Strategic Position 165
In the business world it is not a successful product that constitutes a core
competency, but a distinctive level of skill, ability, and knowledge that
produces market leadership in a whole range of products. Canon, the Japanese
manufacturer of copiers and cameras, for instance, developed a dominant abil-
ity in lens technologies in the 1970s. This broad capability can be qualified as a
core competency since it serves as the generative source for a variety of specific
product innovations. Many of the innovations are not even used by Canon but
are components in the products of other companies (Hamel 1994).
Besides being a generative activity or skill, a core competency is also distinctive.
It is hard for others to duplicate, so it represents a powerful competitive advantage.
Much of the management task itself resides in nurturing the development of core
competencies (Hamel 1994).
Academic Core Competencies
The idea of core competencies offers a powerful way for institutions of higher
education to understand themselves and make strategic decisions (Dill 1997).
When seen as competencies, for example, an institution’s academic program
shows itself to be a repertoire of capabilities by which it defines itself in a world of
challenge and change. To be sure, specific courses and programs of study consist of
important intellectual assets—subjects, topics, and disciplinary methods that have
been created by academic experts and approved by their peers. Yet at the same
time, a program reveals and depends upon a wide variety of distinctive skills and
abilities possessed by the institution’s faculty and its students. These may be dis-
tinguishing capabilities or competitive advantages, or they could reach the level
of being a core competency. Consider how the following list of demonstrable and
generative abilities in teaching, learning, and research exemplify the idea of core
competencies in the work of different programs, departments, and institutions:
- Creating consistent innovations in teaching
- Developing new academic programs
- Establishing rigorous academic expectations
- Producing effective experiential and active learning opportunities
- Involving students in research
- Producing exceptional levels of original faculty research
- Attracting and retaining outstanding scholars
- Stimulating high levels of student intellectual maturity
- Building thematic connections among courses and programs
- Creating a rich array of interdisciplinary programs
- Using technology creatively and extensively in fostering student learning
- Building exemplary programs in diversity
- Constructing powerful programs of international education