战略聚焦视角下的文化特性与新产品创造力研究

 基于竞争价值框架和战略理论,在新产品开发过程中,企业文化特性与战略聚焦因素的有效适应或协同对新产品创造力有积极的影响作用。企业文化特性是指一组企业成员所共享的价值观、规范、信仰和群体性认知,能够影响并塑造组织成员的认知、动机和能力,因而在新产品研发阶段对企业产生新想法和解决创造性问题的能力均有重要影响。目前相关研究已开始探讨员工所处的企业文化环境对其新颖而有用想法的产生能力(即创造力)的影响。但鲜有研究在企业层面分析企业文化特性与企业战略的交互对新产品创造力的作用机理。        从竞争价值框架和战略聚焦视角出发,深入分析企业不同文化特性与新产品创造力之间的作用关系,建立基于战略聚焦视角的文化特性-创造力匹配模型,并实证检验新产品开发过程中两类企业文化特性对新产品创造力的影响以及战略聚焦变量在这一过程中的调节机理。为了揭示企业文化特性影响新产品创造力的作用机理,在直接检验柔性导向文化和控制导向文化与新产品创造力关系的基础上,深入分析并检验组织内外部战略聚焦变量(长期导向和企业家导向）对上述关系的调节作用。        以209家中国企业为研究对象进行实证研究,结果表明柔性导向文化和控制导向文化均正向促进新产品创造力;企业家导向正向调节柔性导向文化和控制导向文化与新产品创造力之间的关系;而长期导向对柔性导向文化和控制导向文化与新产品创造力之间关系的调节作用是非线性、倒U形的,即在新产品开发过程中,中等强度的长期导向对企业两种类型文化与新产品创造力的促进作用最强。        研究结论为探讨企业文化特性的激励效能提供了新的理论视角,并对企业在新产品开发过程中的战略聚焦规划和创造力管理有重要的实践指导意义。     

Production systems and supplier selection: a multi-phase process model

Abstract

Purpose: This paper presents a combined multi-phase supplier selection model. The process repeatedly revisits the criteria and sourcing decision as the development process continues. This enables a structured adoption of product and production system innovation from strategic suppliers, where previously the literature purely focuses on product innovation or cost reduction. Design/methodology/approach: The authors adopted an embedded researcher style, inductive, qualitative case study of an industrial supply cluster comprising a focal automotive company and its interaction with three different strategic stamping suppliers. Findings: Our contribution is the multi-phased production and product innovation process. This is an advance from traditional supplier selection and also an extension of ideas of supplier-located product development as it includes production system development, and complements the literature on working with strategic suppliers. Specifically, we explicitly articulate the previously unreported issue of whether a supplier chosen for its innovation capabilities at the start of the new product development process will also be the most appropriate supplier during the production system development phase, when an ability to work collaboratively may be the most important attribute, or in the large-scale production phase when an ability to manufacture at low unit cost may be most important. Originality/value: The paper identifies a multi-phase approach to tendering within a fixed body of strategic suppliers which seeks to identify the optimum technological and process decisions as well as the traditional supplier sourcing choice. These areas have not been combined before and generate a valuable approach for firms to adopt as well as for researchers to extend our understanding of a highly complex process.     

A framework to study strategizing activities at the field level: The example of CSR rating agencies

This paper responds to recent calls to bridge strategy and organization research by combining Strategy-as-Practice and Neo-Institutional Theory through re-theorizing the notion of strategic actor. We problematize the notion of strategic actor at the field level, and rely on insights from management and organization studies and sociology to advance a theoretical framework that conceptualizes organizations as social actors at the field level. We demonstrate our theoretical framework by drawing on corporate social responsibility rating agencies. We see corporate social responsibility rating agencies as supra-individual, social actors that are predisposed to assume an active role in defining and revisiting structural parameters within the society through their purposeful, meaningful actions and interactions. Our main contribution is to the development of the Strategy-as-Practice literature, achieved by re-theorizing the notion of strategic actor at the field level. This contribution responds to the micro-isolationism critique, and proposes a new focus for Strategy-as Practice research.     

