The impact of project management assets on the VRIO characteristics of PM process for competitive advantage

Abstract

Biographical notes: Seung-Chul Kim is a Professor of Operations and Service Management, School of Business at Hanyang University, Seoul, Korea. He received his PhD from the University of Oregon, USA, his MBA from the University of Hawaii, USA, and BA from Seoul National University in Korea. He has published in such journals as Journal of Operations Management, European Journal of Operational Research, International Journal of Production Research, Production and Operations Management, OMEGA, International Journal of Business Excellence, and others. His research interests include operations strategy, project management, service and health care management, supply chain management, and international manufacturing practices. Jae-Sung Lee received his PhD from Hanyang University, Korea, and currently teaches operations and service management courses as an Adjunct Professor in the School of Business, Hanyang University. He has published in Korean management journals. His research interests include project management and business strategy, service management, and supply chain management. Kyu-Il Shin is a PhD student at Hanyang University, Korea, and is currently working on dissertation in the discipline of project management. His research interests include project management and business strategy, service management, and supply chain management. Abstract: Business strategy plays an important role for the success of a business firm. Strategy must be implemented in order to contribute to the success of a business firm. Often, however, strategic management research focuses on the development of strategy, but neglects the importance of implementation. Project management capability is considered an important factor for successful implementation of business strategy. The purpose of this research is to investigate the impact of project management capability as the source of a firm's competitive strategy by focusing on the VRIO (value, rarity, inimitability, organisation) characteristics of project management processes. The results show that project management assets have significant impacts on the VRIO characteristics of the PM process. One of the meaningful findings is to confirm that the intangible project management assets play a mediating role for the tangible project management assets to achieve the VRIO characteristics of the PM process.