How do PESTEL and Porter’s Five Forces help entrepreneurs create a business strategy?

PESTEL assesses broad external forces such as political, economic, social, technological, environmental and legal factors, while Porter’s Five Forces evaluates industry competition and profitability.

What is the difference between cost leadership, differentiation and focus strategy?

Cost leadership targets the lowest operating costs, differentiation offers distinctive customer value, and focus strategy serves a specific market segment or niche.

How can the VRIN model identify a sustainable competitive advantage?

The VRIN model tests whether resources and capabilities are valuable, rare, difficult to imitate and non-substitutable, indicating an advantage competitors cannot easily replicate.

Free online course Business Strategy

Duration of the online course: 3 hours and 46 minutes

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Build a smarter business plan with this free strategy course—analyze markets, outmaneuver rivals, and make long-term decisions with confidence.

In this free course, learn about

How the onion model explains layers of an organisation’s environment
What business strategy is and why it must be long-term for entrepreneurs
How to analyse macro-environment forces using the PESTEL framework
How to assess industry attractiveness with Porter’s Five Forces
How rivalry, entry barriers, and other forces shape prices and margins
How industry life cycle stages affect competition, scale and cost control
How Blue Ocean thinking creates new market space beyond competitors
What strategic and dynamic capabilities are and why they matter
How to evaluate resources with VRIN for sustainable competitive advantage
How value chain and value network analysis identify value-creating activities
How to do a SWOT and turn findings into strategic options
How and why firms define Strategic Business Units (SBUs)
How to choose generic strategies: cost leadership, differentiation, focus
How strategy clock, interactive strategies and game theory guide competitive moves

About the free online course

Strong strategy is what turns a good idea into a business that lasts. This free online Business Strategy course helps you think like a strategist: scanning your environment, understanding where profit really comes from in your industry, and choosing competitive moves that fit your resources and goals. Whether you are launching a startup or growing an existing venture, you will learn to make decisions that hold up beyond the next quarter and align daily actions with long-term direction.

You will start by learning how organisations are shaped by their surroundings, then move into practical ways to read the broader context using structured thinking. From political and economic shifts to social trends and technology change, you will train yourself to spot risks early and identify opportunities before they become obvious. You will also develop an industry lens, examining how rivalry, new entrants, substitutes, buyers, and suppliers influence pricing power and margins, so you can better judge how hard it will be to compete and where to position your offer.

Next, you will focus on what happens inside the organisation. You will explore strategic capabilities and why some businesses adapt faster than others. Using the VRIN perspective, you will learn how to evaluate which strengths genuinely create sustained advantage rather than short-term wins that competitors can copy. You will also connect capabilities to performance through value chain and value network thinking, linking what a business does to the value customers perceive and the costs required to deliver it. With SWOT used as a decision tool, you will practice turning insights into realistic strategic options.

Finally, you will bring it all together through competitive strategy. You will examine how businesses win through cost leadership, differentiation, and focus, and how to make those choices deliberately rather than by habit. You will also learn to anticipate competitive reactions using interactive strategy and game-theory logic, helping you choose moves that improve your odds when others respond. By the end, you will have a clearer way to evaluate markets, select a strategic position, and explain your choices with confidence.

Course content

Video class: 1.0 Introduction to Module 1: Organisational Environment 00m
Exercise: In the introductory video to the first module, what is the first aspect of the 'onion model' that will be discussed?
Video class: 1.1 Introduction to Business Strategy 09m
Exercise: What does the 'long-term' aspect of a business strategy imply for entrepreneurs?
Video class: 1.2 Macro Environment of Organisation (PESTEL framework) 10m
Exercise: Which of the following frameworks is used for analyzing the macro environment in business strategy?
Video class: 1.3 Industry of Organization (Porter Five Forces Framework) 18m
Exercise: According to Porter's Five Forces framework, which factor does NOT contribute to barriers to entry in an industry?
Video class: 1.4 Porter´s Five Forces Continued 10m
Exercise: Which of Porter's Five Forces refers to the pressure competitors can exert on each other's prices and margins due to aggressive and frequent interactions?
Video class: 1.5 Industry Life Cycle 10m
Exercise: Which stage in the industry life cycle is characterized by strong competition and a need for cost control and economies of scale?
Video class: 1.6 Blue Ocean Thinking (Competitor Analysis) 04m
Exercise: What does the 'blue ocean' concept in business strategy refer to?

Video class: 2.0 Introduction to Module 2: Strategic Capabilities 01m
Video class: 2.1 Strategic Capabilities of Organisations 07m
Exercise: What exactly are 'dynamic capabilities' in the context of business strategy?
Video class: 2.2 VRIN Model For Assessing Organisations Capabilities 12m
Exercise: Which component of the VRIN model relates to whether the capabilities of an organization provide a competitive advantage that is sustainable and not easily duplicated by others?
Video class: 2.3 Organisation´s Value Chain and Value Network 06m
Video class: 2.4 SWOT Analysis 06m
Exercise: What final step must be taken in a SWOT analysis to develop strategic options?

Video class: 3.0 Introduction to Section 3: Business Strategies 01m
Exercise: In module three of the course, what type of business strategies will be primarily discussed?
Video class: 3.1 Generic Competitive Strategies 08m
Exercise: What is the primary reason for defining Strategic Business Units (SBUs) in larger organizations?
Video class: 3.2 Cost-leadership Strategy 11m
Exercise: Which of the following is NOT one of the four key drivers that can help deliver a cost leadership strategy?
Video class: 3.3 Differentiation Strategy 07m
Exercise: What is a key approach to achieving a differentiation competitive strategy according to the video?
Video class: 3.4 Focus Strategy 06m
Exercise: What is a focus strategy in the context of business strategy?
Video class: 3.5 The Strategy Clock 03m
Exercise: Which of the three competitive strategies detailed in the strategic clock model aims to combine extremely low production costs with distinctive benefits perceived as premium by customers?
Video class: 3.6 Interactive Competitive Strategies 09m
Exercise: What should a well-established firm consider when faced with the entry of a low-cost competitor in their industry?
Video class: 3.7 Game Theory for Business Strategy 08m
Exercise: Which principle does game theory encourage in the context of business strategy?

Video class: 4.0 Introduction Module 4: Corporate Level Strategy 03m
Video class: 4.1 Strategy Directions 13m
Exercise: In corporate level strategy, which strategy direction involves offering existing products to new markets?
Video class: 4.2 Diversification Drivers and Effectiveness 07m
Exercise: What is the primary reason companies might pursue economies of scope in diversification?
Video class: 4.3 Vertical Integration 07m
Video class: 4.4 Portfolio Matrices 07m
Exercise: What does a 'Cash Cow' represent in the BCG matrix?

Video class: 5.0 Introduction to Module 5: Innovation 02m
Exercise: What is the primary focus of the fifth module in the discussed course?
Video class: 5.1 Innovation Dilemmas 12m
Exercise: Which of the following is NOT one of the innovation dilemmas discussed in the context of business strategy?
Video class: 5.2 Innovation Diffusion 08m
Video class: 5.3 Innovators and Followers 07m
Exercise: According to the video discussion about business strategy and innovation, what is the primary benefit for a company that adopts the role of a follower rather than an innovator?

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