From strategic alliances to learning alliances - the key to a sustainable competitive advantage

Strategic alliances are becoming an important means for survival for organization experiencing economic and or market decline. Strategic relationships guide firms to compromise between doing something themselves and achieving it through another organisation. Alliances provide opportunities for partners to cooperatively come together and create greater value rather than a basic commercial transaction. However, the key to future success may be within learning alliances. Learning alliances are strategic relationships which are based on creating an environment that encourages mutual and reflective learning between partners. This climate enhances the cooperativeness between partners which encourages a higher level of trust and commitment. Alliances that incorporate a conducive learning environment encourage partners to come together and effectively transfer knowledge, resources and information. Learning alliances are more likely to achieve sustainable long-term competitive advantages in a market place that is becoming more competitive and volatile. We present a learning framework which encourages the formation of successful cooperative strategic partnerships and discuss transaction cost minimisation as one of the implications of this relationship