Corporate planning in an international environment

In any company, corporate planning centres on deciding what kind of business it should be in, and the philosophy which should govern its method of operation. When the company is an international one, then not only does its organisational structure require closer attention, but another dimension is added to its strategy—that of choosing the countries in which to operate. This article is concerned with two aspects of management: organization and control and the factors influencing the selection of a country for investment purposes.     

The Challenges of Socially Responsible Investment Among Institutional Investors: Exploring the Links Between Corporate Pension Funds and Corporate Governance

During the last few decades, globalization of finance markets has come under increasing pressure to manage the many risks that companies face due to the negative impact that certain financial crises have had on securities quoted on the stock exchange. Simultaneously, there is a growing tendency among different institutional investors to take into account nonfinancial aspects—social, environmental, and ethical values—of company management. In this respect, increasing numbers of asset managers are aware of the importance of nonfinancial aspects of company management for finance markets. Asset managers integrate corporate social responsibility, sustainability policies and corporate governance strategies as indicators in risk management and the search for long‐term investments. The largest segment of socially responsible investment (SRI) screened and mutual funds are portfolios that are privately managed on behalf of institutions. Socially responsible investors include private and public pension funds, mutual funds, and private accounts that are managed on behalf of institutional investors such as corporations, universities, hospitals, religious institutions, and nonprofit organizations, among others. The aim of this paper is to analyze the development of SRI‐screened management corporate pension plans in the Spanish finance market. Spain is one of the European countries with a less developed SRI institutional market. Since SRI is still at the fledgling stage in the Spanish institutional market, this analysis is restricted to the awareness of SRI among a sample of the total number of corporate pension funds or schemes in Spain. The paper concludes with some proposals to encourage wider SRI acceptance and practice in Spain.     

Integration—The key to success with CAD/CAM

The first realization in planning the acquisition of a large-scale integrated CAD/CAM system is that it must be a corporate question and not a departmental one. The overall aim should be to lay down a corporate strategy with a timeframe of at least 5 years; to understand the long-term benefits and most important to stick to it. Within this strategy it is then necessary to take on appropriate sub-systems to satisfy the objectives— some will have immediate benefits whilst others have no intrinsic value but will be vital building blocks for the achievement of the integrated whole. This paper aims to provide the visionary managing director with the necessary confidence to see his vision through to completion.     

The theory of the corporate life cycle

There appears to be a widespread management belief that the corporation is endowed with an inbuilt elixir for survival and growth, despite recent corporate declines.In this article, the author outlines and illustrates the operation of one of the newest theories on corporate activity—the corporate life cycle— and its use as a planning aid in determining where the company is and where it is going and as a relationary tool in predicting corporate trends for comparison with corporate objectives and the future operating environment.     

The theory of the corporate life cycle

There appears to be a widespread management belief that the corporation is endowed with an inbuilt elixir for survival and growth, despite recent major corporate declines.In this article, the author outlines and illustrates the operation of one of the newest theories on corporate activity—the corporate life cycle—and its use as a planning aid in determining where the company is and where it is going and as a relationary tool in predicting corporate trends for comparison with corporate objectives and the future operating environment.     

The Social Dimensions of Business Excellence

In an era of dynamic markets, globalisation, telecommunication and volatile stock markets, the board of directors of listed companies have grown familiar with the pressure of shareholders. Nowadays CEO's discus corporate responsible behaviour and sustainability more often. They feel the pressure of external stakeholders. They are aware of the increasing vulnerability of their corporate reputation, an increasing number of financial institutions start demanding social and environmental criteria — and it is more and more difficult to attract new talented people and at the same time, keeping existing employees satisfied. These developments make companies aware of the social dimensions of their organisation, their corporate identity, their role within society and their duty towards future generations.The business environment is beginning to accept that prosperity, profitability and shareholder value alone do not represent the value of the company. The companies’ ability to grow and to improve continuously is also determined by its social competences, ethical responsibility and environmental contributions. This shift of focus leads to a reorientation of the concept of business excellence. At first, quality management focused on the quality improvement of products and services, later on the processes providing these products. Quality was renamed into business excellence when corporations oriented themselves on the quality of the organisation and the chain (or network or hub) in which it operates. With the present challenges at hand, companies are beginning to focus on the quality of society while taking care of their core businesses, an objective that transcends and includes the former quality orientations.This article first introduces the European Business Excellence Model (EFQM model), which have facilitated the transformation toward an integral management approach, including openings to corporate social responsibility (CSR). We will than elaborate on the cultural context of companies engaged in CSR and social responsible investing (SRI) activities. We will end this article with an overview of CSR activities, structured according the EFQM model.     

Participative planning at Swiss reinsurance

Reinsurance—the insurance of insurance companies—is very much a behind-the-scenes business. It is not surprising to see that planning seminars and planning literature rarely touch on the problems of developing and implementing corporate planning models in this field. The Swiss Reinsurance planning example might show how sources from various industries and ‘doctrines’ were blended together and built to form a compact medium-term planning ‘package’ for a very specific type of service business.     

