unique proprietary resources.
A number of strategic management research conducted on the resource-based theory development, to better answer: a source of competitive advantage is what? Enterprises to maintain a competitive advantage? In some successful examples for analysis, the Hammer and Prahalad on '", proposed a theory of core competence, the two professors believe that the continued success of all enterprises that have a common characteristic of continuous develop and strengthen the ability of a business, and competitive advantage through the ability, they decided that the ability of competitive advantage in many aspects of enterprise resources, technology and combination of different skills, not simply corporate resources, capacity expansion theory awareness of resources, although the source of competitive advantage Renshi a step forward, but not on why the enterprise with core Neng Li and Yi Xie core business in the acquired ability, but will Yinchu Xian "core rigidity" Er Shi Qu explain the core competencies Zuochu . through the core competencies of the different descriptions and measure competitive advantage of four dimensions: innovation, hard to imitate, sustainability, learning ability of the analysis, enterprise knowledge and theory making decisions and competitive advantage is that enterprises have the knowledge and and knowledge are closely related to cognitive learning ability.
Hamel define core competencies in enterprise outlined in the following several factors, first of all, core competencies and technical schools to produce a combination of skills, personal skills or can not exist in the form of individual teams, there is usually a variety of collection capabilities; followed Core competencies are the result of learning is the explicit knowledge and tacit knowledge of mixing & third core competence is sustainable, because they are difficult to imitate; the fourth series of the company through the integration of products or services' that they can enter the new market. In a variety of literature, tacit knowledge on the contribution of competitive advantage often expressed as a theme, which range from technical innovation management and enterprise unique emphasis on the accumulation of technical knowledge to the learning organization and management of knowledge assets . The capacity of the core business is often the most difficult to code that, implicit, and business experience and knowledge of history, closely linked to the enterprise through the implementation of knowledge management, the gradual accumulation and enhance the business process of tacit knowledge, experience and staff management skills to form the core of enterprise unique ability to maintain sustainable competitive advantage.
2, competitive advantage
The concept of competitive advantage that is difficult to describe is not easy to explain, really, very few critics to give it a formal definition of the next. For the "competitive advantage" itself, so far no single and clear definition. Professor Porter of the 20th century on the competitive advantage of 80 years in-depth study of competitive advantage that comes from his business clients to create value more than its cost. Grant pointed out that the competitive advantage derived from the past was considered a higher corporate earnings than the ability of competitors. However, despite the long-term corporate profitability is generally used as an indicator of higher performance, but the competitive advantage of the simplistic view. In fact, the benefits of an enterprise even though it is much higher better than its competitors may have competitive advantages. For example, a company may choose to give priority to investment in new technology to gain market share, increase customer satisfaction, rather than the current high returns, in this case, the investment in the future may help companies develop and maintain a competitive advantage.
Just as the definition of competitive advantage as there are different views on what factors generate and maintain a competitive edge have different understanding. This is trying to understand why a company can get the advantage than the competitors, what determines its competitive edge over their competitors is very important. Competitive advantage originates from the external and internal environmental changes, changes in the environment enables enterprises to change the competitive situation facing the trigger competitive advantage. For example, the development of information and communication technologies have created new potential sources of high-efficiency, competitive advantage, however, ultimately depends on the ability of companies to change the mode of operation. Competitive positioning schools of that competitive advantage is owned by a single company to be more effective than the competition to engage in production activities and the ability to solve various problems, relying on competitive ability of enterprises to change the way business, too much emphasis on this point of view "positioning", namely, by choosing a good trade or industry segments to gain competitive advantage, while ignoring the internal source of corporate competitive advantage. Resources or capacity to scholars argue that the source of competitive advantage is that enterprises have the internal resources of competitors, based on hard copy of the core competencies, this ability to enable enterprises continue to customers than its competitors and create greater customer value.
3, Knowledge management: the key to gaining competitive advantage
In recent years, people turning their attention to cultivate and maintain a competitive edge in the process of the role of knowledge, indeed, as Nonaka said: "Knowledge is a source of sustainable competitive advantage." In fact, in today's turbulent and changeable environment, the enterprise has the knowledge and values can only provide a temporary competitive advantage. To maintain sustainable competitive advantage need to rely on organizations to create more quickly than competitors, dissemination and use of new knowledge. Enterprise use of knowledge to create sustainable competitive advantage in two ways, first of all, enterprises should produce almost impossible to copy other companies within the knowledge, that tacit knowledge; Second, companies should form a strong knowledge management capabilities in order to keep the knowledge innovation .
