Bridging the awful gap between strategy and action

This article describes the lessons learned from a study carried out within British Telecommunications as part of the author's doctoral research programme. It was found that strategy was formulated and implemented, with direct action taken and resources commited, by Divisional managers at all three organizational levels in BT so that implementation did not always follow the lines intended by the HQ strategic planners. Implementation was found to be an interactive rather than a rational/sequential process. Marked variations in practice were observed and explanations for these are offered. The relative success of the strategies differed widely, both overall and within the divisional field units. The manner of implementation and factors managers perceived to help and hinder it were studied. Success or failure was felt to hinge on getting a few basics right: resources, organizational ‘fit’, historical performance and the expectations it generated (track record), information and support, market acceptance, technical competence, consistent goals and top management support.     

Licensed house manager skills/competences and the management development process in Bass Taverns

The aim of this paper is to explore the nature of critical licensed house management skills within Bass Taverns. In particular, it focuses on the extent to which these are viewed as being concerned with 'soft' (behavioural) or 'hard' (technical) aspects of management. The focus of the research is on the 'shared understanding' of the importance of licensed house managerial skills. It is concerned with the identification of coherence and tensions in the criticality of certain managerial skills as perceived by the company's senior and licensed house managers. It presents the findings of surveys conducted at both senior and licensed house manager levels within the company to establish the extent to which interhierarchical consistency exists in the areas of critical skills/competences and whether these are seen as being specific to the organization or considered as generic. The research reports a general harmony regarding the nature of the skills required by licensed house managers and evidence of a focus on people-oriented skills, which are seen as being particularly important for achieving business success. Licensed house managers rated the critical skills as 'generic' rather than 'specific' to the taverns context, drawing attention to the need for the organization to address the manner in which these skills are developed.     

Performance evaluations of physician executives. Interview by Barbara J. Linney.

Six senior physician executives were interviewed to see how they were doing or not doing performance reviews in their organizations. There seems to be a trend toward doing them, but it is in the beginning stages. Of the physician executives surveyed, the experience ranges from formal lengthy evaluations with rating scales to reviewing a short list of goals. Several are in the process of developing new systems or revising old ones. Probably the most useful part of a performance evaluation is the conversation between the physician executive and the person he or she reports to. If you can stop approaching performance evaluations as passing negative judgments on people, but as having a conversation to hear their concerns, learn what their goals are, and offer ways to help them achieve their potential, they can be useful, enjoyable experiences for both people.     

Strategic change and organisational restructuring: How managers negotiate change initiatives

This study examines the organizational changes and varied response amongst managers to those changes in seven subsidiaries of multinational apparel firms. Because of intensified competition from low wage economies, such firms have been forced to restructure production processes to heighten both their productive efficiency and attain greater flexibility at the plant level. Much of this change has involved the introduction of high performance work practices (HPWP), a central focus of much recent scholarship on post-Fordism. Drawing from several qualitative strategies, this paper focuses on the role of managers as agents of strategy implementation and discusses how they negotiate, accept or resist such changes. We describe the failure to implement HPWP as some firms seek efficiency gains from work restructuring rather than broader effectiveness goals that would have deepened employee participation. In doing so we theorise about structural impediments to organisational innovation, the operational constraints that render some managers change recipients rather than change agents, and what this might tell us about micro-political strategies within large organisations as key actors negotiate a new organisational reality.     

What innovation managers really do: a multiple-case investigation into the informal role profiles of innovation managers

Over the last fifteen years companies tended to formalise their innovation management activities and to establish formal jobs like the innovation officer, the network manager or the innovation manager. Knowledge of the informal role profiles of these formal roles is still rare. HR and R&D Managers do not know which informal role profile might suit them best, thus having difficulties to assign the best candidates for jobs in innovation management. Researchers cannot help to resolve the problem. Our research answers the question what innovation managers really do, by analysing their tasks, skills and traits, theoretically based on informal role theories. Furthermore, we will analyse how these characteristics change with company size. To provide answers to our research questions we choose a multiple-case study approach. We found, among others, that innovation managers fulfil the role of the relationship and process promotor or a combination of both with the champion, but we also found, that the innovation manager’s roles profile becomes fuzzier with shrinking company size. Our results have practical implications for top management and also HR and R&D managers, enabling them to better select and steer employees in innovation management. Researchers will be able to build on our results because we offer a comprehensive understanding of the informal role profiles of innovation managers based on informal role theories.     

