Turning now to supplier power, from the services company’s point of view (who is in this case the supplier as they are positioned upstream in the industry value chain), the major attractors of servicing the retailer (as opposed to other types of customer) depicted in Figure 5 are:
|
Figure 4. The retailer — agenda analysis.
Figure 5. A services company — agenda analysis. |
• The retailer offers a way of satisfying the imperative of achieving a prerequisite
sales volume. An especially large retailer would provide operational throughput and also help to smooth cash flow.
• If the retailer were an existing customer, by securing the business, the fear of losing business in the event of the retailer going elsewhere would be avoided.
• Some personal commitments to the retailer’s senior executives might have been made. This may produce the resulting mind-set that the services company needs to honour these commitments.
The major repellers from the services company’ point of view are:
• Thepressurefromretailersfortheservices company to contain and reduce costs and for the services company to absorb the effect of any cost increases.
• The opportunity cost of not being able to do business directly with end consumers which would alienate the retailer. By continuing to supply larger retailers these opportunities of selling directly to the end market would be forgone.
Comparing Figures 4 and 5 we see some interesting contrasts between strategic agendasofbuyerandsupplier.Theseagendasplay a major role in shaping the patterns of competition within an industry structure. These
Agendasplayamajor roleinshapingthe patternsof
competitionwithinan
industrystructure
strategic agendas are important in shaping the relative mind-set advantage between different players which it is contended form a major role in shaping competitive advantage (Porter, 1985). This mind-set advantage is ultimately a result of the intensity of psychological states of key managers within the respective companies, their ambitions, fears and anxieties. It will influence the balance of economic power between the different players significantly. These psychological states include, for example:
• Their relative commitment (to a particular market posture)
• The degree of excitement (of doing business in that particular area)
• The level of anxiety and fear (of losing business or of not replacing business)
• The extent of resentment (at being exploited by their opposite number)
• The worry (that by losing business one might have to instigate redundancies)
• Their relative aggression (or their relative strength of the urge to dominate the other player), perhaps coupled with seeking revenge.
These psychological states have a high degree of emotional content. While they also contain a cognitive element it is evident that these agendas are saturated with emotions. Emotional forces and psychological drivers generally do not get much of a mention in strategic management generally, save perhaps for Miles and Snow’s (1978) typologies of corporations as prospector versus defender or Haspelagh’s and Jemison’s (1991) account of the thrill of the chase in the context of acquisitions.
While a select number of writers in the strategic management literature have drawn our attention to the role which psychological states have in shaping competitive strategies for example, Staw (1976), for the most part emotional states have not figured prominently. This might be a result of strategy theorists being caught up in a morecognitiveparadigmofstrategicdecision making. This might also reflect the fact that managers are more inclined to explain their strategic behaviour in rational rather than in emotional terms.
Figure 6 provides a detailed model of stakeholder agendas beginning with the more visible agendas through to the less visible. The stages are:
Figure 6. The onion model of stakeholder agendas.
• Agendas manifested in action (or manifest agendas)
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