2. What are the two most critical considerations when completing SWOT analysis? O A. Understanding the key deficiencies and implementing corrections immediately O B. Synthesizing and summarizing conclusions from the analysis and then initiating strategic actions O C. Increased awareness of a company's competitive position and the potential profitability resulting from the analysis O D. Knowledge of which critical strategic priorities should be benchmarked and the subsequent decisions arising from each3. Which of the following does not exemplify the impact of the macro- environment on a company's strategic opportunities? O A. Sales of Stolichnaya Vodka in the United States dwindle on account of a boycott of Russian products. 0 B. Trafc increases at the outlets of Whole Foods following its introduction of stores comprised solely of generic products. Q C. Consumer condence in Volkswagen drops precipitously because of falsified emissions data. 0 D. Netix squares off with Amazon Prime as its most potent rival in the streaming television and film industry. 4. Which of the following is a typical source of competitive pressures? O A. The stock prices of competitor companies O B. The power and inuence of industry driving forces 0 C. The threat of new entrants into the market 0 D. Potential changes in a company's senior leadership and strategy 5. Which one of the following groups of processes qualies as potential driving forces capable of inducing fundamental changes in industry and competitive conditions? 0 A. Increases in the economic power and bargaining leverage of customers and suppliers, growing supplier-seller collaboration, and growing buyer-seller collaboration O B. Maintenance of economies of scale due and a greater customer understanding and use of technology 0 C. Customer loyalty and adherence to standard demands for consistent products and services O D. Growing buyer preferences for differentiated products instead of mostly standardized or identical products 6. Which of the following is a part of a company's macro-environment? O A. The company's functional-area strategies 0 B. Company-wide operating strategies O C. The company's resource strengths, resource weaknesses, and competitive capabilities O D. Local, regional, and global economic conditions 7. The rivalry among competing sellers tends to be less intense when 0 A. rivals have diverse strategies and objectives and are located in different countries. 0 B. industry conditions tempt competitors to use price cuts or other competitive weapons to boost unit sales. O 0. industry rivals are not particularly aggressive or active in making fresh moves to improve their market standing and business performance. 0 D. buyer demand is weak and many sellers have excess capacity and/or inventory. 8. A company's value chain helps create competitive advantage by A. ensuring company products and services remain relatively constant. B. contributing to increased efficiency and lower costs than competitors. C. driving down costs through lean management principles. O D. by diversifying distribution channels to increase product availability.9. Which of the following statements is true of activity-based costing? O A. It involves determining which value chain activities represent variable costs and which represent xed costs. O B. It's an accounting system that assigns expenses to whichever activity in a company's value chain is responsible for creating the cost. O C. It's a powerful tool for identifying the different pieces of a company's value chain and classifying them as primary or support activities. O D. It uses benchmarking techniques to develop cost estimates for the valuechain activities of each major rival. 10. Which one of the following conditions is a factor in causing supplier bargaining power to be relatively strong? 0 A. The input being supplied is a commodity. Q B. Substitutes are relatively easy to nd among suppliers. O C. Supplier inputs are in short supply. 0 D. Supplier inputs are similar to one another. 11. How strong the competitive pressures from substitute products are depends on whether the O A. attractively priced substitutes are readily available and the ease with which buyers can switch to substitutes. O B. producers of substitutes have ample budgets for new product research and development (R&D). O C. available substitutes are products or services. 0 D. available substitutes are strongly or weakly differentiated and whether buyers make purchases frequently or infrequently. 12. The lower the user's switching costs, the O A. less intense the competitive pressures posed by substitute products. 0 B. more intense the competitive pressures posed by substitute products. 0 C. harder it is for the sellers of attractive substitutes to lure buyers to their offering. 0 D. greater the bargaining power from both suppliers and inuential customers. 13. When a company has become procient in modifying, upgrading, or deepening the company's resources and capabilities in response to its changing environment and market opportunities, it's called a O A. core competence. Q B. strategic assessment. O C. distinct competence. O D. dynamic capability. 14. A company requires a dynamically evolving portfolio of resources and capabilities to Q A. retain the benets of high market share as an interest in growth strategies. 0 B. assist the strategic planning team in overall direction. 0 C. sustain complex manufacturing systems as a strategic recoil. O D. maintain its competitiveness and help drive improvements in its performance. --.__.- -.... .7--- -...-..-. ._. -.._ 1......... 15. Which of the following statements is true of SWOT analysis? 0 A. It reveals whether a company is competitively stronger than its closest rivals. O B. It's a way to measure whether a company's value chain is longer or shorter than the value chains of key rivals. O C. It's a tool for benchmarking whether a rm's strategy is closely matched to industry key success factors. 0 D. It provides a good overview of whether a company's situation is fundamentally healthy or unhealthy. 16. Which of the following characteristics is a relevant consideration in identifying an industry's dominant competitive pressures? O A. The number of facilities the company must manage in order to achieve protability O B. The likelihood of a merger among competing groups O C. The number of strategic groups the industry has and which ones are most or least protable O D. Market size and growth rate, the geographic scope of competitive rivalry, and demand-supply conditions 17. Factors that cause the rivalry among competing sellers to be weaker include 0 A. weakly differentiated products among rival sellers. 0 B. low buyer switching costs. 0 C. low xed costs or storage costs. 0 D. many industry rivals of roughly equal size and competitive strength. 18. A useful way to identify a company's resources is to view them as O A. physical resources, such as the company's brand, image, and reputation assets. 0 B. an inventory or a collection of the rm's strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. 0 C. divided into two main categories, tangible and intangible. O D. productive inputs or competitive assets, except human assets and intellectual capital, which are considered capabilities or competencies. 19. The strategically relevant factors outside a company's industry boundaries economic conditions, political factors, sociocultural forces, technological factors, environmental factors, and legal/regulatory conditions-are known as O A. the industry and the competitive arena in which the company operates. O B. the competitive market environment that exists between a company and its competitors. 0 C. general economic conditions plus the factors driving change in the markets where a company operates. O D. a company's macro-environment. 20. Activity-based cost accounting is used to O A. benchmark the costs of primary value- chain activities against the costs of the support value chain activities. 0 B. determine the costs of each strategic action a company initiates. O C. determine whether the value chains of rival companies are similar or different. 0 D. determine the costs of each primary and support activity in a company's value chain to reveal the nature of its internal cost structure. 1. The nature and strength of the strongest competitive force that prevails in an industry is generally a product of O A. the unknown competitor business expansion strategies that impact industry production and outlook. O B. the pressures of environmental requirements in different competing geographies. Q) C. the pressures induced by the market maneuvering and jockeying for buyer patronage that goes on among rival sellers in the industry. 0 D. regulatory requirements intensied by changing governing bodies