Competitive Advantage Through the Employees

Competitive Advantage Through the Employees

Rahim K. Jassim (*)

Abstract

In today's fast-paced economy competition is an issue of services and products.

Much attention has been directed to a better service and the best product and how this

can be achieved through utilising the human resources. This research paper identifies

the competitive advantage concepts and models, competitive strategies and the main

human resource practices that have a significant impact on the employee's performance.

Understanding sources of competitive advantage has become a major area of research in

the field of strategic management. Therefore this research paper also develops an

analytical framework for strategic management in order to initiate/formulate and

implements the strategic plans successfully. Three questions regarding identifying,

defending and achieving competitive advantage through the employees have been raised

and answered. Finally a summary of practical criteria of best practice for competitive

advantage is presented and a general discussion and recommendations have been drawn.

Keywords: Competitive advantage, HRM, Strategic Management, Selection,

Performance, Reward.

Introduction

The firm is regarded as a cohesive organism, which learns to adopt or find better

ways of doing things essentially in response to its environment (Child 1997: 67). The

question then is what really the firm should do to maintain or to optimise its situation in

its environment? Should it focus on its financial situation, it's technology, or it's human

resources?. To answer this question we should at first see what other researchers have

concluded. Barney 1991 suggests that, in order for a resource to qualify as a source of

sustained competitive advantage, the resource must add value to the firm, it must be

rare, it must be inimitable and it must be non-substitutable. Wright, et al 1994 have

shown that human resources meet Barney's criteria for being a source of sustainable

competitive advantage. Coff 1994 argues that human assets are a key source of

sustainable advantage because of causal ambiguity and systematic information making

them