Can information technology enable profitable diversification? An empirical examination

Investments in information technology (IT) are now a major part of corporate investment, and the management of IT is essential to performance. In general, IT is expected to have performance effects when it is judiciously used to complement existing corporate capabilities. In this research, we examine how IT can complement diversification strategy. Using hypotheses and measures suggested by information processing theory and the theory of corporate strategy, testable hypotheses are derived to examine how IT can complement diversification. Results suggest that spending on computer technology significantly complements a strategy of unrelated diversification. Implications for theory and practice are discussed.     

Managing Strategic Change; The Role of Symbolic Action

As our understanding of processes of strategic management develop, it is clear that the problems of managing major shifts in strategy, which organizations face on occasions, are of a different order to the typically incremental strategy development they follow. It is also recognized that these problems are closely linked to cognitive and cultural dimensions of organizations. Research on the management processes associated with more fundamental strategic change is still sparse, but suggests that it requires substantial cognitive shifts in which intervention, often by new corporate leaders, and political and symbolic, as well as more substantial action, is likely. This paper draws together the author's and other research in related fields, to formalize explanatory models, which link organizational inertia of strategy, more fundamental strategic change, and in particular the symbolic management activities of corporate leaders as strategic change agents.     

International joint venture partner origin,strategic choice,and performance: A comparative analysis in an emerging economy in Africa

This study examines the competitive strategic choices of international joint ventures (IJVs) and their performance implications in a low-income emerging economy in Sub-Saharan Africa — Ghana. Using the resource-based view of the firm, it is argued that IJVs with partners from emerging economies are more likely to pursue an efficiency-oriented business strategy to strengthen their strategic positioning, competitiveness and performance. Conversely, IJVs with partners from advanced industrialized economies would be more likely to pursue a market effectiveness-oriented strategy to strengthen their strategic positioning, competitiveness and performance. The findings from 76 IJVs offer support for the hypothesized relationships. IJVs with partners from emerging economies implementing an efficiency-oriented strategy of cost leadership outperform those with partners from advanced industrialized economies implementing the same strategy. In contrast, IJVs with partners from advanced industrialized economies implementing a differentiation strategy outperform those with partners from emerging economies implementing a differentiation strategy.     

From organization development to corporate development at Trebor

This article is a case history of a medium-sized, family-owned business where the corporate planning activity has been taken over by the Executive Board, which is concerned with a careful definition and dissemination of company strategy and with focusing action in the form of long-term planning projects. The organizational learning approach is evolutionary and incremental, involving—as in the Japanese style of management— many levels in project development.     

CAPITAL,LABOR, AND THE FIRM: A STUDY OF GERMAN CODETERMINATION

Under the German corporate governance system of codetermination, employees are legally allocated control rights over corporate assets through seats on the supervisory board—that is, the board of nonexecutive directors. The supervisory board oversees the management board—the board of executive directors—approves or rejects its decisions, and appoints its members and sets their salaries. We empirically investigate the implications of this sort of labor participation in corporate decision making. We find that companies with equal representation of employees and shareholders on the supervisory board trade at a 31% stock market discount as compared with companies where employee representatives fill only one‐third of the supervisory board seats. We show that under equal representation, management board compensation provides incentives that are not conducive to furthering shareholders' interests, possibly because labor maximizes a different objective function than shareholders. We document that, under equal representation, companies have longer payrolls than their one‐third representation peers have. Finally, we provide evidence that shareholders respond to the allocation of control rights to labor by linking supervisory board compensation to firm performance and by leveraging up the firm. (JEL: G32, G34)     

Finding and Implementing Energy Efficiency Projects in Industrial Facilities

This study addresses the challenges of finding and implementing profitable energy efficiency (EE) projects, a critical foundation for sustainable operations. We focus on manufacturing enterprises, but many of our findings apply also to the back office of service operations. Our starting point is that, in nearly every industrial enterprise, there are many profitable EE projects that could be implemented but are not. An oft‐cited hindrance to implementation is the lack of an internal management framework in which to find, value, and execute these projects. Using a conceptual approach, we rely on proven sustainable operations tools to develop such a framework. We identify three major value drivers of EE projects: savings intensity, “green” image, and project complexity. We then describe a framework for understanding the context of EE projects in industry, with an underlying analytic foundation in optimal portfolio analysis. A case study of a large manufacturing site is used to illustrate emerging best practices—based on Kaizen management principles—for integrating EE project management with operations, engineering, and strategy.     

