Chapter 2: The External Environment: Opportunities, Threats, Industry Competition, and Competitor Analysis 67
in Chapter 9.) In the example we are considering here, each of the two alliances is a
network of complementors. American Airlines, British Airways, Finnair, Japan Airlines,
and Royal Jordanian are among the airlines forming the Oneworld alliance. Air Canada,
Brussels Airlines, Croatia Airlines, Lufthansa, and United Airlines are five of the mem-
bers forming the Star alliance. Both of these alliances constantly adjust their members
and services offered to better meet customers’ needs.
As our discussion shows, complementors expand the set of competitors that firms
must evaluate when completing a competitor analysis. In this sense, American Airlines
and United Airlines examine each other both as direct competitors on multiple routes but
also as complementors that are members of different alliances (Oneworld for American
and Star for United). In all cases though, ethical commitments and actions should be the
foundation on which competitor analyses are developed.
2-8 Ethical Considerations
Firms must follow relevant laws and regulations as well as carefully articulated ethical
guidelines when gathering competitor intelligence. Industry associations often develop
lists of these practices that firms can adopt. Practices considered both legal and ethical
include:
- Obtaining publicly available information (e.g., court records, competitors’ help-
wanted advertisements, annual reports, financial reports of publicly held corpora-
tions, and Uniform Commercial Code filings)
- Attending trade fairs and shows to obtain competitors’ brochures, view their exhibits,
and listen to discussions about their products.
In contrast, certain practices (including blackmail, trespassing, eavesdropping, and
stealing drawings, samples, or documents) are widely viewed as unethical and often are
illegal as well.
Some competitive intelligence practices may be legal, but a firm must decide
whether they are also ethical, given the image it desires as a corporate citizen. Especially
with electronic transmissions, the line between legal and ethical practices can be diffi-
cult to determine. For example, a firm may develop website addresses that are similar
to those of its competitors and thus occasionally receive e-mail transmissions that were
intended for those competitors. The practice is an example of the challenges companies
face in deciding how to gather intelligence about competitors while simultaneously
determining how to prevent competitors from learning too much about them. To deal
with these challenges, firms should establish principles and take actions that are con-
sistent with them.
Professional associations are available to firms as sources of information regard-
ing competitive intelligence practices. For example, while pursuing its mission to
help firms make “better decisions through competitive intelligence,” the Strategy and
Competitive Intelligence Professionals association offers codes of professional prac-
tice and ethics to firms for their possible use when deciding how to gather competitive
intelligence.^134
Open discussions of intelligence-gathering techniques can help a firm ensure that
employees, customers, suppliers, and even potential competitors understand its convic-
tions to follow ethical practices when gathering intelligence about its competitors. An
appropriate guideline for competitor intelligence practices is to respect the principles of
common morality and the right of competitors not to reveal certain information about
their products, operations, and intentions.
