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hoW does learnIng ConTrIbuTe To sTraTegIC ConTrol? 363

Figure 10.12 ‘disruptive’ technological change

Performance required
by ‘top end’ of
the market
Performance based
on ‘new’ technology
Performance of goods and services based on the technology on ‘old’ technology market-acceptable

Performance based

Zone of
performance

‘Disruptive’
technological Performance required
by ‘bottom end’ of
change the market

A B
Time
Source: Adapted and reprinted with permission of Harvard Business School Press from Christensen, C.M.
(1997) The Innovator’s Dilemma. Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Publishing Corporation, p. xvi
Introduction (all rights reserved).

In that sense, this technology is not an immediate threat to existing car or engine
manufacturers. However, the electric car is a disruptive technology in so much as its
performance will eventually improve to the extent that it enters the lower end of the
acceptable zone of performance. Perhaps initially, only customers with relatively unde-
manding requirements will adopt motor vehicles using this technology. Eventually,
however, it could prove to be the dominant technology for all types of vehicle. The
dilemma facing all organisations is how to simultaneously improve product or service
performance based on sustaining technologies, while deciding whether and how to
incorporate disruptive technologies.

resource and process ‘distance’

The degree of learning, and the degree of difficulty in the implementation process, will
depend on the degree of novelty of any new resources and the changes required in the
operation’s processes. The less the new resources are understood (influenced perhaps
by the degree of innovation), the greater their ‘distance’ from the current resource base
of the operation. Similarly, the extent to which an implementation requires an opera-
tion to modify its existing processes, the greater the ‘process distance’. The greater the
resource and process distance, the more difficult any implementation is likely to be. This
is because such distance makes it difficult to adopt a systematic approach to analysing

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