Business Strategy: Development and Application – 4th
Canadian Edition Author:Gary Bissonette (Updated
2025/2026) – Complete Solutions Manual & Accredited Test
Bank Latest Version
, INSTRUCTOR’S MANUAL
Chapter 1: Understanding and Managing Today’s Business Enterprise
Chapter Summary
In this chapter, we have described the nature of business and discussed the ways in which businesses
strive to maintain their viability and relevancy through interacting with the marketplace in ways that
meet the needs, wants, and desires of targeted customers. Our discussion focused on the interaction
of business as a commercial endeavour, guided by employee interaction and supported by
organizational efficiency and structure. This process results in the development of a business system
and ultimately a business model, which together are designed to deliver desired goods and services to
the marketplace. Utilizing productive resources at their disposal (assets, labour, capital, and
managerial acumen), businesses seek to create demand, generate revenue, and drive a profit from the sale
of such goods and services, thereby ensuring their long-term profitability and growth. While striving
for profitability, businesses are being increasingly challenged by customers, and the marketplace at
large, to be good corporate citizens, acknowledging their responsibility to act in a socially acceptable
manner and respecting the finite nature and scarcity of resources. This evolving requirement of
businesses is resulting in a significant emphasis on resource sustainability and environmental
initiatives.
To help you to understand why some companies are more successful than others, this chapter’s focus
emphasizes (at a macro level) the importance of positioning, and developing and communicating a value
proposition to the customer group that a business is trying to attract, in a manner that differentiates
the business’s products and services from those of its direct competitors and that attempts to develop
and sustain a competitive advantage in the marketplace. The creation of this value proposition takes
1|Page
, INSTRUCTOR’S MANUAL
into consideration both tangible and intangible benefits that the product or service offers, and looks
to determine the extent at which price will become a key decision criterion within the customer’s
purchase decision. The chapter closes with a discussion associated with the importance and
interrelationship between strategy and tactics and the need for managers to recognize that in order to
be successful, businesses not only have to properly develop a plan for serving the marketplace, but
also must be effective in the implementation of this plan.
Learning Objectives
This chapter is designed to provide students with:
1. A macro-level understanding of what business is
2. An overview of the major components of a business model and how their successful
2|Page
, INSTRUCTOR’S MANUAL
development and execution determines business performance
3. An awareness of the overarching role of the business owner or “C-suite” management team
4. An understanding of how businesses plan
5. Exposure to the concept of visionary leadership
6. Via a Management Reflection, an overview of the relationship between business strategy and
business model development, and the importance of successfully executing both for a business
to achieve its identified objectives
Advanced Topics to Enhance Learning – Applicable Supporting Appendices
The following additional appendices can be added to the delivery of this chapter’s materials for instructors
interested in offering an advance understanding of a particular subject matter.
Appendix A – Analyzing Business Situations (SCQA Method)
Appendix B – The Business Model and Profitability
Management Reflection – The Business Decision-Making Landscape
Being in business goes beyond simply developing your value proposition and understanding its asset
base and cost structure. It is about being able to understand the macro environment around you; the
resources, capability, and capacity that you possess; and the ability to communicate to the marketplace
the uniqueness and importance of the products/services you offer. At its core base, developing and
managing a business requires its owners/managers to:
• create a vision of the opportunity in the marketplace
• confirm that the market size of customers is large enough that, once commercialized, the
opportunity can enable the organization to make a profit and sustain this profitability for
the anticipated planning cycle and beyond
• confirm that a position within the market is feasible, which will enable the company to
3|Page
Canadian Edition Author:Gary Bissonette (Updated
2025/2026) – Complete Solutions Manual & Accredited Test
Bank Latest Version
, INSTRUCTOR’S MANUAL
Chapter 1: Understanding and Managing Today’s Business Enterprise
Chapter Summary
In this chapter, we have described the nature of business and discussed the ways in which businesses
strive to maintain their viability and relevancy through interacting with the marketplace in ways that
meet the needs, wants, and desires of targeted customers. Our discussion focused on the interaction
of business as a commercial endeavour, guided by employee interaction and supported by
organizational efficiency and structure. This process results in the development of a business system
and ultimately a business model, which together are designed to deliver desired goods and services to
the marketplace. Utilizing productive resources at their disposal (assets, labour, capital, and
managerial acumen), businesses seek to create demand, generate revenue, and drive a profit from the sale
of such goods and services, thereby ensuring their long-term profitability and growth. While striving
for profitability, businesses are being increasingly challenged by customers, and the marketplace at
large, to be good corporate citizens, acknowledging their responsibility to act in a socially acceptable
manner and respecting the finite nature and scarcity of resources. This evolving requirement of
businesses is resulting in a significant emphasis on resource sustainability and environmental
initiatives.
To help you to understand why some companies are more successful than others, this chapter’s focus
emphasizes (at a macro level) the importance of positioning, and developing and communicating a value
proposition to the customer group that a business is trying to attract, in a manner that differentiates
the business’s products and services from those of its direct competitors and that attempts to develop
and sustain a competitive advantage in the marketplace. The creation of this value proposition takes
1|Page
, INSTRUCTOR’S MANUAL
into consideration both tangible and intangible benefits that the product or service offers, and looks
to determine the extent at which price will become a key decision criterion within the customer’s
purchase decision. The chapter closes with a discussion associated with the importance and
interrelationship between strategy and tactics and the need for managers to recognize that in order to
be successful, businesses not only have to properly develop a plan for serving the marketplace, but
also must be effective in the implementation of this plan.
Learning Objectives
This chapter is designed to provide students with:
1. A macro-level understanding of what business is
2. An overview of the major components of a business model and how their successful
2|Page
, INSTRUCTOR’S MANUAL
development and execution determines business performance
3. An awareness of the overarching role of the business owner or “C-suite” management team
4. An understanding of how businesses plan
5. Exposure to the concept of visionary leadership
6. Via a Management Reflection, an overview of the relationship between business strategy and
business model development, and the importance of successfully executing both for a business
to achieve its identified objectives
Advanced Topics to Enhance Learning – Applicable Supporting Appendices
The following additional appendices can be added to the delivery of this chapter’s materials for instructors
interested in offering an advance understanding of a particular subject matter.
Appendix A – Analyzing Business Situations (SCQA Method)
Appendix B – The Business Model and Profitability
Management Reflection – The Business Decision-Making Landscape
Being in business goes beyond simply developing your value proposition and understanding its asset
base and cost structure. It is about being able to understand the macro environment around you; the
resources, capability, and capacity that you possess; and the ability to communicate to the marketplace
the uniqueness and importance of the products/services you offer. At its core base, developing and
managing a business requires its owners/managers to:
• create a vision of the opportunity in the marketplace
• confirm that the market size of customers is large enough that, once commercialized, the
opportunity can enable the organization to make a profit and sustain this profitability for
the anticipated planning cycle and beyond
• confirm that a position within the market is feasible, which will enable the company to
3|Page