Towards an integrative framework of performance in product development projects

This paper aims to identify the factors that are associated with high performance in product development projects. The study takes a multidisciplinary approach in order to first explore key characteristics of product development processes. A synthesis of literatures from the fields of organization theory, strategic management, innovation management, project management, and group effectiveness provides the necessary theoretical foundations for analyzing the complex organizational processes that are involved in a typical product development project. The theoretical development that follows leads to the formulation of a series of propositions regarding relationships between product development performance dimensions and a variety of factors. An integrative framework that summarizes the proposed relationships is then developed. The paper concludes with a discussion that focuses on key elements of product-development strategies and management processes and how these can be controlled in order to enhance product development performance.     

Knowledge Management in Strategic Alliances: A Review of Empirical Evidence

Knowledge‐related and organizational learning processes in alliances have received much attention throughout the last 25 years. The field has generated a rapidly growing body of empirical evidence on how knowledge is managed in alliances. However, the sphere is highly complex, fragmented, incoherent, and heterogeneous in terms of the theoretical approaches applied. This paper presents an integrative and organizing framework for the empirical literature on knowledge management in strategic alliances. It illustrates how the knowledge management outcomes of knowledge creation, transfer and application are determined by four distinct sets of factors: knowledge characteristics, partner characteristics, partner interaction, and active knowledge management. Based on this framework, this review analyses and integrates empirical evidence in order to identify where findings converge and where results conflict. So far, research has focused strongly on singular interrelations between these four sets of factors and the transfer of knowledge. Conversely, the questions of how knowledge is created, retained, retrieved and applied and how the interplay of the different factors affects knowledge management in strategic alliances remain widely unexplored. The review concludes with a summary of the current state of the art in empirical research and discusses some promising avenues for future investigation.     

Capability,Quality, and Performance of Offshore IS Vendors: A Theoretical Framework and Empirical Investigation

Information systems (IS) offshoring has become a widespread practice and a strategic sourcing choice for many firms. While much has been written by researchers about the factors that lead to successful offshoring arrangements from the client's viewpoint, the vendor's perspective has been largely scarce. The vendor perspective is equally important as offshore IS vendors need to make important decisions in terms of delivering operational and strategic performance and aligning their resources and processes in order to meet or exceed targeted outcomes. In this article, we propose and test a three‐level capability–quality–performance (CQP) theoretical framework to understand vendor outcomes and their antecedents. The first level of the framework represents three vendor capabilities: relationship management, contract management, and information technology management. The second level has three mediating variables representing process quality: partnership, service, and deliverable quality. The third level has three dependent variables representing vendor outcomes: operational performance, strategic performance, and satisfaction. The model was tested with 188 vendor firms from India and China, the two most popular destinations for IS offshoring. Results support the CQP framework; vendor capabilities are significant predictors of intermediate quality measures, which in turn affect vendor outcomes. Implications of the study findings to both theory development and IS offshore vendor strategic decision making are discussed.     

Context matters: how internal and external factors impact servitization

Abstract

The study investigates how internal and external context factors impact a manufacturer’s servitization process (i.e. the strategic transformation from competing through products towards competing through services). A theoretical framework was developed that integrates a multi-stage conceptualisation of servitization with a focus on the wide range of internal and external context factors that support or oppose the transformation. The study draws on the collective experiences of 25 senior executives from 17 servitizing small- and medium-sized manufacturers, using a focus group-based enquiry method. The findings recognise servitization as a multi-stage transformation process with each stage being exposed to different context factors. The findings identify a wide range of context factors and show how their specific impact varies depending on the manufacturer’s servitization stage. Several theoretical and practical implications are provided.     

A learning perspective on the offshoring of advanced services

Based on longitudinal case studies of offshoring of advanced IT and engineering services from Danish firms to Indian firms, this paper explores organizational learning that occurs over time in both home and host firms and uses learning as a measure of the firm impact of advanced services offshoring. The findings are consistent with the theoretical view that advanced services offshoring must be understood as an antecedent for strategic business development and organizational change in both home and host firms. The study shows that when offshoring partnerships mature and firms gain experience, learning in both home and host firms evolves over time and differs in many cases from their initial objectives and expectations. In some of the Danish firms engaging in offshoring even ignites a process of strategic transformation. Both Danish and Indian firms use the input from their offshoring partnership to upgrade their organizations and business processes.     

The Influence of Context on the Strategic Decision‐Making Process: A Review of the Literature

This paper critically reviews the strategic decision‐making process literature, with a specific focus on the effects of context. Context refers to the top management team, strategic decision‐specific characteristics, the external environment and firm characteristics. This literature review also develops an illustrative framework that incorporates these four different categories of contextual variables that influence the strategic decision‐making process. As a result of the variety and pervasiveness of contextual variables featured within the literature, a comprehensive and up‐to‐date review is essential for organizing and synthesizing the extant literature to explicate an agenda for future research. The purpose of this literature review is threefold: first, to critically review the strategic decision‐making process literature to highlight the underlying themes, issues, tensions and debates in the field; second, to identify the opportunities for future theory development; and third, to state the methodological implications arising from this review.     