Re-appraising Managers' Perceptual Errors: A Behavioural Decision-Making Perspective

Findings reported by Mezias and Starbuck (2003), indicating that managers have inaccurate perceptions of their organization and its environment, are appraised in the context of work from the field of behavioural decision-making (BDM) on heuristics and biases. Drawing on theory, research and criticisms concerning calibration of human judgement, continuous versus discrete judgements and the adequacy of the normative solutions used, we identify issues that require further clarification and suggest lines of research to address them.     

Economic impact reports—Management controls for the 1980s

Modern management thinking has evolved according to the problems and opportunities encountered by business managers in their socio-economic environment. The radical changes of economic environment experienced by companies in Western Europe since the early 1970s have rendered many traditional management concepts obsolete or proved them inadequate. In economies where markets may be either growing, falling or oscillating, one major problem is that actual results often differ considerably from planned results. How much of this variance is due to what is going on in the economy at large and how much is due to company performance? A simple tool for controlling the organization in this situation is the monthly ‘economic impact report’, designed to subtract the effect of the economic environment from company performance in order to assess net performance in meeting marketing goals.     

The Impact of Information System Personnel Skill Discrepancies on Stakeholder Satisfaction

System development efforts depend to a large degree upon how well information systems (IS) managers, IS specialists, and IS users work together in a project team structure. Yet, these individuals frequently work under different perceptions about matters of importance to development, management, and success. This paper introduces a framework for examining IS specialists' skill requirements from a multiple‐stakeholder perspective. Derived from discrepancy theory, the framework concedes that different stakeholders hold a variable set of expectations for IS personnel skill levels as well as a perception of skills held by IS personnel. We examine differences in expectation and performance expressed by each group and describe the impact of the discrepancy on user satisfaction, career satisfaction of IS specialists, and on job performance evaluations by IS managers. Results confirm that a discrepancy between an IS specialist's expectations of skill and their perceived skill self‐proficiency impacts career satisfaction. Similar relations hold for IS managers and users. Since different stakeholders may hold different perceptions, satisfaction of all parties becomes problematic unless a common frame of reference can be determined.     

The Formation of Top Managers: a Discourse Analysis of Five Managerial Autobiographies

What do top managers see as the root of their success? This paper reports on a discourse analysis of five autobiographies from major industrial figures. Those chosen all had some disruption (war, being a refugee, or immigrant status) between the culture of their childhood and the culture in which they undertook their careers. This makes them more aware than most of their upbringing. Their accounts of their first 20 years are examined, and themes are drawn out for each of them. These themes are tabulated and some of the differences between them are discussed. Common themes are conspicuous by their absence. The paper discusses why this should not surprise us; top management is not one activity in one culture, and an upbringing that might have led one of these managers to success might have been disadvantageous to another. The paper concludes that the common factor between the accounts of the managers is that they all regard their upbringing as having fitted them particularly well for the company, industry and culture in which they were eventually successful.     

Competitive Goals and Plant Investment in Environment and Safety Practices: Moderating Effect of National Culture

Operations managers clearly play a critical role in targeting plant‐level investments toward environment and safety practices. In principle, a “rational” response would be to align this investment with senior management's competitive goals for operational performance. However, operations managers also are influenced by contingent factors, such as their national culture, thus creating potential tension that might bias investment away from a simple rational response. Using data from 1,453 plants in 24 countries, we test the moderating influence of seven of the national cultural characteristics on investment at the plant level in environment and safety practices. Four of the seven national cultural characteristics from GLOBE (i.e., uncertainty avoidance, in‐group collectivism, future orientation and performance orientation) shifted investment away from an expected “rational” response. Positive bias was evident when the national culture favored consistency and formalized procedures and rewarded performance improvement. In contrast, managers exhibited negative bias when familial groups and local coalitions were powerful, or future outcomes—rather than current actions—were more important. Overall, this study highlights the critical importance of moving beyond a naïve expectation that plant‐level investment will naturally align with corporate competitive goals for environment and safety. Instead, the national culture where the plant is located will influence these investments, and must be taken into account by senior management.     

