Coursera

Foundations of Business Strategy (Coursera)

Offered by University of Virginia,
Foundations of Business Strategy (Coursera)

Develop your ability to think strategically, analyze the competitive environment, and recommend firm positioning and value creation. In this course, developed at the Darden School of Business at the University of Virginia, top-ranked faculty will help you explore the underlying theory and frameworks that provide the foundations of a successful business strategy and provide the tools you need to understand that strategy: SWOT, Competitor, Environmental, Five Forces, and Capabilities Analyses, as well as Strategy Maps.

Class Deals by MOOC List - Click here and see Coursera's Active Discounts, Deals, and Promo Codes.

Course 1 of 5 in the Business Strategy Specialization.

Syllabus

WEEK 1
Introduction to Strategic Analysis
Welcome to the first module in the Foundations course. In this module, we'll discuss the meaning and importance of business strategy to an organization's competitive positioning. You'll learn about strategic analysis and the SWOT, competitor, and environmental analysis tools. Have fun building your strategy skillset!

WEEK 2
Analyzing Industry Structure
Hello and welcome back. In this module, we'll explore how to assess an industry's structure and how the competitive dynamics in an industry affect profitability. We'll go into depth with the five forces tool, a common and highly influential analytical framework. Happy analyzing!

WEEK 3
Analyzing Firm Capabilities
Welcome! In this module, we'll examine the tangible and intangible assets that form an organization's strength. We'll show you in depth how to complete a capabilities analysis and how to use this analysis to guide decision making. Happy analyzing!

WEEK 4
Determining Competitive Position
Welcome to the final module. In these lessons, we'll explore firms' competitive positioning relative to rivals and analyze the advantages and disadvantages of four generic competitive positions firms occupy. We'll use an easy and intuitive tool--strategy maps--to visually communicate information about firm positioning, and discuss which position is best for a particular firm to see maximum value. Happy analyzing!

Go to Class
MOOC List is learner-supported. When you buy through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.

Related Courses

Design Thinking para Inovação (Coursera) Coursera
University of Virginia

Design Thinking para Inovação (Coursera)

Business

Hoje em dia, a inovação é um negócio de todos. Se você for um gerente em uma corporação global, um empreendedor iniciando em uma função governamental ou um professor em uma escola primária, espera-se que todos sejam enxutos – para fazer melhor com menos. É por isso que todos nós precisamos de design thinking (pensamento criativo).

Sep 28th 2026
5-12 Weeks
Business Entrepreneurship Business Strategy
Details
Shaping Your Professional Brand (Coursera) Coursera
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Shaping Your Professional Brand (Coursera)

Management & Leadership

You've thought about who you are and how you want your career to be. You have some skills to deal with situations that could cause problems. What about the team around you? How do you build functional and constructive professional relationships? How can you add value? What do employers look for when they are promoting?

Sep 28th 2026
4 Weeks
Business Career Branding
Details
New Technologies for Business Leaders (Coursera) Coursera
Rutgers University

New Technologies for Business Leaders (Coursera)

Marketing & Communication Business

This introductory course is developed for high-level business people (and those on their way) who want a broad understanding of new Information Technologies and understand their potential for business functions (e.g. marketing, supply change management, finance). This is not a course for people looking for guidance on how to become a deep technical expert or implement these technologies.

Sep 28th 2026
5-12 Weeks
Business Artificial Intelligence Big Data
Details
The entrepreneur's guide for beginners (Coursera) Coursera
University of Barcelona

The entrepreneur's guide for beginners (Coursera)

Business

The Entrepreneur's Guide for beginners and is a course created in collaboration with all Catalan public universities and EIT Health and aims to be the starting point for all those who want to improve their knowledge and skills in the world entrepreneurship. In this course you will be able to identify a business opportunity, develop the business model (and the steps to validate it) and know the main mechanisms to find your business.

Sep 28th 2026
5-12 Weeks
Business Entrepreneurship Entrepreneurial Skills
Details
The Search for Great Ideas: Harnessing creativity to empower innovation (Coursera) Coursera
Michigan State University

The Search for Great Ideas: Harnessing creativity to empower innovation (Coursera)

Management & Leadership Business

Where do great business ideas come from? We all have compelling business concepts that we've been thinking about for years. In this course we will explore how to use observational tools and other techniques for idea generation and we will talk about how to evaluate the good ideas from the bad. The goal is to settle on a business idea that you are not only passionate about but also has real market application.

Sep 28th 2026
3 Weeks
Business Innovation Entrepreneurship
Details
Technology Strategy: Creative Destruction (Coursera) Coursera
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Technology Strategy: Creative Destruction (Coursera)

Business

The success of modern companies depends critically on their ability to manage and respond to technological change. Innovation is continually challenging companies’ competitive advantages, giving rise to new business models, and stimulating new platform-based competition. Managers and entrepreneurs need to understand these strategic forces and how they impact firms and industries in the modern knowledge economy. This course explains how technological innovation affects the competitive dynamics of markets, and how managers and entrepreneurs alike can strategically manage these dynamics to maximize the likelihood of success.

Sep 28th 2026
4 Weeks
Innovation Business Strategy Strategic Management
Details
The Power of Markets III: Input Markets and Promoting Efficiency (Coursera) Coursera
University of Rochester

The Power of Markets III: Input Markets and Promoting Efficiency (Coursera)

Business

The final module of the Power of Markets course begins by further exploring firm behavior in imperfectly competitive market settings: how firms with monopoly power can increase profits through price discrimination; and the price-output combinations we can expect firms to select in cases of monopolistic competition and oligopoly. We will also analyze monopolies from an efficiency perspective and look at the effects of imperfect information on firm and consumer behavior. We will next turn to exploring input markets and what determines the demand for an input by a firm, an industry, and the overall market.

Sep 28th 2026
4 Weeks
Business Markets Pricing
Details
Design-Led Strategy: Design thinking for business strategy and entrepreneurship (Coursera) Coursera
The University of Sydney

Design-Led Strategy: Design thinking for business strategy and entrepreneurship (Coursera)

Business

This course is for entrepreneurial managers who are looking for tools and techniques to introduce exciting, innovative products or services to market quickly and informed by high-quality customer insights. It is applicable to a range of organizations from small-medium sized enterprises through to corporates, and across a range of industrial segments.

Sep 28th 2026
5-12 Weeks
Prototyping Strategy Entrepreneurship
Details
Foundations of Diversity and Inclusion at Work TeachOut (Coursera) Coursera
University of Virginia

Foundations of Diversity and Inclusion at Work TeachOut (Coursera)

Management & Leadership Business

The summer of 2020 has brought issues of equity and race to the forefront of society. How do we create tolerant and just climates at work? Changing the culture of an organization is challenging in the best of circumstances; today, it can seem impossible. Yet, it is more necessary and urgent than ever to address these issues thoughtfully and with effective practices that can produce real change. Six Darden professors have designed this teach-out to bring you the latest scholarship and best practices on diversity, equity and inclusion and organizational change.

Sep 28th 2026
2 Weeks
Management Leadership Business Strategy
Details