VRIO

VRIO is a business analysis framework that forms part of a firm's larger strategic scheme. The basic strategic process that any firm goes through begins with a vision statement, and continues on through objectives, internal & external analysis, strategic choices (both business-level and corporate-level), and strategic implementation. The firm will hope that this process results in a competitive advantage in the marketplace they operate in.

VRIO falls into the internal analysis step of these procedures, but is used as a framework in evaluating just about all resources and capabilities of a firm, regardless of what phase of the strategic model it falls under.

VRIO is an initialism for the four question framework asked about a resource or capability to determine its competitive potential: the question of Value, the question of Rarity, the question of Imitability (Ease/Difficulty to Imitate), and the question of Organization (ability to exploit the resource or capability).

The basic question asked by the V in the VRIO framework for internal analysis is “Is this resource or capability valuable to the local firm?” In this case, the definition of value is whether or not the resource or capability works to exploit an opportunity or mitigate a threat in the marketplace. If it does do one of those two things, it can be considered a strength of the company. However, if it does not work to exploit an opportunity or mitigate a threat, it is a weakness. Occasionally, some resources or capabilities could be considered strengths in one industry and weaknesses in a different one. (Strategic Management Journal, 5, pp. 171–180. Barney, J.B. (1991)). Six common examples of opportunities firms could attempt to exploit are technological change, demographic change, cultural change, economic climate, specific international events, and legal and political conditions. Furthermore, five threats that a resource or capability could mitigate are the threat of buyers, threat of suppliers, threat of entry, threat of rivalry, and threat of substitutes.

Generally, this exploitation of opportunity or mitigation of threat will result in one of two more outcomes: an increase in revenues or a decrease in costs (or both).

A great way to identify possibly valuable resources or capabilities is by looking into the company’s value chain. In the value chain, a business develops its products and services step-by-step, with each function along the way adding some sort of value to the product or service. The choices a firm makes regarding its value chain (including how to operate, and which steps to operate in) is closely tied to the firms resources and capabilities, therefore making it a valuable tool in identifying value in resources and capabilities. If some asset that the company has allows it to operate more effectively in a certain portion of the value chain, chances are that resource will be considered valuable by the VRIO framework.

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