Ergebnisse der MittelstandsForschung
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Unser Aufsatz beschäftigt sich mit der Logik des Weiterbildungsverhaltens von Unternehmen. Wir kommen zu dem Ergebnis, daß das Weiterbildungsverhalten nicht ausschließlich einem ökonomischem Kalkül folgt, sondern nur erklärt werden kann, wenn man die Wirkungsweise betrieblicher Institutionen in Rechnung stellt. Wir prüfen unsere Hypothese anhand von Daten des IAB-Betriebspanels und von Angaben zu regionalen Arbeitslosenquoten. Theoretiker sind nicht ohne Grund skeptisch, wenn sie mit empirischen Daten konfrontiert werden, die ihren theoretischen Überlegungen widersprechen, denn die Ableitung empirischer Prognosen aus theoretischen Ansätzen ist nicht unproblematisch. Jede empirische Hypothesenprüfung unterstellt die Gültigkeit einer Vielzahl von — oft nicht explizit herausgestellten — Hilfshypothesen. Aus diesem Grund gelingt es Theoretikern auch meist ohne große Mühe, fast jedes empirische Ergebnis zu ignorieren. Unser Aufsatz ist ein Versuch, sich diesem wenig fruchtbaren Verhalten entgegenzustellen. Natürlich müssen auch wir bei unserer Dateninterpretation ungeprüfte Hilfshypothesen in Anspruch nehmen, dennoch glauben wir, daß unsere Analyse relativ robust ist. Wir stützen diese Überzeugung vor allem auf das insgesamt konsistente Muster der empirischen Daten. Dennoch zeigen sich auch in unserer Analyse die üblichen Grenzen in der Vermittlung theoretischer und empirischer Konzepte. Unsere Schlußfolgerung ist, diesem Problem nicht aus dem Weg zu gehen. Die organisationstheoretische Analyse kann die empirische Analyse nur voran bringen.
Evidence from past research and insights from an exploratory investigation are combined in a conceptual model that defines and relates price, perceived quality, and perceived value. Propositions about the concepts and their relationships are presented, then supported with evidence from the literature. Discussion centers on directions for research and implications for managing price, quality, and value.
Constructs an analytical framework for a resource-based approach to strategy formulation. There are five stages in this framework: analyze resources, appraise capabilities, analyze competitive advantage, select strategy, and identify resource gaps. The concepts of this framework are illustrated by reference to existing U.S. firms such as IBM, Xerox, Harley-Davidson, and 3M. This framework uses resources and capabilities as the foundation for a firm's long-term strategy because they provide direction for firm strategy and serve as the primary source of firm profit. Resources are defined as the inputs into the production process and include items of capital equipment and skills of individual employees. Capabilities are defined as the capacity for a team of resources to perform some task or activity. When analyzing the competitive advantage of a firm, durability, transparency, transferability, and replicability are considered important factors. To be successful, firms must develop strategies which utilize their unique characteristics. (SRD)
Literature pertaining to the structural influence of size, technology, and environment is reviewed. Results indicate similar structural predictions are offered by each of the three contingency variables. The roles of measurement, unit and level of analysis, variable and effect independence, and variable dominance in research inconsistencies and future research directions are considered.
As a potential theory, the elemental resource-based view (RBV) is not currently a theoretical structure. Moreover, RBV proponents have assumed stability in product markets and eschewed determining resources' values. As a perspective for strategic management, imprecise definitions hinder prescription and static approaches relegate causality to a "black box." We outline conceptual challenges for improving this situation, including rigorously formalizing the RBV, answering the causal "how" questions, incorporating the temporal component, and integrating the RBV with demand heterogeneity models.
Social approval is the result of satisfiers of social needs: status, affection, behavioral confirmation. These satisfiers can be interpreted as goods that are unequally distributed in society and one can analyze the social and economic conditions that determine this distribution. In this way social inequality can be analyzed in a much wider context than the usual SES context.
The paper represents a structured survey of theoretical and empirical literature about the dependency of efficiency on organizational size. First the main features of the discussion of (dis-)economies of scale are briefly outlined. The main part provides a comprehensive table listing theoretical studies and their controversial arguments as well as a table containing the empirical findings of selected investigations. The final section sums up the most important results. It is argued that first the verdict on size and efficiency cannot be generalized and rather depends on certain economic conditions, second in many cases, however, there exists a (minimum) optimal plant and firm size (the latter at roughly 500 employees) and third the development of the economic environment within the past 15 years has tended to shift the comparative advantages of efficiency from big, dominating, but bureaucratically paralysed to small and highly flexible firms.
