Search results

This article inversitgates how a smaller, less resource-rich competitor can successfully out-maneuver a stronger opponent.

This study explores the role of expatriate satisfaction in organizational performance. It also posits that international transfer of knowledge and corporate learning are determinants in the overall satisfaction of expatriate managers. Moreover, as organizations gain international experience, their expatriate managers contribute to the global learning of the firm. This corporate learning provides the tools (e.g. foreign market experience and know‐how) for future expatriate managers and increases the likelihood of positive overseas experiences. Results from 132 expatriates of Fortune 500 firms indicate that satisfaction is significantly related to the performance of the organization as a whole and, further, that this relationship will vary depending on the international orientation of the organization.

Attempts to show the underlying layers of contradictions and tensions beneath the illusions of harmony that have been socially constructed. Shows how organisation members may not be cognisant of the repressive structure that they themselves help to build and looks at how this structure is held together through hegemonic story‐telling. Reveals that while a strong sense of cohesiveness and group identify is often applauded as humanising, domination and control can be exercised through this process of identity development and that a common out‐group “enemy” can be adopted to divert attention away from the anxieties and tension of the current state.

The paper seeks to build on a model from extant literature which utilized a similar historical analysis approach in a study of strategic decision making. Using the (unsuccessful) defence of Hong Kong in World War II as the historical case, the paper seeks first to apply Chung and McLarney's model in the analysis, and then extend the model so as to better handle the unique sequence of events that took place in 1941.

The paper employs a historical case event in an analysis of competitive strategies. The first section provides a descriptive historical account of the battle of Hong Kong. The second section describes the decision‐making model, while the third section applies the model to explain three sets of decisions: the decision to defend the colony, decisions made during the battle and the decision to surrender. The fourth section draws implications for strategic decision making in organizations, while the last section presents conclusions.

Organization theorists seem to be fascinated with planning and strategy formulation, at the expense of strategy implementation. While designing organizational strategy is often more glamorous than execution, it is the execution of strategy that ultimately determines an organization's competitive advantage. Clearly, the strategy of the Allied Forces in Hong Kong was not hard to figure out (Mintzberg). However, there is growing research on how lower organizational levels have a tremendous contribution in fundamentally changing, formulating organizational strategy and sometimes even obstructing strategy formulated at the top. The decision to defend Hong Kong in the face of the Japanese invasion, decisions made during the battle and the decision to surrender were all major, critical decisions, especially susceptible to such biases as overconfidence, problem framing, availability heuristics and confirming‐evidence. Overconfidence is particularly dangerous.

The study not only modifies and extends the model, but also contributes to the literature by augmenting the validity of previous case research.

There has been much social and legal debate over the definition of the word “charity.” For some it is a path way to heaven, for others, it plays a decisive role in anti‐trust cases. Charles Dickens wrote “Charity begins at home and justice begins next door.” Lord Macnaghten’s take on the Preamble to the Statute of Elizabeth (1601) 43 Eliz. 1, c.4 (UK), whilst considered to have its limitations, is widely regarded as a useful starting point for a legal definition of charity.

The literature on strategic planning has examined the process of planning in some detail, but most of it has ignored the external environment in its discussion. In the studies that have looked at the linkage between the environment and the strategic planning process, the strategic planning process has been treated like a black box. The literature does not delve into the box and examine the linkage between the environment and the characteristics (components and context) of the strategic planning process, but rather it has only looked at a simple relationship between the environment and this entity called the strategic planning process. It is this omission that is addressed in this study. This paper suggests that there is a need to open the black box and examine the relationship between the characteristics of the strategic planning process and the external environment of the organisation.

Culture is an overarching phenomenon that helps individuals make sense of their world. However, culture is not an unchanging “given.” Members of a society actively create culture and, through their activities and interactions, sustain or change this culture. In an organizational setting, culture gives meaning to each person’s membership in the social stage that is the workplace. In the process of cultural creation and sustenance, the past is often used as a harbinger of things to come. How an organization effectively uses the past to shape its present culture is a major focus of this study. This article is an ethnographic study of how culture is fabricated, sustained, and renewed in a small advertising firm. The authors propose three interpretive themes – nightmare avoidance, “Richardism,” and dream building – and develop these into a framework using Drucker’s three entrepreneurial strategies. A fourth strategy, creative divergence, emerges from our in‐depth analysis of EMC.

The purpose of this paper is to examine social policy recommendations to deal with the high level of pressure placed upon informal providers of elder care.

The paper investigates this subject of elder care by first establishing the significance of the problem. The paper provides an examination of how this problem is dealt with in several countries, both at the governmental level and by private enterprise. This forms the basis of a discussion of social (and enterprise) policy implications in particular for the USA. A focus on flexible work scheduling as a viable means to help alleviate the problem is recommended. In particular an approach of voluntary compliance is proposed to encourage wider acceptance by corporations.

The paper finds that priority needs to be given to developing a social policy agenda that focuses on flexible work scheduling. In addition, meaningful effort must be expended to capture input from various stakeholders, and to educate and promote the program itself. Concurrently, efforts targeted at managers must be executed to move them away from the traditional line of sight management schema into one more akin to a target‐based schema.

The paper offers useful suggestions to promote implementation.

This paper develops a new model for analysing industry competitive structure. The new model combines traditional strategic group analysis with stakeholder theory. Thus we have a model that incorporates all actors into the industry analysis. Company‐stakeholder clusters reveal the hidden, and often, crucial relationships that determine firm longevity. Using the new model, the small production canning industry is analysed.

Especially over the past decade, there have been numerous changes in the global marketplace which indicate that change is the only constant fact of life. These changes have increased not only opportunities but also uncertainty for organizations. The dynamic environment provides organizations with continuous feedback, to which they need to adapt. Past success masks the multinational corporation’s ability to perceive and respond to these changes. The key to survival in such a setting is culturally sensitive organizational learning. Strategic planning is necessary to cope with different levels of uncertainty encountered in foreign markets and to fully tap the new resources. Organizational effectiveness is directly influenced by the firm’s ability to achieve a “close‐fit” between the internal dynamics and the socio‐political structures. This, in turn, is possible through management practices sensitive to the local core cultural values. The Enron Power Project at Dabhol (Maharashtra, India) brings to light various socio‐political factors that have a direct impact on the organizational effectiveness, its survival and its long‐term success.