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Le rôle de la stratégie collective dans l'écosystème d'affaire en situation de crise et de non-crise
Abstract
Les théories présentées, Astley et Fombrun 1983 ; Moore, 1993 ; Iansiti et Levien, 2004 ; Peltoniemi et Vuori (2004) nous permettent de décrire clairement le nouveau contexte de la prise de décision stratégique au sein duquel évolue l'écosystème d'affaires.Cette analyse a de profonds effets sur le type de collaboration. Les études récentes ne traitent généralement pas de la manière dont les différents types de stratégies sont influencés par les divers contextes de changement de la politique étrangère. Dans cette perspective, l'environnement politique est considéré comme une question compliquée pour les entreprises multinationales. Par conséquent, ne pas les examiner peut avoir des dommages irréparables et les études récentes négligent cette importance. Notre recherche comble, en partie, ces lacunes en étudiant les types de stratégie collective et inclut une réflexion sur la politique étrangère.Selon l'analyse de la base de données de PSA, cette recherche a illustré la stratégie d'alliance avec des partenaires sous forme de « joint-venture » afin de réduire le risque imprévisible. Par ailleurs, nous avons découvert le rôle de deux types de stratégie collective (alliance-coopétition) pouvant aider à la compréhension et à la performance des écosystèmes.Les analyses effectuées lors de notre travail, nous permettent de souligner que la compréhension du changement de l'environnement de la politique joue un est rôle important sur le choix de la stratégie collective.
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Aligning supply chain decisions of separate entities with independent objectives can be considered to be one of the difficulties of supply chain management. This difficulty becomes worse if the supply chains are characterised by an asymmetrical distribution of information. Although considerable research has recently been devoted to supply chain coordination, less attention has been paid to different information asymmetry settings to the mechanisms underlying it. This research attempts to help fill this gap by reviewing and classifying the literature based on supply chain features, applied methodology, coordination mechanisms, and types of information asymmetry. The proposed classification is used to highlight the ongoing issues in the area and identify the direction for future research.
The concept of an ‘ecosystem’ is increasingly used in management and business to describe collectives of heterogeneous, yet complementary organizations who jointly create some kind of system-level output, analogous to an ‘ecosystem service’ delivered by natural ecosystems, and one that extends beyond the outputs and activities of any individual participant of the ecosystem. Due to its attractiveness and elasticity, the ecosystem concept has been applied to a wide range of phenomena by a variety of scholarly perspectives and under varying monikers such as ‘innovation ecosystems’, ‘business ecosystems’, ‘technology ecosystems’, ‘platform ecosystems’, ‘entrepreneurial ecosystems’, and ‘knowledge ecosystems’. This conceptual and application heterogeneity has contributed to conceptual and terminological confusion, which threatens to undermine the utility of the concept in supporting cumulative insight.
In this article we seek to re-introduce some order into this conceptual heterogeneity by reviewing how the ecosystem concept has been applied to variably overlapping phenomena and by high-lighting key terminological and conceptual inconsistencies and their sources. We find that conceptual inconsistency in the ecosystem terminology relates to two key dimensions: the ‘unit’ of analysis and the type of ‘ecosystem service’ – i.e., the ecosystem output collectively generated. We then argue that although there is considerable heterogeneity in application, the concept nevertheless offers promise to support insights that are distinctive relative to other concepts that describe collectives of organizations, such as those of ‘industry’, ‘supply chain’, ‘cluster’, and ‘network’. We also find that despite extant proliferation, the concept nevertheless describes collectives that are distinctive in that they uniquely combine participant heterogeneity, coherence of ecosystem outputs, participant inter-dependence, and non-hierarchical governance.
Based on our identified dimensions of conceptual heterogeneity, we offer a typology of the different ecosystem concepts, thereby helping re-organize this proliferating domain. The typology is based upon three distinct ecosystem outputs—ecosystem-level value offering to a defined audience, collective generation of business model innovation, and collective generation of research-based knowledge—and three research emphases that resonate with alternative ‘units’ of analysis—community dynamics, output co-generation, and interdependence management. Together, these al-low us to clearly differentiate between the concepts of innovation ecosystems, business ecosystems, platform ecosystems, technology ecosystems, entrepreneurial ecosystems, and knowledge ecosystems. Based on the three distinct types of ecosystem outputs, our typology identifies three major types of ecosystems: innovation ecosystems, entrepreneurial ecosystems, and knowledge ecosystems. Under the rubric of ‘innovation ecosystems’, we further distinguish between business ecosystems, modular ecosystems, and platform ecosystems. We conclude by considering innovation ecosystem dynamics, highlighting the important role of digitalization, and reviewing the implications of our model for ecosystem emergence, competition, coevolution, and resilience.
