Abstract
According to knowledge based view, firm-specific knowledge is considered to be a foundational source of competitive advantage. However, the recent trend towards social software radically changes the very essence, role, and value of firm-specific knowledge in driving competitive advantage. On one hand, firms are very enthusiastic about the investments in the social software initiatives; on the other hand, the broader strategic impact of these initiatives is not clear yet. This position paper highlights deep-seated problems in applying prominent strategic management theories in the context of social software. To address these problems, drawing on literature on value co-creation and service logic, it describes four ways social software can enable a firm’s competitive advantage, and call for more research in this area.
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Desai, D. (2013). Social Software: Silver Bullet or an Enabler of Competitive Advantage?. In: Dwivedi, Y.K., Henriksen, H.Z., Wastell, D., De’, R. (eds) Grand Successes and Failures in IT. Public and Private Sectors. TDIT 2013. IFIP Advances in Information and Communication Technology, vol 402. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-38862-0_38
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-38862-0_38
Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg
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