The design of socially optimal decisions in a consensus scenario

Several situations of conflict between basic social principles can crop up during a consensus searching process. The majority principle and respect for minority groups is a possible example of a conflictive situation between two social principles. In this paper, we outline a specific consensus searching scenario, where individual preferences are expressed by “pairwise” comparison matrices. The set of compromise consensuses between the majority and minority principles is determined using a procedure based upon an adaptation of Yu's p-metric distances. Finally, we use three different theoretical approaches – utility theory, p-metric distance functions and bargaining theory – to obtain the social optimum from the set of compromise consensuses. The links and differences among the three approaches are analysed. Finally, the working of the proposed theoretical framework is illustrated with the help of a forestry case study.     

Devising Context Sensitive Approaches To Change: The Example of Glaxo Wellcome

There is a growing awareness of the need for designers of organisational change to develop context sensitive approaches to implementation if change is to be successful. Existing change literature indicates that there are many aspects of an organisation’s change context that need to be considered, and a wide range of different implementation options open to those designing change. However, these contextual aspects and design options are not currently pulled together in a comprehensive manner, or in a form that makes them easily accessible to practitioners. This paper builds a framework, called the change kaleidoscope, which aims to achieve this. It illustrates the applicability of this framework in practice as an aid to managers in the development of context sensitive implementation approaches via a case study on the changes undertaken at Glaxo Wellcome UK since the early 1990s. This is an interesting case of a successful organisation that managed to change in a pro-active manner rather than in a crisis driven re-active manner. The paper concludes with the lessons for practitioners on the impact of certain contextual features and design choices during change as illustrated by the Glaxo Wellcome case, and a discussion on the use of the kaleidoscope in practice.     

Technology-based total factor productivity and benchmarking: New proposals and an application

The present study fills a gap between the benchmarking literature and multi-output based efficiency and productivity studies by proposing a benchmarking framework to analyze total factor productivity (TFP). Different specifications of the Hicks–Moorsteen TFP index are tailored for specific benchmarking perspectives: (1) static, (2) fixed base and unit, and (3) dynamic TFP change. These approaches assume fixed units and/or base technologies as benchmarks. In contrast to most technology-based productivity indices, the standard Hicks–Moorsteen index always leads to feasible results. Through these specifications, managers can assess different facets of the firm's strategic choices in comparison with firm-specific relevant benchmarks and thus have a broad background for decision making. An empirical application for the Spanish banking industry between 1998 and 2006 illustrates the managerial implications of the proposed framework.     

Middle Managers Moulding International Strategy: An Irish Start-up in Jamaican Telecoms

This is a story of how a group of middle managers moved beyond just implementing their firm’s tightly prescribed strategy for developing an international venture to the point where it could be argued that they failed to accomplish the four clear strategic objectives set by the firm’s executive management. Instead, the authors suggest, their success was in collectively orchestrating an emergent strategy¹ which provided the executive with a better, more profitable and durable embodiment of their strategic vision.Operating between the parent firm’s original strategic intent and the political and economic realities of the host country environment, their strategic influence is worthy of close examination. They can be divided into two distinctive groups—parent country nationals and host-country nationals—and the extent to which they co-operate with or obstruct each other will have a significant effect on the success of the enterprise.² The middle management in this case example, an Irish company launching a mobile telecommunications network in Jamaica, is drawn from both groups. This article investigates the apparent autonomy from executive control afforded these particular middle managers to identify the contingent factors that appear to allow, or constrain, their positive transmutation of the original strategic objectives. The key questions addressed are first, how the two groups, both individually and collectively, played out their roles in shifting strategy, and second, once these contextual dynamics have been identified, how other executive management groups can learn from this Irish/Jamaican experience considering similar international ventures. The authors’ response highlights those elements of strategy design, organisational structure and human resource management that they believe are critical in maximising the strategic contribution of middle managers to international ventures, and hence providing a better chance of success.     

