Academics, executives, and consultants are virtually unanimous on the importance of speed as a competitive advantage and the need to achieve more rapid strategic decision making:
Strategy making has changed. . . . The premium now is on moving fast and keeping pace. . . . The best strategies are irrelevant if they take too long to formulate.1
— Kathleen M. Eisenhardt Stanford University
Speed kills the competition.2
— Richard D. Stewart Chief Executive Officer Computer Corporation of America
As a strategic weapon, time is the equivalent of money, productivity, quality, even innovation.3
— George Stalk, Jr. Boston Consulting Group
Perhaps the most prevalent focus on speed has been in new product development. Japanese companies have been heralded as models of how to achieve time-based advantages in reaching the market. Honda, Sony, Canon, and Toshiba, among others, have been cited for their abilities to reduce product development cycle times and to introduce a constant stream of new products or product improvements responsive to evolving customer needs. Recently, many leading U.S. and European firms also have adopted a time-based philosophy and are substantially reducing product development cycles.
Benetton is a well-known example. Management has recognized the extreme difficulties of forecasting demand for style and fashion and has built the firm’s competitive advantage on a production and logistics system that is enormously responsive to initial... To read the complete article, login or sign-up using the form below.
Become a premium subscriber today to read this and all MIT Sloan Managmeent Review articles.
Buy this article. Purchase one or more copies of this article in PDF form.
Become a premium subscriber today to read this article and the entire archive of MIT SMR articles.
Upgrade your existing subscription to premium
Sign in if you are a premium subscriber.
Do you subscribe the MIT Sloan Management Review in print? Enter the email address and password you used when ordering. Don't remember? Lookup your subscription account information
- Register for free access to recent articles and the current issue of MIT Sloan Management Review.
- Subscribe and read articles from the past three years online.
- Premium subscription give you access to the entire archive of articles.