中国企业环境、健康和安全管理者胜任力模型研究

环境、健康和安全管理者的综合素质和能力集中表现为他们的胜任力,他们的胜任力是影响组织环境、健康和安全管理绩效的主要因素。采用实证研究设计,以胜任力理论为基础,探讨中国企业环境、健康和安全管理者的胜任力模型。利用行为事件访谈法,对外资企业、国有企业和民营企业中一些业绩优秀的资深环境、健康和安全管理者进行采访,从中得出环境、健康和安全管理者的基本胜任力特征指标;通过对多省市和多类型企业的环境、健康和安全管理者的大样本问卷调查和数据处理,探索和验证中国企业环境、健康和安全管理者的胜任力模型。研究结果表明,环境、健康和安全管理者胜任力模型包括团队协作、个人特质、沟通决策、问题解决以及环境、健康和安全专业知识与技能5个维度,这5个维度由19个指标构成,并对模型的应用进行讨论。     

Factors influencing perceived learning transfer of an outdoor management development programme in Malaysia

This study investigated if components of outdoor management programme, participant characteristics and work environment characteristics influence perceived transferable skills. The study used 148 executive and management participants who attended a 3-day outdoor management programme using experiential learning at a secondary rainforest in Malaysia. Motivation to learn was the predictor of perceived transferable skills. Macro-dynamic activities, continuous learning culture and self-efficacy were found to significantly influence perceived transferable skills, but micro-dynamic activities, instructor's skills and perceived content validity were not. The outdoor management development programme was not effective in achieving its main objectives and return on investment to the relevant stakeholders. A well-designed instructional programme should be developed for accountability purposes.     

Disengagement in Open Innovation: A Cognitive Perspective

The central tenet of open innovation (OI) is that useful knowledge is widely distributed. By purposively engaging in knowledge sourcing and sharing (KSS) activities, organisations can create and capture value through collaborative exchange with others. Organising for OI relies on the assumption that individual managers tasked to bring it to fruition will enact behavioural responses conducive to external KSS. However, understanding what characterises and informs managers’ disengagement in OI remains an unresolved challenge. The interactions between managers’ in-role demands in OI and their self-concept, which guide behavioural responses, are under-investigated. Drawing on cognitive dissonance theory (CDT), this article conceptualises the sources of managerial dissonance and situates discussions on underlying influencing mechanisms, culminating towards a cognitive model of disengagement in OI. Bridging OI, psychology and management literature, hypotheses are developed to stimulate investigations into what characterises and influences managers’ disengagement in OI. Managerial implications are discussed to curate approaches that can help manage managerial dissonance in order to attain the desired organisational OI goals.     

A behavioural classification of managerial jobs

This article describes the aims, hypotheses, and first stage of a research project which seeks to compare some of the behavioural characteristics of managerial jobs, and to develop a typology of jobs on this basis. The criteria for selecting these characteristics and the different characteristics that are being explored are described. Management scientists may find that the research can provide them with a new perspective on the jobs of the managers with whom they work.     

Paving the way for coopetition: drivers for work–life balance policy implementation

An extensive literature provides evidence that conflict between employees’ family and work duties is associated with stress and poor well-being, which have negative consequences for firms and their employees. This paper analyzes the role of two internal and two external drivers that encourage (or discourage) organizations to adopt and implement work–life balance policies. The role of external financial assistance and specific laws (external drivers), together with budgetary provision for work–life balance policies and managers’ perceptions regarding problems due to work–life conflict (internal drivers), are analyzed. Fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis is used to pursue the study’s research goals. Analysis of data on 132 SMEs suggests that financial issues (external financial assistance and/or a specific budget within the company) are key factors for the implementation or lack of implementation of work–life balance policies. Moreover, to implement these policies, managers need not necessarily perceive problems due to work–life conflict. Finally, work–life balance legislation seems not to play an explicit role in the relationships discussed herein. Consequences of these findings are discussed in the final section of the paper.     

