What Explains the Lack of Innovation at American Express? Is It Hubris, Inertia, or Lack of Capability?” on pages 438-439
Answer the following questions in essay format (with six peer-reviewed sources as support).
1. This case suggests that a lack of continuous innovation contributed to American Express’s (AmEx) poor performance in 2014. Assuming this is true, what factors might prevent a firm the size and scope of AmEx from being able to innovate continuously?
2. Use material from Chapter 4 to identify the business-level strategy AmEx uses. What dimensions do you believe AmEx should emphasize to use the strategy you identified successfully across time?
3. What actions do you believe AmEx should take to establish an entrepreneurial mind-set among employees throughout the company?
4. This Mini-Case includes descriptions of recent AmEx innovations. Do you anticipate that most of these innovations resulted from autonomous strategic behavior or from induced strategic behavior? Why?