Many recent studies of the time-squeeze have used aggregate, trend data on work-hour behavior and inferred changing preferences among working men and women. This article begins with couple data and examines preferences as well as behavior in married-couple families. Work-hour behavior is conceptualized as an interaction between employee preferences, employer demands, and the institutional context. The article's analyses clearly indicate that there is a considerable disparity between couples' self-reports of preferences and their actual behavior. These results suggest that long work weeks generally do not reflect employee preferences but may result from constraints and demands imposed by the workplace. The rising sense of a time-squeeze in American society may stem from all-or-nothing assumptions about the nature and structure of work and the pressure to put in long hours to be seen as committed, productive, and having the potential for advancement.
Sue Marlow and Dean Patton are with Leicester Business School, De Montfort University, Leicester, UK. The authors would like to thank Adam Strange of Warwick Business School for his assistance in preparation of this paper.
Der Beitrag befaßt sich mit der Konzeption und Implementation eines integrierten Laufbahnplanungssystems für Fach- und Führungskräfte. Eine Integration des Fachpersonals in Laufbahnplanungssysteme erscheint angesichts der steigenden Bedeutung fachlicher Qualifikationen (vgl. Schein 1978, 1988) von besonderem Interesse. Insbesondere im Rahmen der aktuellen Diskussionen um das Konzept des Lean-Managements verdient dieser personalwirtschaftliche Aspekt besonderes Augenmerk. Dennoch erreichen Fachkräfte – insbesondere in mittelständischen Unternehmen – rasch Karriereplafonds. Damit wird ein Problem beleuchtet, das seitens der personalwirtschaftlichen Literatur bislang nur am Rande Beachtung findet. Es ist davon auszugehen, daß der singuläre Einsatz personalpolitischer Instrumente zu keiner nachhaltigen Entschärfung des Problems der Karriereplafonds führen. Nach einem kurzen Problemaufriß (1.) wird in diesem Beitrag ein Laufbahnplanungssystem für Fach- und Führungskräfte in mittelständischen Unternehmen vorgestellt, in das – entsprechend den unternehmensspezifischen Erfordernissen und Werthaltungen – verschiedene personalpolitische Instrumente integriert werden können (2.). Besonderes Augenmerk wird schließlich auf die Handhabung des Implementationsprozesses gelegt (3.). Das vorgestellte Modell beruht auf empirischen Erfahrungen und wird anhand eines authentischen Fallbeispiels illustriert. Abschließend erfolgt – und damit wird zum Ausgangspunkt zurückgekehrt – eine Evaluation (4.) des Systems anhand der Fluktuationsraten des Beispielunternehmens.
The majority of employees currently working in the private sector are now employed in small firms, yet little is known about their working conditions. This collection of essays addresses this gap. Based on theoretical analysis supported by contemporary empirical evidence, the book explores key areas of the employment relationship adding a new perspective to our understanding of contemporary work.
The results of a study reveal that most small businesses call in tax advisors and a majority call in some other consultant. But there is a small group of owners who have an aversion to consultants. Generally speaking, small-business owners have rather unrealistic expectations concerning the benefits of a consultancy in relation to the time and involvement they are prepared to invest during the consulting process. This implies that the potential benefits of a consultancy are not fully exploited.
SOMMAIRE
Les résultats d'une étude indiquent que la plupart des petites entreprises ont recours à des conseillers fiscaux et une majorité d'entre elles, à d'autres conseillers. Un petit nombre de chefs d'entreprise répugne toutefois à faire appel à ces spécialistes. En règle générale, compte tenu du temps et des énergies qu'ils sont prêts à consacrer au processus de consultation, les chefs de petites entreprises ont des attentes irréalistes à l'égard des avantages offerts par l'expertise-conseil. Le potentiel de ces services n'est donc pas pleinement exploité.
An operational definition of universalism-particularism is suggested that distinguishes this pair of concepts from the other pattern variables and pertains to social structures of role relations rather than to personality dispositions or to cultural symbols. Whether universalistic or particularistic standards govern the orientations of a group of people toward one another is inferred from the pattern of distribution of these orientations. The development of such empirical procedures for operationalizing Parsons' abstract concept is a first step in translating his theoretical framework into a substantive theory of social structure.
