Revisiting Tradeoffs in Manufacturing Strategy: A Fuzz y Set Approach for Developing a Typology of Competitive Priorities

In this paper, we adapt and extend the core-peripheral perspective of typology proposed by Fiss (2011), and propose a typology structure consisting of three conditions, namely, necessary, core, and peripheral conditions. We develop a structured typology of manufacturing strategy based on Miles and Snow (1978)’s typology of organizational strategy and utilize the newly emerging FsQCA methodology to identify necessary, core, and peripheral conditions in typology. The analysis of 434 Chinese manufacturers shows that configurations of competitive priorities that are consistent with the Miles and Snow (1978)’s typology can lead to excellent organizational outcomes.