Managing Culture at British Airways: Hype, Hope and Reality

Nearly twenty years after the publication of the (in)famous In Search of Excellence, the notion of ‘cultural change’ within organisations continues to excite attention. This is readily understandable, since cultural interventions offer practitioners the hope of a universal panacea to organisational ills and academics an explanatory framework that enjoys the virtues of being both partially true and gloriously simple. Such a combination is apparent in the way that many attempts to shape organisational culture are presented to the public: as simple stories with happy endings.¹ This article attempts to rescue a fairy-tale. The story of British Airways is one of the most widely used inspirational accounts of changing culture. Throughout the 1980s and 1990s it was used to demonstrate the necessary compatibility of pleasure and profits² in celebratory accounts where culture change is presented as the only explanation for the transformation that occurred. This corrective makes no attempt to deny the very substantial changes that took place in BA. Rather, it sets these in context noting the organisation’s environment at the time of the transformation, the structural changes that took place and observes the impact that such changes had over the long term. ^{[3], [4] and [5]}Today, nearly twenty years after the publication of the (in)famous In Search of Excellence, the notion of ‘cultural change’ within organisations continues to excite attention. This continuing attraction is readily understood, since cultural interventions offer practitioners the hope of a universal panacea to organisational ills and academics an explanatory framework that enjoys the virtues of being both partially true and gloriously simple. Such a combination is apparent in the way that many attempts to shape organisational culture are presented to the public: as simple stories with happy endings.To a certain extent, of course, any form of narration encourages a story, an ending, and, as a result, a simplification—and stories may be used to shed light on attitudes and understandings not otherwise easily available to the researcher. But there is a very significant difference between listening to the accounts that individuals tell in order to make sense of their lives and allowing the study of the workplace to become ‘fictionalised’. The former involves engaging with the ‘subjects’ of the research, attempting to understand their world view and allowing them a voice in the process they are participating in. The latter can mean a selective reading of the data with examples chosen because they illustrate pre-set conclusions.In management particularly the capacity of writers to turn case studies into celebratory fictions is worrying. As Marchington argues, too many texts focus on “fairy tales and magic wands”.⁶ Such an emphasis encourages the belief that what is important in the workplace is not context, structure, power, economics or industrial relations but whatever new initiative management have chosen to introduce (the “magic wands”). The form that this magic takes varies from intervention to intervention but the impact claimed for each is curiously similar, with unproductive workplaces turned around and reluctant employees transformed into enthusiasts. Any changes that take place are seen to be a direct result of the magic and most are exaggerated. As a result, research into management becomes research into a series of fads and fashions with Total Quality Management or Business Process Re-engineering or empowerment or culture vying for attention. Every intervention is presented as new, so academic understanding of the workplace starts afresh each time a guru develops a new magic wand. Lessons cannot be carried forward since BPR is not employee involvement and company culture is not TQM. Elements of the workplace that might have provided a crucial element of continuity are ignored or dismissed as unimportant since only change is magical. As a result, by relying on these accounts, we understand less and less about why organisations function in the way that they do and practitioners are encouraged to believe that each initiative starts with a blank sheet, entirely unconstrained by what has gone before.Accordingly, in this article we attempt to rescue a fairy-tale. The story of British Airways is one of the most widely used inspirational accounts of changing culture. Throughout the 80s and 90s it was used to demonstrate the necessary compatibility of pleasure and profits. In such celebratory accounts, culture change is presented as the only explanation for the transformation that occurred. This corrective makes no attempt to deny the very substantial changes that took place in BA. Rather, it sets these in context noting the organisation’s environment at the time of the transformation, the structural changes that took place and observing the impact that such changes had over the long term.⁷     

Managing Internal R&D Networks in Global Firms: What Sort of Knowledge is Involved?

