At the conclusion of your presentation for the virtual work environment, the bosses seem perplexed about what to do. Both your plan and Rogers' plan has legitimacy in their eyes. Over dinner at the Grand View Lodge, you learn that the C-Level Managers are all concerned about this up and coming competitor called Nexus Corp. In the last 5 years, they've taken 20% of the market, and your focus groups continually compare the deficiencies of your products against the excellencies of Nexus Corp.'s products. They're becoming something of a plumb-line for industry innovation. 

It seems that the C-Level manager sitting across from you is fishing for something. Then it occurs to you that maybe she wants some advice on how IT can help them blunt Nexus Corp.'s inexorable rise. This is good since she sees IT in the light of opportunity. So you ask her some questions, like "What is our value chain and how are we using IT to leverage improve it;" "Have you used Porter's 5 forces as a lens to look at the value chain;" and "Where in the value chain will IT make the biggest difference?" She doesn't really know what you mean and readily admits that she doesn't know where IT will make the biggest difference. She says, "All I know is that while our operations are top notch - I mean, we've got the best Six Sigma Black Belts in the industry -and even though we're delivering a product on schedule, our customers think we're just trying to copy Nexus Corp. Which we kind of are, but we do a good job and we're cheaper! They're taking our target market from us, and no one on the board of directors wants us to deliver niche products. That's for those InneTech monkeys." 

1) Explain what a value chain is and how IT can leverage it.  2) Tell her what Porter's 5 forces are and how to use it as a lens to look at the value chain 3) Finally, help her understand where the company should begin when analyzing the business process problem.  Finally, your company's strategy is clearly failing. Decide on a business strategy you're ready to stand behind that you can share with your dinner companion. Beware, whatever you tell her is probably going to be highly contentious

Instructions:

required: Write [decision], [answer], [rationale], [justification], [information, Pg.()

• Decision - Come down definitively on some course of action.  No opinions.  No options.  Just provide a decision.
  • Rationale - Provide good reasons for why your decision will result in a great benefit (good).
  •  Justification - Your decision must accommodate all problems, hang-ups, objections, issues, and constraints (which probably means addressing the 3 issues below).
•  Issues - There are usually 3 issues/questions stated within the context of the fiction of the case.  This means the issues/questions may not be obvious, but they are there and they must be answered.  Make an attempt on each issue/question to get some points.
• Information/Sources - Without any information to back up your decision, you will write a hypothetical that is loosely based on reality.  Try to find something credible on the internet in order to give your answer plausibility (believable-ness).