The Industry-Level Impact of Information Technology: An Empirical Analysis of Three Industries*

As noted by several observers, information technology (IT) has rapidly evolved from “part of the organizational overhead” into a strategic resource capable of changing patterns of competition within industries [8, p. 275]. However, while this evolution has become part of the fabric for literature exploring the strategic impact of IT, very few studies have been undertaken to determine the specific influence(s) of technology-based competition on industry structure. The development of analytical frames for capturing aspects of industry behavior provides a potentially powerful tool for evaluating the influence strategic IT initiatives may have on current bases of competition. Drawing from the theoretical disciplines of industrial economics and strategic management, this study develops a framework for analyzing longitudinal changes in industry structure. Working within this frame, the study then analyzes the nature and change of structure in three industries during and after the introduction of strategic information technology. The findings suggest that in each of these industries structural characteristics were dramatically altered subsequent to the introduction of competitive-based IT. In two of the industries (airlines and industrial chemicals), early adopters broke away from other industry participants, in effect, forming unique bases of competition. In the remaining industry (drug wholesalers), previously distinct bases of competition consolidated, resulting in a more competitive industry structure than that which existed prior to the technological innovation.     

Conditions for successful strategic alliances in the food industry

This paper focuses on strategic fuzzy alliances (SFAs) and the role of trust in business-to-business relationships. First, a theoretical model of governance choice involving strategic alliances is developed, integrating the Shapiro, Sheppard, and Cheraskin (1992) taxonomy of trust into a neoinstitutional framework. Second, this model, based on transaction theory, is then used to generate necessary and sufficient conditions for trust-based agreements. The third component of this paper is an empirical model, which tests the above theory. Finally, managerial implications from the results are discussed.     

The stability of strategic alliances: Characteristics, factors and stages

This paper presents a theoretical framework for understanding the evolutionary dynamics of strategic alliances. Using an integrated process model, we analyze the conceptual characteristics and antecedents of the stability of strategic alliances. The primary purpose of this study is to (1) conceptualize and characterize alliance stability to fill the academic gap in the literature, and (2) identify a range of endogenous factors underlying alliance stability across four developmental stages — partner selection, structuring/negotiation, implementation and performance evaluation — so as to fill the managerial relevance gap. From the discussion, we develop a number of propositions to facilitate future empirical testing of our conceptual model. Finally, we indicate some key implications for theoretical research and managerial practice.     

A Public Transportation Decision‐Making Model within a Metropolitan Area

Understanding the decision‐making factors associated with public transportation is essential in strategic development of public transportation to improve acceptance and utilization of mass transit systems. This research analyzes factors affecting attitudes toward public transportation and the choice of transportation mode by investigating the public transportation decision‐making process of working professionals using a survey methodology. The objectives of this research are to model the transportation decision‐making process of public transportation users in a metropolitan area and to determine key factors that affect the public transportation choices made by potential public transportation users. This study contributes to the literature by developing and testing an integrated theoretical framework for modeling an individual's public transportation decision‐making process using four independent variables: Perceived Public Transportation Security, Knowledge, Price, and Convenience. We develop the proposed theoretical framework based upon the extant literature and tested it using partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS‐SEM). Based on the Theory of Reasoned Action, the Theory of Planned Behavior, and utility theory, we develop the factors and refine associated items using confirmatory factor analysis.     

Personality, perceptions and retrenchment decisions of managers in response to decline: Evidence from a decision-making study

Drawing on the strategic leadership and leadership cognition literature, we develop a theoretical framework linking personal characteristics of strategic leaders with their perceptions of organizational decline and retrenchment activities. Our hypotheses are tested using a sample of 110 experienced MBA students in a scenario-based study. The findings of this exploratory study suggest that strategic leaders' perceptions of the severity of a firm's decline play an important role in the recommendation of extensive retrenchment activities in response to decline. However, perceptions of the severity of decline vary substantially across decision makers and are influenced by an individual's locus of strategic control, functional background and maturity. The study's findings that perceptions of decline and planned responses to decline vary substantially and predictably across individuals are discussed in light of existing theory and practice.     