How should a global firm manage its network of R&D centres in an effective manner? Some have developed an Integrated Network model in which the R&D centres around the world are tightly integrated into a coherent whole. Others have adopted a Loosely-Coupled Network model in which individual “centres of excellence” are given considerable autonomy. In this paper we argue that the way individual R&D units are structured, and the way the entire network is managed, should be based not on administrative heritage, environmental turbulence or management style, but on the basis of the underlying characteristics of the firm’s knowledge assets. In particular we focus on the observability and mobility of the firm’s knowledge assets, the impact these factors have on the way individual R&D centres are structured, and how they relate to one another in the international network. The argument is supported using examples and data from Swedish firms including ABB, Alfa Laval and Ericsson.     

Applying consistent fuzzy preference relations to partnership selection

Partnership selection has been important to the formation of a virtual enterprise. Based on the fuzzy preference programming (FPP) method proposed by Mikhailov [Fuzzy analytical approach to partnership selection in formation of virtual enterprises. Omega 2002;30:393–401], this investigation presents a consistent fuzzy preference relations method to select partners. Human thoughts are full of uncertainty, so the decision-makers cannot make exact pairwise comparisons. The FPP method solves this problem using an interval value instead of Saaty's 1–9 scale. In this study, the FPP method is reviewed, and then the consistent fuzzy preference relations method is elucidated. Finally, the presented method is applied to the example addressed by Mikhailov [Fuzzy analytical approach to partnership selection in formation of virtual enterprises. Omega 2002;30:393–401]. This study reveals that the proposed method yields consistent decision rankings from only n-1$n-1$ pairwise comparisons—the same number as in Mikhailov's research. Briefly, the presented consistent fuzzy preference relations method is an easy and practical way to provide rankings of partnership in making decision.     

The design of computer based planning and modeling systems

Today there are nearly 2000 corporations in North America and Europe either using, developing, or experimenting with some form of corporate planning model. With the emergence of this new and rather substantial interest in the methodology of corporate planning modeling, there appears to be a definite need for a conceptual framework which can be used to design and implement computer based planning and modeling systems.In this paper the authors describe a collection of elements which they believe to be of critical importance in designing a corporate planning model. Their objective is to develop a set of criteria for not only designing a planning and modeling system, but a set of criteria which can also be used to facilitate the evaluation and comparison of alternative planning and modeling systems.There are over 50 planning and modeling software packages on the market today. These include systems such as BUDPLAN, COMOS and SIMPLAN. This paper attempts to provide the reader with a convenient checklist of possible features to consider in either designing one's own system or selecting an appropriate software package.     

New contributions from old sources: Recovering Barnard’s science and revitalizing the Carnegie School

Scholars have called for the Carnegie School to revisit fundamental ideas such as decision, behavioral plausibility (Gavetti, Levinthal, & Ocasio, 2007, p. 531), and the individual (Cohen, 2007). In essence, these calls urge greater realism, beyond the School’s founding concepts such as satisficing and bounded rationality, which differentiated organization science from economics. This paper argues that revisiting the School’s ties to Chester Barnard advances work along these lines because of Barnard’s experiential method and his findings on the subjective and objective nature of, and on the personal and impersonal forces entailed in, organization. The paper begins by discussing the insufficient recognition of the School’s ties to Barnard and the emphasis on Herbert Simon’s translation of Barnard at the expense of the original Barnard. Then, based on Barnard’s unpublished and lesser known works (O’Connor, 2012, p. 112–170), it shows the scope and depth of Barnard’s contributions: a new “organic applied social science” (Barnard’s phrase, Wolf, 1995a) founded on a subjective relationship to scientific knowledge and ordinary action that Barnard called “personal responsibility.” Likewise, this science emerged from Barnard’s relationship to his own experience, specifically, his pursuit of a science to explain his and others’ experience of organization.     