(1) changing the implicit knowledge is difficult to imitate core competencies
The external environment faced by enterprises from the objective that is completely the same, but business knowledge structure and cognitive ability are not the same, so they can find market opportunities is not the same. Therefore, the theory of core competence should be the core concept of knowledge. Knowledge can be broadly divided into two types of explicit and implicit, the former is tangible, identifiable, you can use language, words, numbers and other expressions, pass. Thus, in particular through the use of information and communication technologies, it can be relatively easily integrated into organizational strategy. Tacit knowledge from individuals to the outside world judgments and perceptions, judgments and perception of such a strong individual, is difficult to express using language clearly, difficult to identify, often in the form of personal knowledge remain in the individual mind, is the basis of individual skills. Two types of knowledge complement each other. Tacit knowledge has four categories: hard constraints skills and knowledge (know how, know how to do the knowledge), mental models, problem-solving approach, organizational practices. In the enterprise, experience, skills and mental models is an important business asset, is the specific form of tacit knowledge is central to the ability of enterprises, but also because such knowledge is often implicit in nature, not coding, and therefore can not easily be Imitation is the competitiveness of enterprises where the most lasting. Research shows that hide behind the capacity and ability to determine the enterprise business knowledge. In particular, tacit knowledge is a source of competitive advantage, because the tacit knowledge than explicit knowledge is difficult to imitate by competitors, so the acquisition, transfer of tacit knowledge of the ability to be the key to developing sustainable competitive advantage.
(2) Organizational learning: the driving force for competitive advantage
The formation of core competencies through internal unique resources, knowledge and technology accumulation and integration process. Through this series of effective accumulation and integration of the enterprise has a unique and lasting competitiveness. Knowledge theory that hidden behind core competencies and core competencies of an enterprise decision knowledge. Core capacity for knowledge and experience, knowledge and experience through continuous organizational learning and get and update. If the organization of the individual learning gained through knowledge and experience to become competent, "gene", then the business organization formed by a team of knowledge through learning constitutes a single system of core competencies, and organizational learning are integrated throughout the individual core competencies, constitute a capability system, the formation of the whole enterprise core competencies. In other words, learning is the ability of the enterprise's individual ability to transform the organization, ultimately forming the core capabilities necessary means. The sharing of knowledge, experience, skills and failures to share, is the main content of Organizational Learning, through sharing of knowledge can make the individual's abilities, knowledge into the collective organizational capacity and business knowledge.
Competitive advantage of an outstanding performance of the enterprise's learning ability, learning ability is to develop new competitive advantage is all about. Peter Senge pointed out that the only sustainable future advantage, is capable of faster than your competitors to learn, competitive advantage comes from the core competencies, core competencies showed some knowledge and skills, knowledge and skills only through organizational learning and be constantly updated, so the cultivation of core competence and organizational learning are inseparable. Closely associated with the business knowledge of individuals and organizations to determine the learning ability of the enterprise knowledge accumulation, thus determining the competitive advantage. Organizational Learning is a business acquisition, creation and dissemination of knowledge process is the existence of knowledge within and outside the organization to collect, store, disseminate, use and integration of activities. Business enterprise competition is based on the acquisition, dissemination, sharing of knowledge skills, ability to acquire knowledge and basic channels of learning. As the company's knowledge and ability is not the knowledge and abilities of each employee a simple sum, but staff knowledge and ability of organic combination, through organized learning can not only enhance their own knowledge and ability, but also promote personal knowledge and ability to organizational knowledge and ability to transform, to the knowledge and ability to focus, a greater force. Through organizational learning so that individuals and groups within an enterprise can efficiently between the understanding and exchange of knowledge. First, companies must learn to survive outside the necessary knowledge (explicit knowledge), followed, but also learning business activities and accumulation of experience and knowledge.
4 Summary and conclusions
Widely believed in the knowledge economy intellectual capital than land, labor and physical capital is more important. On the contrary, tacit knowledge and excellent knowledge management can not imitate the formation of the key competitive advantage, tacit knowledge can be widely disseminated within the organization difficult to imitate by other companies, higher knowledge management capability is the rapid acquisition and transfer of new knowledge base, personal learning and organizational learning as a key competitive advantage of companies, this study not only the study of knowledge, but also stressed the mental models of practice. Therefore, once an organization has established a competitive advantage based on tacit knowledge, it is difficult to comparable competitors. It can maintain the advantages of tacit knowledge to maintain this competitive advantage.