1.This factor considers or provides creative adaptations that can suggest possibilities for new products or for improvements in existing products or in manufacturing and marketing techniques.

• Operations factor
• Sales factor
• Technological factor
• Industry factor

2Because the quantity, quality, price, and accessibility of financial, human, and material resources are rarely ideal, assessment of suppliers and creditors is critical to an accurate evaluation of which of the firm's external environments?

• Remote environment
• Industry environment
• Operating environment
• Business environment

3Which of these is a determinant of entry, according to Porter?

• Presence of substitute input
• Ability to backward integrate
• Economies of scale
• Exit barriers

4This information is used to explain or predict some aspect of customer behavior with regard to a product or service. Information such as usage rate, benefits sought, and brand loyalty can provide significant aid in the design of more accurate and profitable strategies.

• Demographic information
• Psychographic information
• Geographic information
• Buyer behavior

5A firm's external environment is divided into various subcategories that include

• political, social, and industry
• remote, industry, and operating
• industry, technology, and internal
• remote, social, and operations

6When managers consider the general availability of credit, the level of disposable income, and the propensity of people to spend, they are considering what factors?

• Social factors
• Business factors
• Political factors
• Economic factors

7What Human Resource component within its operating environment is a major element of a firm's ability to satisfy its personnel needs?

• Employment rates
• Labor union
• Benefit packages
• Reputation

8This is considered a collection of firms that offer similar products or services that customers perceive to be substitutable for one another..

• Industry
• Environment
• Oligopoly
• Monopoly

9This environment in the strategic planning process comprises factors in the competitive situation that affect a firm's success in acquiring needed resources or in profitably marketing its goods and services.

• Operating environment
• Industry environment
• Remote environment
• Business environment

10The quasi-science of anticipating environmental and competitive changes and estimating their importance to an organizations operation refers to

• environmental scanning
• SWOT analysis
• technological forecasting
• business analysis

11Which threat of entry creates a barrier by forcing entrants to spend heavily to overcome customer loyalty?

• Powerful buyers
• Product differentiation
• Economies of scale
• Powerful sellers

12This element of employment or labor represents the workers in their negotiations with employers through the process of collective bargaining.

• Wage & Hours Association
• Human Resources
• Hiring agent
• Labor unions

13The environment that is typically subject to much influence by the firm is

• operating
• remote
• industry
• external

14Economies of scale in an industry refers to

• declining average short run costs per unit
• savings that companies within the industry achieve due to increased volume
• decreased barriers to entry to new firms attempting to enter the industry
• improved contractual agreements with suppliers in the near term

15This term refers to descriptive characteristics that can be used to differentiate groups of present or potential customers.

• Psychographics
• Demographics
• Buyer behaviors
• Geographics

16A firm's access to needed personnel is affected primarily by four factors that include

• the firm's reputation as an employer, national employment rates, community involvement, and overall employee satisfaction
• the firm's size and location, local employment rates, labor unions to assist with labor needs, and trained potential employees
• the firm's size and location, competitive hourly rates, availability of talented people, and its relationship with labor unions
• the firm's reputation as an employer, local employment rates, the ready availability of people with the needed skills, and its relationship with labor unions

17This group is considered powerful if it is not obliged to contend with other products for sale to the industry.

• Retailers
• Buyers
• Suppliers
• Wholesalers

18This termrefers to the relationships among human beings and other living things and the air, soil, and water that supports them.

• Eco-efficiency
• Ecology
• Going green
• Society