How do companies position themselves to achieve and sustain success? How do they identify threats and seize opportunities? Professor Bharat Anand makes the case that scanning the environment is critical to creating a strategy that will establish a sustainable competitive advantage.



The Faculty Seminar Series brings you inside the classroom for the most dynamic talks from business visionaries at Harvard Business School and Stanford Graduate School of Business. For volume discounts or student pricing call 800-545-7685 (outside the United States and Canada, 617-783-7600). Minimal system requirements Microsoft Windows 98, Microsoft Windows Media Player 6.4, Microsoft Internet Explorer 5.0, and Adobe Acrobat Reader 5.0.



Learning Objective:

To understand the importance of sizing up your environment as the first step in crafting a successful strategy; to apply the Five Forces framework as a structured way to analyze a complex environment; to extend the framework to consider the availability of complements, as well as the effect of external forces; to avoid common pitfalls such as ignoring how forces interact; and to realize the potential to shape your environment by exploiting opportunities and turning threats into advantages.