Investment Appraisal and Measures of Performance in Italian Divisionalised Companies

The aim of this study was to describe and analyse the current practice and trends in the development of management control practice as regards divisional investments in large Italian firms, using a survey questionnaire method. Some comparison with top North-American and German international manufacturing units were also made.The findings of the study supported two theoretical propositions. In the identification stage, firms tend to decentralise the process of capital budgeting and the control mechanism ensuring the link between corporate strategic objectives and capital expenditure projects at divisional level is based on guidelines produced by headquarters. In the selection stage firms which perceive a high interface level with the corporate strategic objectives in divisional capital expenditure tend to use discounted cash flow techniques when choosing one or more investment projects. When an economic approach is used to provide a comprehensive measure of performance, the theoretical framework fails to predict the relationship between corporate control and performance evaluation system in divisionalised companies. Essentially, financial control combines non-financial measures, used to understand manufacturing operations, with traditional accounting measures, used to understand the effects of manufacturing activities on the level of operating cash flow and operating income, as a comprehensive measures of performance in the medium-term of divisional investments.     

The wider implications of business-model research

Business-model research has struggled to develop a clear footprint in the strategic management field. This introduction to the special issue on the wider implications of business-model research argues that part of this struggle relates to the application of five different perspectives on the term “business model,” which creates ambiguity about the conceptual boundaries of business models, the applied terminology, and the potential contributions of business-model research to strategic management literature. By explicitly distinguishing among these five perspectives and by aligning them into one overarching, comprehensive framework, this paper offers a foundation for consolidating business-model research. Furthermore, we explore the connections between business-model research and prominent theories in strategic management. We conclude that business-model research is not necessarily a “theory on its own” and that it can be more fruitfully understood as a theoretical mechanism for combining different literature streams. As such, business-model research is positioned as a central connecting component in the further development of the strategic management field.     

Regulatory focus as a psychological micro-foundation of leaders' exploration and exploitation activities

In recent years, there has been strong interest in leaders' exploration and exploitation activities, especially because of their positive effects on performance. Most prior research in this area has focused on the organizational antecedents of leaders' exploration and exploitation activities, with less consideration given to the psychological precursors. This paper draws upon insights from the behavioral strategy literature to inform our theoretical perspective on leaders' exploration–exploitation activities. In particular, by conceptually linking leaders' regulatory focus and exploration–exploitation, we provide a theoretical framework to explain these activities from a psychological viewpoint. Moreover, we employ two moderator variables to better understand the different properties and boundaries of this framework. All in all, this paper has a number of implications for strategic leadership theory and practice.     

Value‐enhancing Learning from Industry‐wide Diversification Experience

Diversification is an important strategic decision and a rare event. By definition, when undertaking a new diversification, a firm will not have direct internal experience of the venture. In this regard, external experience of similar diversifications provides a valuable lesson pool for the focal manager. While there are many studies of internal learning in organizational learning literature, research on external learning is still scarce. This paper proposes a theoretical framework for external experiential learning and applies it to a study of the effect of industry experience on diversification value. It reports the novel finding of a cubic relationship between external learning from industry experience and diversification value. This indicates that industry experience matters to the outcomes of strategic decisions, but that the effect of this external experience on learning is conditional upon certain characteristics of the experience: namely, specificity and heterogeneity.     

Does a Store Brand Always Hurt the Manufacturer of a Competing National Brand?

It is generally believed that store brands hurt the manufacturers of competing national brands while benefiting retailers. In this study, we challenge this notion by studying the impacts of a store brand when it is introduced by a power retailer. We show that a store brand may benefit the manufacturer when the interaction between the manufacturer and retailer is modeled as a retailer‐led Stackelberg game. This phenomenon occurs because the store brand changes the nature of the strategic interaction between the manufacturer and retailer in our model. In particular, while the interaction is always vertical strategic substitutability without a store brand, it may become vertical strategic independence with one. With the store brand, the demand for the national brand becomes larger, and the wholesale price for the national brand may increase, both of which benefit the manufacturer. Finally, the store brand may lessen the double marginalization problem of the supply chain for the national brand in the retailer‐led Stackelberg game, but does so in an unconventional way: The reduction in the double marginalization effect may come from a lowered retail markup instead of a lowered wholesale price. Our results reconcile some discrepancies between theoretical predictions and empirical findings regarding the impacts of store brands on manufacturers.