Resource Integration, Reconfiguration, and Sustainable Competitive Advantages: The Differences between Traditional and Emerging Industries

Abstract

Emerging industries bear great difference from traditional industries. It is valuable to explore the effectiveness of different resource management methods in the two industries. Based on this, the purposes of this paper are first to define and distinguish two core resource management methods (i.e., resource integration and resource reconfiguration), and second to research the different impact paths of resource integration and resource reconfiguration on the sustainable competitive advantages in different industries. Primarily, in order to achieve these purposes, this paper explores the generation path of resource integration and resource reconfiguration from the perspective of organizational learning; secondly, the empirical analysis method is applied to examine the different influences between resource integration and resource reconfiguration on sustainable competitive advantages. Based on 208 samples in traditional industries and 220 samples in emerging industries, the results show that resource integration and resource reconfiguration are the consequence of organizational learning. In traditional industries, resource integration and resource reconfiguration have a positive impact on sustainable competitive advantages, respectively, resulting in a “concerto effect” on sustainable competitive advantages. While, in emerging industries, though resource integration has a positive impact on sustainable competitive advantages, however, there is an inverted U-shaped relationship between resource reconfiguration and sustainable competitive advantages. In such a situation, the “concerto effect” disappeared. This paper not only reveals the uniqueness of different resource management methods in different industries but also enriches the applications of resource management theories in different situations.