后发企业如何应对竞争诱发的组织危机？——基于华为追赶经验的探索性案例研究

后发企业在追赶进程中时常由于竞争而受到外部竞争者的针对性威胁，甚至陷入组织危机，然而现有研究并未对此现象予以足够的重视。通过对高技术公司华为在知识产权竞争力发展过程中的主要危机事件——华为与思科诉讼案的深入调查，研究发现：在外部竞争者威胁与内部竞争力缺陷的联合作用下，后发企业易陷入组织危机；通过系统地扫描和分析内外部环境来感知和准确识别外部竞争者威胁（敌对竞争行为）和内部竞争力缺陷是危机管理的基础；适当地运用合作与竞争手段可以帮助后发企业减缓外部威胁并更好地抵御危机，从而为企业赢得良好的发展空间；系统的组织变革是提升组织竞争力、降低危机发生可能性的根本手段。

What Latecomer Firms Can Do to Deal with Organizational Crisis Caused by Competition? A Case Study Based on Huawei’s Experience

In the catch-up process, latecomer firms frequently face targeted threats from external competitors due to competition and sometimes even fall into organizational crises, which has a very severe impact on the survival and development of such enterprises. However, current catch-up research field has not paid enough attention to this phenomenon. By conducting in-depth exploratory single-case analyses of major crisis events in the development of intellectual property competitiveness of the high-tech company Huawei, three research questions were resolved. (1) Why do the crises occur? (2) How could latecomer firms better survive the crisis? (3) How could latecomer firms learn and grow up from the crisis? This study finds:(1) The combined effects of external targeted hostilities from incumbent companies and the lack of alertness and competitiveness weaknesses within the latecomer firms make them more likely to fall into (competition-induced) organizational crises.(2) Systematic scanning and analyses of the internal and external environment to accurately perceive and identify external threats and internal competitiveness deficiencies are the basis of crisis management for latecomers, and this action can increase the vigilance of the organization and provide necessary information for the organization’s further actions.(3) Appropriate ″crisis adaptation behaviors″ can help latecomer companies mitigate external threats and escape from crises at a lower cost, thereby winning a suitable development space, ″crisis adaptation behaviors″ include the comprehensive use of necessary compromises (cooperation) and counterattacks (competition). (4) Systematic organizational change is an important means for latecomers to enhance organizational competitiveness, which is a fundamental approach to mitigate the possibility of all future crises. By emphasizing the significance of crisis management in the catch-up process of latecomers, this research primarilycontributes to the field of catch-up research of latecomers. The conclusions of this article show that it is very dangerous to ignore the possible crisis (caused by competition) in the catch-up process of latecomers, because even if ″all parameters are set″, one organizational crisis could still easily destroy all the hard works of the enterprises overnight. By analyzing Huawei’s case, this study provides a template for latecomers, explaining why a crisis occurs, how to better survive the crisis, and how to learn from it and get stronger. In addition, the importance of IP management for latecomers has been highlighted. This article integrates IP resources and IP management capabilities into the IPC structure and considers it as an important independent component of the company’s overall competitiveness. Finally, this study also enriches theories on crisis and crisis management. This study finds and proposes another factor that increases the possibility of a crisis: internal competitiveness (resources and capabilities).For latecomer firms with weak internal competitiveness, the crisis is largely due to low resistance to external threats. Therefore, the fundamental way to prevent crisis from happening again is to enhance organizational competitiveness. In addition, the research conclusions of this article also have made important practical implications for the catch-up process of Chinese manufacturing companies in a turbulent environment.