The impact of a waiting-time threshold in overflow systems with impatient customers

This paper analyzes the performance of call centers with impatient customers, two levels of support, and an overflow mechanism. Waiting calls from the front-office queue – if not reneging – are sent to the back office if at least one back-office agent is available and if a certain threshold t on the waiting time is reached. We approximate such systems via a continuous-time Markov chain that allows for overflow immediately upon arrival. Two different approaches for the derivation of the respective probability of an overflow are developed. Numerical results compare the reliability of these Markovian performance approximations for different parameter settings. The impact of the threshold t on different performance measures is shown dependent on the impatience of customers.     

A Modeling Framework for Supply Chain Simulation: Opportunities for Improved Decision Making*

Owing to its inherent modeling flexibility, simulation is often regarded as the proper means for supporting decision making on supply chain design. The ultimate success of supply chain simulation, however, is determined by a combination of the analyst's skills, the chain members' involvement, and the modeling capabilities of the simulation tool. This combination should provide the basis for a realistic simulation model, which is both transparent and complete. The need for transparency is especially strong for supply chains as they involve (semi)autonomous parties each having their own objectives. Mutual trust and model effectiveness are strongly influenced by the degree of completeness of each party's insight into the key decision variables. Ideally, visual interactive simulation models present an important communicative means for realizing the required overview and insight. Unfortunately, most models strongly focus on physical transactions, leaving key decision variables implicit for some or all of the parties involved. This especially applies to control structures, that is, the managers or systems responsible for control, their activities and their mutual attuning of these activities. Control elements are, for example, dispersed over the model, are not visualized, or form part of the time‐indexed scheduling of events. In this article, we propose an alternative approach that explicitly addresses the modeling of control structures. First, we will conduct a literature survey with the aim of listing simulation model qualities essential for supporting successful decision making on supply chain design. Next, we use this insight to define an object‐oriented modeling framework that facilitates supply chain simulation in a more realistic manner. This framework is meant to contribute to improved decision making in terms of recognizing and understanding opportunities for improved supply chain design. Finally, the use of the framework is illustrated by a case example concerning a supply chain for chilled salads.     

Research in organizational evolution. What comes next?

The literature about organizational evolution has been witnessing a tremendous amount of and continuous development among strategists since the second half of the 20th century and this critical review article aims to provide readers with a thorough discussion of past and contemporary research within this area. From the beginning, the article works through analogies with biology in attempting to trace the current boundaries of the field, with much of the review’s content thus structured around the proposed conceptual (and methodological) framework. In addressing the question of what forces drive organizational evolution, the article then takes on a middle ground by mainly focusing on the development of the dialectical and co-evolutionary approaches. It ends by prospecting what can come next for evolutionary (and co-evolutionary) research in the strategic management field.     

THE DETERMINANTS OF HUMAN CAPITAL FORMATION DURING THE EARLY YEARS OF LIFE: THEORY,MEASUREMENT, AND POLICIES

In this paper, I discuss a research agenda on the study of human capital accumulation in the early years, with a particular focus on developing countries. I discuss several methodological issues, from the use of structural models, to the importance of measurement and the development of new measurement tools. I present a conceptual framework that can be used to frame the study of human capital accumulation and view the current challenges and gaps in knowledge within such an organizing structure. I provide an example of the use of such a framework to interpret the evidence on the impacts of an early years intervention based on randomized controlled trial.     

Failings in U.K. transport planning

This discussion of British Government policy on transport, highlights the absence of a coherent strategic plan as a guideline for individual decision-making. Without this framework and a recognition of the close connection between transport and land use planning, conventional methods of project appraisal produce an unsatisfactory piecemeal transport system. As an example, the 1973 Channel Tunnel proposals are examined and found inappropriate for either of the main possible directions of progress sketched out.     

Peripheral Vision: Sensing and Acting on Weak Signals: Making Meaning out of Apparent Noise: The Need for a New Managerial Framework

Doing business in the face of constant change requires a shift from a ‘make-and-sell’ to a ‘sense-and-respond’ framework. This in turn requires four new competencies which require intense attention to what would have been considered the periphery of the traditional make-and-sell company—the customers and environment. The paper concludes by saying it is important to invest in expanding an organisation’s peripheral vision because it will make meaning out of apparent noise; it will extend the number and types of signals that can be sensed; it will drive the development of an ability to transform new signals into meaning; and it enables role-specific management.     

