Distributorships that dominate the world of distribution by always performing in the upper quartile of their industry and those which will play an even greater role in the foreseeable future generally have characteristics that often create a large and incredibly complex set of independent relationships between highly diverse groups of people. Problems with staffing and retention often apparent in their counterparts, the lower quartile performers, may not be due to bad hires or a low unemployment rate. In fact, they may be related to poor leadership insight by not recognizing employees as a core competency in the business strategy.

Although employees may not fit the strictest definition of a core competency, it is a fact that employees are the ones responsible for creating many of the core competencies that create competitive advantage for the company. It is an undisputable fact that failure to recognize the importance of employee contributions will lead to lower quartile performance and even failure regardless of your business strategy. Core competence is professed to be the source of sustainable competitive advantage.

The Three Determinants of Core Competence include: