64 The Marketing Book
r-strategist-small, new firms that are quick to
move and not constrained by the inherent
inertia confronting firms established in other
environments. While r-strategists are flexible,
they are also inefficient due to their lack of
experience. After several r-strategists have
entered a new environment, established organi-
zations, k-strategists, overcome their inertia,
enter the environment, and exploit their advan-
tage of greater efficiency based on extensive
experience. The characteristics of the environ-
ment and particularly the viable niches that
emerge determine whether these successive
entrants can coexist.
A niche is defined as the specific combina-
tion of resources that is needed to support a
species or type of organization. Niche width
indicates whether this combination of resource
is available over a broad range of the resource
source space or whether it is only available in a
narrow range of the space. A generalist is able
to operate in a broad range while a specialist is
restricted to a narrow range. The nature of a
particular environment favours either general-
ists or specialists.
Environments are described by two dimen-
sions: variability and frequency of environmen-
tal change. In a highly variable environment,
changes are dramatic, and fundamentally dif-
ferent strategic responses are required for sur-
vival. In contrast, strategic alterations are not
required to cope with an environment of low
variability. A specialist strategy in which high
performance occurs in a narrow portion of the
environment is surprisingly more appropriate
when environmental changes are dramatic and
frequent. Under these conditions, it is unlikely
that a generalist would have sufficient flex-
ibility to cope with the wide range of environ-
mental conditions it would face, whilst the
specialist can at least outperform it in a specific
environment. For a more detailed discussion of
this analysis, see Lambkin and Day (1989), as
well as an introduction to more complex
strategy options involving polymorphism and
portfolios. Achrol (1991) also develops this
approach further with some useful examples. A
generalist strategist is most appropriate in an
environment characterized by infrequent,
minor changes, because this environment
allows the generalist to exploit its large-scale
efficiencies.Comparing the key elements in
different models of competition
In this analysis we have left out two other
generic types of competitive analogy which are
commonly used: sports games and military
conflict. Whilst in general these can both be
illuminating and informative, they represent in
many ways intermediate categories between
game theory and evolutionary ecology.
The sports game approach focuses on the
relationship between prior planning and the
action in the game itself (including the degree
of co-ordination between the various individ-
ual players), the interaction between com-
petitive response within different time periods
(play, game, season), the multiple routes to
success but the general evidence that it is
necessary to compete on more than one dimen-
sion, and that success rapidly encourages imita-
tion. Within the sports game analogy, we
recognize the key role of ‘rules’ and particularly
changes in rules as a means of influencing
competitive strategies.
The military analogies raise the related
issue of what happens in competitive situations
when the rules themselves are neither well
codified nor necessarily fully accepted, com-
bined with the fact that there is no analogy to
the referee in the sports game context. Perhaps
most useful from the point of view of com-
petitive strategy is the focus on the balance
between clarity and confusion in one’s inten-
tions and the general notion of signalling. It is
important to avoid becoming over-committed
to a particular approach because one’s inten-
tions can be read unambiguously by the enemy;
on the other hand, a sense of direction is
required to maintain internal cohesion and
morale. The military perspective also reinforces
the multiple time periods of the sports game