Impact of Growth Opportunities and Competition on Firm-Level Capability Development Trade-offs
通过模拟实验，研究企业在市场竞争和增长背景下，如何在运营能力（提升短期绩效）与动态能力（长期发展）之间进行投资权衡，发现运营能力投资若增强绩效、投资与能力发展的强化循环，则优先于长期能力投资，且面对竞争对手关注短期增长时，企业需进一步忽视长期能力建设以求生存。
How should managers prioritize among production, product development, branding, internationalization, and other capabilities and resources? This question is central to the resource-based view, and the answer depends not only on the direct returns on investment in each capability but also on the trade-offs in using those returns for future growth or survival in a competitive market. Through simulation experiments, this study examines firm-level capability development trade-offs in the context of a firm's market-level competition and growth. It is found that investing in operational capabilities (which enhance short-term performance) gains priority over investing in long-term dynamic capabilities when the operational capability investment strengthens the reinforcing loop between performance, investment flow, and capability development. Such operational capability investment provides growth opportunities and competitive advantage. Moreover, in strategic competition, firms anticipating rivals' focus on short-term growth need to further ignore dynamic (long-term) capability building in order to survive. Testable propositions are offered as to how trade-offs between short-term and long-term investments depend on different firm and industry characteristics. The results may explain why short-term-focused firm behavior persists in firms even in the absence of discounting, short-term managerial incentives, decision biases, or learning failures.