Technology in Services: Rethinking Strategic Focus
Besides the changes in organizational strategy described in the companion article, new service technologies also dictate substantive changes in strategic structures and strategic thinking. These include defining each value-creation activity as a service, asking in each case whether the company can perform that service better than anyone else in the world, and outsourcing or eliminating the activity if the answer to the question is "no." This article discusses how firms can best perform that analysis and implement the strategy that emerges from their analysis. (Its companion article is "Technology in Services: Rethinking Strategic Focus" by J. B. Quinn, T. L. Doorley and P. C. Paquette; Sloan Management Review 31, no. 2 [1990]: 67-78.)