How Subgroup Interests and Reputations Moderate the Effect of Organizational Identification on Cooperation

Two experiments tested the effects of organizational identification on individual decisions to cooperate. These decisions occurred in the context of a nested social dilemma in which individuals, subgroups, and the larger collective each held distinct and incompatible interests. In Study 1, when the two subgroups in the dilemma were from different real organizations, higher organizational identification caused lower cooperation with the collective (and higher cooperation with the subgroup) when the opposing organization had a purportedly individualistic culture and reputation. The results of Study 2 supported this interpretation by showing that organizational identification had a negative effect on collective cooperation, and a corresponding positive effect on subgroup cooperation, when decision makers perceived the opposing department to have an individualistic reputation. I discuss the implications of these results for organizations that try to elicit cooperation by fostering members’ organizational identification.     

Globalisation, International Configurations and Strategic Implications: The Case of Retailing

In contrast to the old debate between national and more globally orientated strategies, recent typologies, as outlined by Calori and others in a recent issue of this journal, have begun to uncover subtler international strategies applicable to less patently global industries. This article investigates whether such typologies can be adapted to a service sector such as retailing and analyses performance differences across the whole set of these new categorisations, segregating some of the main sectors. Focusing on clothing where scale economies were lower, we present a case study demonstrating how this approach can still yield strategic insights and recommendations at an early stage in internationalisation, even for players located in more peripheral locations such as Norway. We confirm ‘continental leadership’ strategies (under consideration) can be associated with slightly better profitability for retailers more generally; but we warn that this is riskier for clothing retailers, for whom market share emerges as a less critical driver. The most profitable retail strategy configuration is the bold ‘global shaper’ strategy. However, taking into account the case company’s resource position within the clothing sector, our approach recommends consideration of the ‘quasi-global’ strategic configuration, associated with an improvement of just under 2% return on investment. This perspective also aids ‘strategic benchmarking’ (illustrated against high performers H&M and Zara), setting an agenda for operational improvements.     

Hitting the Target…but Missing the Point: Resolving the Paradox of Strategic Transition

Many firms are undertaking a strategic shift from cost leadership (through process management) to differentiation based on radical product innovation. Success in such transitions has been mixed, as have findings on the role of performance measurement and management in the process. This study explores the challenges of managing this transition, with specific focus on the role of performance metrics. Conventional wisdom indicates that top management can use metrics - measures, standards and rewards - to communicate new directions and priorities. Based on findings reported in this paper, this approach is found to be potentially fatally flawed when applied to a situation where both the corporate goals and the means of achieving these goals have changed. Using detailed data drawn from a multi-level analysis of a major international corporation undertaking such a strategic shift, this study explores the process by which metrics are formed and deployed, and the impact of this process on the ability of the firm to successfully achieve the change. Using measures such as the percentage of sales from new products, top management in the case study had the impression that the strategy was being successfully carried out by the various operating divisions. However, radical innovation (the desired result) had been replaced by incremental innovation. This study identifies the reasons for this situation. A major finding is that the performance measurement and management system can both allow and conceal this failure. Firms trying to significantly change their strategic directions must change their selection of performance metrics to focus less on the intended outcomes and more on the means by which these outcomes are to be achieved.     

A Little Creativity Goes a Long Way: An Examination of Teams’ Engagement in Creative Processes

Using surveys and interview data this research examines teams’ engagement in creative processes. Results of cluster analysis indicated that the more creative teams were those that perceived that their tasks required high levels of creativity, were working on jobs with high task interdependence, were high on shared goals, valued participative problem-solving, and had a climate supportive of creativity. In addition, members of the more creative teams spent more time socializing with each other and had moderate amounts of organizational tenure. Implications for management are discussed.     

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     

Parenting in Complex Structures

In complex, interdependent corporate structures, there is overlap and sharing of responsibilities between the operating units and the corporate parent. As a result, the distinction between “business” and “parent” is blurred and a focus on the role and added-value of the parent is less obviously relevant. This article explores the nature of corporate parenting in complex structures and draws out the particular demands placed on parent managers in these structures. It also examines the role of the parent’s functional support staff and the complications that result from having more than one level of parenting. It concludes that there are some special parenting challenges in complex structures, but that the quest for “parenting advantage” should remain a fundamental driver of corporate strategy and structure.