Key Success Factors

734 Words3 Pages
Industries have characteristics or strategic elements that affect their ability to prosper in the marketplace (i.e., attributes, resources, competencies, or capabilities). The ones that most affect a firm's competitive abilities are called key success factors (KSFs). These KSFs are actually what the firm must be competent at doing or concentrating on achieving in order to be competitively and financially successful; they could be called prerequisites for success. In order to determine their own KSFs, a firm must determine a basis for customer choice. In other words, how do customers differentiate between competitors offering the same or similar products or services and how will the firm distinguish itself from these competitors? Once this is determined, the firm has to decide what resources and competitive capabilities it needs in order to compete successfully, and what will it take to achieve a sustainable competitive advantage. These KSFs can be related to technology, operations, distribution, marketing, or to certain skills or organizational capability. A key success factor is a performance area of critical importance in achieving consistently high productivity. There are at least 2 broad categories of key success factors that are common to virtually all organizations: business processes and human processes. Both are crucial to building great companies. KSFs relating to business processes include: 1. Ability to transform material or information (technology or operations) 2. Ability to introduce new technologies and bring processes online (technology or organizational capability) 3.Ability to design and introduce new products, service a broad range of products, customize products or services on demand, or provide short lead times (skills) KSFs relating to human processes include: 1. Leadership 2. Vision: A compelling vision is one of a
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