Seinfeld on Resources: Causal Ambiguity, the Perils of Imitable Resources, and the Durability of Resource-Based Advantages

Abstract

Teaching the foundational aspects of strategic management, particularly applications and extensions of the resource-based view and the topic of sustained competitive advantage, can be difficult. This article explains how instructors (in strategy, marketing, entrepreneurship, and so on) can use an episode from the iconic sitcom Seinfeld to teach students how to compete with and against advantages protected by causal ambiguity while not falling prey to the temptation to focus on easy-to-copy resources when trying to build a sustained competitive advantage. This article explains how novice and seasoned instructors alike can use this episode—whether they teach the logic of the resource-based view (RBV) through the common VRIO approach or not. A few brief clips from episode entitled “The English Patient” follow George Costanza in his quest to discover how a “short, stocky, dimwitted bald man” such as himself could be (temporarily) viewed as someone attractive to the mysterious Danielle, a seemingly unattainable, articulate, well-dressed woman.