The relationship between supply chain manager capabilities and performance: empirical evidence

This study seeks to answer the question how supply chain managers’ capabilities impact individual and firm performance. Organisations have begun to recognise the importance of their supply chain and the necessity for qualified supply chain managers. Therefore, there is a need for further research on the impact of these capabilities on individual and firm performance. Sustained performance of a firm depends on dynamic capabilities and it allows firms to align and adapt strategies according to the volatile external environment. Using dynamic capabilities theory, the supply chain manager capabilities model was developed as a way for supply chain managers to effectively use their skills and past experiences to improve their own and firm’s performance. Primary data was collected through a survey distributed to supply chain management professionals. The results strongly support the relationship between technology and soft skills with supply chain manager capabilities. Interestingly, our study identifies sequential relationship amongst the three constructs such as capabilities, individual and firm performance. Capabilities are related with individual performance whereas individual performance is related with the firm performance. However, our findings revealed that there is no direct relationship between supply chain manager capabilities and firm performance.     

Mastery-approach and mastery-avoidance goals and their relation with exhaustion and engagement at work: The roles of emotional and instrumental support

The results of two cross-sectional studies (N = 220 and N = 258) indicate that employees' work-related mastery-approach goals (i.e. the striving to improve one's performance at work) were positively associated with work engagement. Further, this relationship is explained by high levels of instrumental support. In contrast, employees' work-related mastery-avoidance goals (i.e. the striving to avoid performing worse than one aspires to) are positive predictors of job detachment and fatigue. The relationships between mastery-avoidance goals and these detrimental work outcomes are explained by low levels of perceived emotional support. Altogether, these results suggest that workers with mastery-approach goals tend to invest in their social work environment by establishing instrumental exchange relationships. Such relationships are considered functional for task performance and explain the positive relationship with work engagement. Employees who hold mastery-avoidance goals, on the other hand, tend to withdraw from the social structure of the workplace which explains the negative relationship with emotional support. In turn, given the lack of emotional support, psychological detachment and fatigue may emerge. These results are discussed in relation to the surging interest in the social mechanisms that result from the pursuit of achievement goals.     

A personal formula for motivation.

Have you ever wondered why some colleagues or subordinates are outstanding in their work while others are less so? Training and experience are extremely important factors but, by themselves, they will not ensure outstanding performance. The pivotal factor that activates all others is motivation. And underlying motivation is the fact that we all have needs that we desire to have fulfilled and that we make choices regarding the course of action or strategy to fulfill these needs. As managers, we do not typically create the "products" of the organization but rather must rely on subordinates. It is incumbent upon us to obtain from our employees desired behavior that will fulfill organizational goals. Indeed, it has been asserted that "one of the most basic responsibilities of the health service organization manager [is] motivating constructive participation of other organization members."     

Supplier Strategies and Routines for Capability Development: Implications for Upgrading

This paper examines the strategies and routines adopted by small and medium-sized suppliers to develop capabilities that enable them to engage in upgrading, despite a precarious relational and institutional context. To this end, we investigate the strategic behaviour of two Bangladeshi garment manufacturers. Both started out as small suppliers for multinational enterprises (MNEs) and have eventually grown into micro-multinationals. The firms are involved in ‘tacit promissory contracting’ with their buyers, a specific form of international outsourcing relationship. The study adopts a multiple case study design that involves interviews with managers/owners of the firms. The analysis yields two key findings. Both firms have devised strategies and taken coherent routines involving actions to develop skills and motivation needed to perform appropriate functional activities (i.e. pre-production, production and post-production) as they embarked on different stages of upgrading. Furthermore, firms have designed routines to internalise the challenges originating from their relationships with their buyers and the institutional environment at the time that had the potential to affect their upgrading goals. The paper contributes to IB studies by highlighting how suppliers, even in a precarious context, can control their own strategies and routines, so as to develop capabilities that allow them to gradually redress the power imbalance between themselves and their buyers.