The relevance of the models developed by Michael Porter still remains prevalent in the business environment. The macroeconomic stigma that still surrounds these models make them still relevant in the market climate where internationalisation plays a major role for the success of any business. The simple approach of these models have changed the perceptions of governments and marketers, and these models have created a common approach where they have been able to create strategies to ensure that an economic sustainability has developed. The five forces were commonly used in the wider economic arena to change the direction of businesses. The way that businesses have used this framework has enabled them to create a systematic way of influencing key stakeholders and enhance its infrastructures to increase its market capabilities. The value chain examines the primary and support activities which have been used to support the strategic alliances that a business may pursue when they move to their operations internationally. The generic strategies focus on the management of costs and increasing market leadership. 

Changes of leaderships and strategies all focus on Porter's models and these models have been centralised to create a modernised approach to manoeuvre smooth internal and external business operations. These models focus on the competitive advantage and create a value to form a sustainable investment and a good strategic position. The value chain outlooks the nature of the internal and external environments and it allows businesses to plan and coordinate its systems to match the requirements of its operations. 

The validity of the generic strategies enable organisations to differentiate its market activities against its competitors in regards to how they could influence change in its ownership and developments. The ideology of the generic strategies was to encapsulate how organisations can implement effective strategies which are linked to the overall performance. The generic strategies have established the core competency model where organisations have implemented a cost leadership strategy to achieve a sustainable production system (the example of Toyota’s Way system by using the kaizen model). The truth is that organisations still use this approach when penetrating through emerging markets and developed markets so that they can offer products at a low price with high quality features. Porter’s generic strategies can enhance the organisation’s performance as differentiation and focus strategies can be separated from this model because the notion to be different has made organisations (such as Apple) to enhance its creativeness of its products so that it allows individuals to express themselves differently in the social environments by providing innovative products (Hesterly and Barney, 2010). 

The focus strategy allows organisations to focus on a specific market (Islami et al, 2020). However, Porter’s expression of this strategy was to make it two types where the focus strategy does not only depend on the markets but also low-cost allows organisations to set parameters so that they can operate in both low-cost markets and differentiate its prices based on the focused market. 

Porter (1985) states that the competitive advantage must be achieved when the value chain is implemented accurately with both primary and support activities correlating with each other. This explains why the relevance of Porter’s models cannot be excluded in the market environment for businesses because the due diligence of these models are still prevalent for businesses that want to sustain their competitive advantage and maintain strong market positions. The value chain has a strong presence within the internal operations of the business as this echoes Yi-Chan Chung et al (2008) as they note that the value chain can be linked to the quality management and even set the organisation’s benchmarking can enhance their quality circles. The mechanics of the value chain provides an authentic framework for organisations to build profound relationships with suppliers and other collaborators that are part of the value chain umbrella. The value chain framework strengthens the argument of the relevance of Porter’s models as Kristina and Paul (2005) argue that the value chain provides a coherent framework which policy makers can use to make appropriate decisions when it comes to how organisations should use the support activities effectively. 

The value chain has provided sustainability for organisations’ production systems and its supply chain management and this has enabled organisations to manage risks, increase the demands that customers require and create a transparent process whilst cost control is considered to ensure that the value chain is operating at its full capacity. Aside from the production system relations to the value chain, a requirement of a customer-centric approach from the support activities (service) has proved to be an important elements which is echoed by Slywotzky and Morrison (1999); both authors note that the channel to establish customers’ needs would create a solid product or service which would help create core competencies (Prahalad and Hamel, 1979). The idea is to create a chain that provides a value and this shows how Porter thought about this model before implementing it because the value chain is interlinked to every aspect of the business and this is highlighted by Walter and Lancaster (2000) when both authors noted that the connection of the supply chain and logistics to the value chain gives it an overall tool for businesses to use. Porter thought about the stakeholders when creating the value chain because he ensured that the integration of support activities would provide value of different success factors for policymakers, management and customers to benefit. 

The value chain framework has maximised the value of the businesses’ operations but the five forces of competition are different in its own unique way. The five forces of competition helps organisations understand its industry and enables organisations to foresee the outcome of entering another industry. The relevance of the five forces gives organisations the impetus to drive its business model in a competitive environment by assessing both its microenvironment and macroenvironment. Government policies can be changed depending on the individual determinant of the five forces (Mohapatra, 2012). Bruijil (2018) notes that the sharing of profits is determined by the implementation of the five forces. The significance of the five forces in the current marketplace is highlighted by Bruijil (2018) where the author links the five forces to innovation. In the 1980s when the five forces were designed, Porter did not consider innovations because the internet was not developed for mass consumerisation. However, innovation has been considered by Porter because the forms of deregulation of finance, globalisation and digitalisation have all become the drivers which the forces have been affiliated to (Downes, 1997; Larry et al, 2014; Bruijil, 2018). The threats of new entrants enable organisations to understand what new technology that the business is going to bring into the industry and it has enabled organisations to understand how technological capabilities of that business would change the landscape of the industry. This shows how relevance the five forces are in the current marketplace when innovations are considered and the fact that it is widely used in educational syllables still show how each determinant within the five forces are relevant in change management and other management frameworks. 

Overall, the relevance of these models are still prevalent in the current climate. Although economic and political drivers have steered the market operations to a different path; the notion of these models remain the same and these drivers can still be implemented by using these models. Porter has created three simplistic models to help organisations understand the industry, and its internal and external stakeholders. Globalisation, deregulations and economic digitalisation have made these models more relevant as these models still correspond to these drivers. These three models established by Porter have renovated businesses and they have created a plan for businesses to embark on. 

References 

1. Downes, L. (1997). Beyond Porter. Context Magazine. [online] [accessed on 19 May 2022]

2. Larry, M., Shamir, L., & Johnson, F. (2014). The 5 competitive forces framework in a technology mediated environment. Do these forces still hold in the industry of the 21st century? Thesis. University of Twente, Faculty of Management and Governance. [online] [accessed on 17 May 2022]

3. Porter, M. (1979). How competitive forces shape strategy. Harvard Business Review, March Issues. [online][accessed on 1 June 2022]

4. Porter, M. (1980). Competitive strategy: Techniques for analyzing industries and competitors. New York, NY: The Free Press. 

5. Porter, M. (1985). On competition. Updated and Expanded Edition. Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Publishing.

6. Mohapatra, S. (2012). IT and porter’s competitive forces model and strategies. In Information Systems Theory (pp. 265-281). New York: Springer

7. Bruijl, G. (2018). The Relevance of Porter's Five Forces in Today's Innovative and Changing Business Environment. SSRN Electronic Journal. 10.2139/ssrn.3192207.

8. Yi-Chan Chunga et al (2008). A study of the business value of Total Quality Management. Total Quality Management, 19 (4), 367–379

9. Kristina, D., and Paul, E., (2005) Combining economic and environmental dimensions: Value chain analysis of UK iron and steel flows. Ecological Economics, 58, 507-519

10. Walter. D and Lancaster .G (2000). Implementing value strategy through the value chain. Management Decision, 38 (3), 166-178

11. Hesterly W., and Barney, J., (2010) Strategic management and competitive advantage. New York: Pearson Prentice Hall 

12. Islami, X., Mustafa, N., and Latkovikj, T. M., (2020) Linking Porter’s generic strategies to firm performance. Future Business Journal, 6 (1), 3-18