This study shows some ways in which the progressive bureaucratization of an organization may transform the structure of its mobility channels by emphasizing different "mixes" of the organizing principles of merit and seniority. Both are important to an organization's bureaucratic mobility channels and should occur jointly in contradistinction to more arbitrary nonbureaucratic forms of advancement. Data suggest that merit and seniority do occur together in both pre- and postbureaucratic groups, that seniority becomes more prevalent than merit in postbureaucratic organization, and that ranks within the organization are differentially affected by the two.
In the global economy, where the prices of goods and financial and physical capital are increasingly determined and fixed in world markets, the main source of comparative advantage lies in the strategic use of human resources via the connection of workplace practices and productivity. Most discussions of productivity have been at the aggregate economy-wide level related to such factors as technological change, the computer revolution, and efficiency gains from trade liberalisation and the education of the workforce. In contrast, the focus of this report is on the unit of analysis – the workplace – where such productivity related interactions actually take place. The link between workplace practices and productivity is important for all stakeholders – employers, employees and governments. For employers, productivity is crucial for competitive survival under global competition. For employees, it is important for job security and sustained real wage growth. For governments, enhanced productivity is important for sustainable growth, reduced unemployment, tax revenue generation, and for providing the means for a social safety net and social programs in general. There is also growing recognition of the link between workplace issues and broader issues of health and well-being. Enhanced productivity that is generated through increased stress and loss of control at the workplace can be a false economy in the sense that it generates negative health outcomes and health expenditures. On the other hand, productivity improvements at the workplace, generated through more positive mechanisms outlined subsequently, can enhance compensation and job stability, which in turn can enhance health and well-being.
Der Shareholder-Value — der Unternehmenswert — ist für die Autoren, drei renommierte Unternehmensberater, die Zielsetzung jeder strategischen Geschäftsführung. Das Prinzip des Shareholder-Value bei der Unternehmensführung anzuwenden bedeutet, langfristig Wert zu schaffen. Mit einem kurzfristigen Blick auf die Börsenkurse hat es nichts zu tun.
Small firms are saturated with the ideology of the family. For some, the notion of the `family firm' conjures up an image of harmony at the workplace; moreover, it is seen to serve as an important source of flexibility. Others, however, view it as little more than a cover-up of exploitative practices which are believed to be dominant in small firms. Using an ethnographic approach, this article explores in detail how the notion of the family is actually operationalised at the level of the workplace. Participant and direct observation methods were used to examine the role of the family in management organisation, recruitment and workplace control. We argue that the family is crucial to the understanding of the pattern of social relations within small firms, but it is more complex and contested than commonly portrayed. The `family' was found to be both a resource and constraint; management benefited from the `flexibility' afforded by familial ties, but the family also imposed obligations which contradicted economic rationality. The diffuse nature of such arrangements meant that `negotiated paternalism', rather than autocracy or harmony, more accurately depicted the family at work.
A partir de donnees portant sur la population flamande de Belgique, l'A. etudie d'abord la flexibilite du temps de travail, puis le sens de la flexibilite culturelle definie comme la souplesse des engagements a court terme envers les autres et envers certaines institutions ou valeurs; enfin il etablit une relation entre les deux. Il conclut que la maitrise du temps de travail et l'experience quotidienne de l'autonomie dans le travail correspondent a une augmentation de la flexibilite culturelle et une diminution de l'individualisme
This book discusses the development of a theory on the growth of the firm. It is shown that the resources with which a particular firm is accustomed to working will shape the productive services its management is capable of rendering. The experience of management will affect the productive services that all its other resources are capable of rendering. As management tries to make the best use of the resources available, a ‘dynamic’ interacting process occurs which encourages growth but limits the rate of growth.
Al Rainnie's paper is an attempt to understand the role and importance of small businesses in advanced capitalism. Arguing against widely held myths about small businesses, he claims they should not be viewed as anachronistic survivors of a bygone age destined for destruction. He suggests rather they are an integral part of Thatcher's Britain.
The widely accepted view that job satisfaction is higher among workers in small firms than their large-firm counterparts, especially in terms of non-monetary and expressive aspects of work, is critically examined. Workers employed in small and large firms in the printing and electronics industries were surveyed using a semistructured interview strategy. Job satisfaction was related to work environment and also nonwork influences such as family life-cycle position. The findings show that when such factors as the specific characteristics of the industry and age and marital status of respondents are taken into account, size of firm is not, in itself, an important factor in explaining differences in levels of job satisfaction. It merely interacts with these other influences, sometimes to raise and sometimes to lower, perceived levels of satisfaction.
