Together with Ram B. Baliga and Mikko Kosonen, we have published a new Aalto working paper: Viability Advantage. Institutional Rooting of Competitive Advantage.
Hypercompetitive VUCA environment drives short-term actions in firms’ quest for
temporary competitive advantages. The Sustainability movement has become a
welcome counterforce to VUCA initiatives forcing strategists to take social and
ecological responsibility of the society in their strategic agenda while ensuring viability
of their own organizations. The need for strategists is to balance competitive advantage
issues with long-term viability issues. Using longitudinal data from many organizations,
our study seeks to obtain an insight in the make-up of viability advantage which goes
beyond sustained competitive advantage, both in durability and depth because of its
institutional rooting. We also detail how public-private ecosystems can co-create
robust springboards that facilitate breakthrough innovations, viable business models,
and even new businesses facilitating viability even as they address sustainability
challenges.