Environmental lobbying: A case of the New York state soft drink association

In the field of lobbying, the phrase “an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure” is germane to most issues. However, corporate America is often loath to expend resources on lobbying until an actual problem arises which, in reality, is almost always past the point at which intervention should have occured in order to ensure a reasonable chance of success.The difficulties of convincing management to dedicate resources to an activity whose results are never easily quantified or qualified are numerous. Lobbying does not lend itself to cost-benefit analysis and thus is often scorned as frivolous by corporate officers and managers who are motivated by bottom-line and productivity measurements. Convincing corporate policy makers that it is prudent to be prepared for some as yet unidentified governmental decision, which may significantly impact their operation and profitably, likens the lobbyist to a fortune teller—hardly a credible mantra. However, as illustrated in the following case, corporate America can reap many benefits from wise anticipation of the need for an environmental lobbyist.     

上市公司高管更替模式对企业绩效的影响

本文以上市公司2005-2009年间高管更替数据为研究样本,引入了高管团队重组和战略连续性作为中介变量,探讨了不同高管更替模式对企业绩效的影响路径。研究结果表明,上市公司高管强制更替外部聘任对高管团队重组有正向影响,对战略连续性有负向影响,对企业绩效有负向影响,其中高管团队重组和战略连续性在强制更替外部聘任与企业绩效之间起到中介效应;上市公司高管强制更替内部聘任对高管团队重组影响不显著,对战略连续性有正向影响,对企业绩效有正向影响,其中战略连续性在强制更替内部聘任与企业绩效之间起到中介效应;另外,高管团队重组对企业绩效有负向影响,战略连续性对企业绩效有正向影响。     

Effective responses to public reviews: An environmental manager's perspective at Phillips Petroleum Company

The scrutiny of corporate performance has escalated with the advent of Internet communications and attention by third-party public interest groups to the three dimensions of sustainable development: social, economic and environmental performance. Despite the attention that Philips Petroleum has paid to developing an environmental management system that meets or exceeds ISO 1400 standards—and their participation as a lead company in developing the PERI (Public Environmental Reporting Initiative) standards—Philips found themselves at the tail-end of a ranking of oil refineries by the Council on Economic Priorities.In this article, Barbara Price, Vice President of Health, Environment and Safety (HSE) at Phillips Petroleum, describes a positive approach in communications strategy that works when the results from an external review process are unexpectedly negative.     

Zombies and Originals: How Cultural Theory Informs Stakeholder Management

The question of stakeholder salience has recently resurfaced in the suggestion that the ethical foundations of corporate cultures result in stakeholder cultures that largely explain how firms allocate resources among stakeholders. The present article seeks to complement this novel approach to understanding stakeholder management by adding insights from the multilevel influences that create the corporate culture in the first place, and ultimately affect managers in their stakeholder decisions. This article draws on cultural theory to examine how the individuals who compose firms present group and grid solidarity that results in cultural biases in the corporate culture. These cultural biases—individualism, hierarchy, fatalism, and egalitarianism—are then paired with the stakeholder cultures they enable, and inferences are extracted concerning the salience managers are likely to accord to various classes of stakeholders as a result. Future research and managerial implications stemming from this new view on stakeholder management conclude this article.     

公司企业家精神培育的系统理论假设模型及验证

企业家精神是企业永续发展的不竭动力。是21世纪推动一个国家经济发展最主要的动力之一。本文从微观角度出发,研究公司如何采取有效的措施促进公司企业家精神的培育,进而提高公司的经营业绩。笔者在国内外相关领域研究成果的基础上,提出了影响公司企业家精神培育的系统理论假设模型,并通过实证研究验证了假设模型。     

Competitive advantage and the information technology industry

In this article, Timo Koski sets the stage by defining more clearly what is meant by “high technology”, and points out that it is by no means synonymous with the electronics industry.He then relates corporate management, corporate strategy and competitive advantage to the information technology industry in Finland. This competitive advantage can be summarized in three aspects: technological ability, product market fit and resource market fit. The dynamics of the information technology industry are also explored, and found to run parallel with business and product life cycles and the globalisation process.The article concludes with the view that information technology, as a business, requires fast-moving and fast-reacting management. However, it is also inextricably linked to global issues, and is prevented from becoming too hectic by being part of long-term corporate management.     

Supply-Chain Strategy: Organizational Influence Through Supplier Alliances

The role of supply-chain management as an integral element in corporate strategy has been discussed in prior research, mostly at a broad conceptual level with relatively little empirical validation. This paper uses data from a longitudinal study of buyer-supplier relationships to evaluate the impact from firms' recent initiatives in developing strategic supplier alliances on the role played by the supply management effort in the corporate hierarchy. Contrary to anticipated results, the use of an alliance approach did not lead to any appreciable improvement in status and respect for supply management's role in developing corporate strategy. While several suggestions are offered to explain these results, the major conceptual models of supply-chain strategy are reassessed and a more appropriate and grounded framework for study is proposed. Further research is called for to empirically verify the link between strategic consideration for supply issues and firm success.