Competing both ways: How combining Porter's low-cost and focus strategies hurts firm performance

Organizations can find their activities slowed down due to bottlenecks in their workflows. To address these, managers must look at both work system design and resource portfolio management. The authors find that companies perform better when their work systems’ complexity and decentralization are aligned (either both high or both low), and when they have fungible and slack resources. Aligning both task and resource characteristics further reduces delays and improves overall efficiency.