Title: Making Strategic Trade-offs - Institute For Strategy And Competitiveness - Harvard Business School
Headings: Making Strategic Trade-offs
Making Strategic Trade-offs
IKEA vs. Traditional Furniture Retailers
IKEA, Sweden
Choosing what not to do
Why do Trade-offs arise?

Content: In choosing its particular kind of value and the activities needed to deliver it, IKEA has accepted a set of limits: it does not meet all the needs of all customers. In every major value-adding step in the process of creating and selling home furnishing, IKEA has made different choices from the “traditional” home furnishings retailer. IKEA vs. Traditional Furniture Retailers
IKEA, Sweden
Choosing what not to do
A strategic position is not sustainable unless there are trade-offs with other positions. Trade-offs occur when activities are incompatible. Simply put, a trade-off means that more of one thing necessitates less of another. An airline can choose to serve meals—adding cost and slowing turnaround time at the gate—or it can choose not to, but it cannot do both without bearing major inefficiencies. Why do Trade-offs arise? Trade-offs arise for a number of reasons. Porter highlights three.