Netchising: The Next Global Wave?

Companies have long taken ‘going global’ to mean having a physical presence at locations everywhere. It has meant executives in transit and bricks-and-mortar facilities on the ground. Based on extensive field interviews with executives at 35 different MNCs, our research shows that an increasing number of companies are succeeding overseas without massive foreign investment by adopting the global business model we call netchising. This new business model relies on the Internet for procurement, sales, and maintaining customer relationships, and non-equity partnership arrangements to provide direct customer interfaces and local adaptation and delivery of products and services. Netchising offers potentially huge benefits over traditional exporting or foreign direct investment approaches to globalization.     

Multi-objective simulation optimization using data envelopment analysis and genetic algorithm: Specific application to determining optimal resource levels in surgical services

Simulation is a powerful tool for modeling complex systems with intricate relationships between various entities and resources. Simulation optimization refers to methods that search the design space (i.e., the set of all feasible system configurations) to find a system configuration (also called a design point) that gives the best performance. Since simulation is often time consuming, sampling as few design points from the design space as possible is desired. However, in the case of multiple objectives, traditional simulation optimization methods are ineffective to uncover the efficient frontier. We propose a framework for multi-objective simulation optimization that combines the power of genetic algorithm (GA), which can effectively search very large design spaces, with data envelopment analysis (DEA) used to evaluate the simulation results and guide the search process. In our framework, we use a design point's relative efficiency score from DEA as its fitness value in the selection operation of GA. We apply our algorithm to determine optimal resource levels in surgical services. Our numerical experiments show that our algorithm effectively furthers the frontier and identifies efficient design points.     

Problem structuring methods as intervention tools: Reflections from their use with multi-organisational teams

Problem structuring methods (PSMs), also known as soft OR approaches, are most commonly employed with teams formed by members who tend to operate within an overall framework of authority and accountability, and most of whom have the ‘power to act’ on their recommendations. However, other PSM users include teams whose members are drawn from different organisational settings to work on a problem of common interest. The multi-organisational nature of such multi-organisational teams (MOTs) adds further complexity to the PSM modelling and facilitation processes by increasing the potential for conflict regarding the problem. In addition, members of MOTs tend not to operate within an overall framework of authority and accountability and, therefore, do not necessarily have full authority to commit themselves to their joint agreements. This paper reports on the design and application of a PSM-based methodology with three such groups, within the context of a multi-organisational collaboration in the UK construction industry. The paper reflects on the apparent success of the intervention, discusses the appropriateness of PSMs in this particular intervention context, as well as the generalisibility of the findings to other PSMs and/or multi-organisational contexts. Directions for the research and practice of PSMs with MOTs are also presented.     

Management Control Systems: One View of Components and Their Interdependence1

Professor Robert Anthony's statement that ‘control is the process of assuring that the organization does what management wants done’ implies that systems for management control must be broadly conceived. This paper takes the view that a comprehensive view of control systems should include at least five components: performance measurement, strategy, organization structure, direction and motivation. Each of these components reflects management choices, but those choices have implications for the other components. A strategy of dynamic new product development for example, requires a flexible structure, and should have performance measures that relate to the structure and the desired achievements for that strategy. As what is measured signals what is important, the measures provide direction and the basis for incentives and rewards. The interdependence of the components is seen as a key factor in control system design. When the components support each other, the interdependence is a source of strength; conflict or even absence of support among the components can be a source of weakness. This paper describes the components and illustrates ways in which the design of control systems needs to recognize their interdependence. The process of system implementation is also reviewed, as process choices can be independent of design choices. The framework is related to prior research and writing, showing that the components are themselves complex and have been the focus of extensive study. Finally, several teaching cases are decribed in order to show how the design issues may appear in practice and how the framework can be used to help teach management control systems.