This study aims to decide on the question of the supremacy of coopetition’ strategies compared to pure cooperation’ strategies according to two explanatory factors both internally and externally. Through a sample of Tunisian industrial firms, the study confirms the simultaneous effect of competitive intensity and strategic capabilities on the nature of the strategy adopted. However, face to competition’ intensity, we conclude that strategic capabilities hold the highest weight in explaining coopetition and customer cooperation strategies, but the lowest weight when it comes to supplier cooperation. Also, we show the duality of recourse to the customer cooperation as well as the horizontal coopetition in front of the competition’ intensification. Even more, face to excessive competitive intensity, we find, surprisingly, the primacy of recourse to customer cooperation in face to horizontal coopetition. Moreover, our results also show that the strong need for strategic capabilities accentuates the use of coopetition to the detriment of cooperation.Keywords: competitive intensity; strategic capabilities; supplier cooperation; customer cooperation; horizontal coopetition; vertical coopetition.JEL Classification: M10DOI: https://doi.org/10.32479/irmm.8408
Abstract : This report is part of a research project on the structuring of business microcosm related to scientific periodicals. More specifically, this project aims to study the structuring of business practices and strategic practices of the actors operating within a business microcosm currently undergoing major transformation, namely the production of science and the communication of their results. This report is one of the components of this project and focuses on the structuring of the business microcosm within publication of scientific periodicals. The publication of articles in scientific periodicals is growing much faster than the growing number of scientists. Despite these increases, which undoubtedly reflect the dynamism in the world of the publication of scientific periodicals and greater accessibility to publication, scientists express great discomfort at this important part of their research activities. These discomforts are often expressed only from the point of view of the actors of the scientific fields, that is to say, from a scientific-centrist perspective. However, the publication of scientific periodicals involves a group of actors from different industries: suppliers, publishers, aggregators, customers, associations. For our part, we wanted to adopt an economic-centrist perspective. The aim of this report is therefore to present these actors through their corporate structure and their connections. At the end of our study, we can see that the main economic actors form a microcosm evolving around two oligopolies working on international markets (one in the publishing industry and the other in the aggregation industry) composed mainly of private firms, including private investment firms, and that they operate in a low-growth market. We also found that the dynamics of this microcosm is driven by a set of strategic alliances.
Résumé : Ce rapport d’inscrit dans le cadre d’un projet de recherche portant la structuration du microcosme d’affaires relié aux périodiques scientifiques. Plus spécifiquement, ce projet vise à étudier la structuration des pratiques d’affaires et des pratiques stratégiques des acteurs évoluant au sein d’un microcosme d’affaires actuellement en transformation importante, soit celui de la production de la science et de la communication des résultats de cette production. Le présent rapport est un des volets de ce projet et il porte sur la structuration du microcosme d’affaires de la publication des périodiques scientifiques. La publication d’articles dans des périodiques scientifiques connaît une croissance bien supérieure à la croissance du nombre de scientifiques. Malgré ces croissances qui traduisent sans nul doute le dynamisme du monde de la publication des périodiques scientifiques et une plus grande accessibilité à la publication, les scientifiques expriment beaucoup d’inconfort envers cette partie importante de leurs activités de recherche. Ces inconforts ne sont souvent exprimés que du seul point de vu des acteurs des champs scientifiques, c’est-à-dire selon une perspective scientifico-centriste. Or, la publication de périodiques scientifiques interpelle un ensemble d’acteurs issus de différentes industries: Les fournisseurs, les éditeurs, les agrégateurs, les clients, les associations. Nous avons voulu pour notre part adopter une perspective économico-centriste. L’objectif de ce rapport est donc de présenter ces acteurs par le biais de leur structure corporative et de leurs liens. Au terme de notre étude, nous pouvons constater que les principaux acteurs économiques forment un microcosme évoluant autour de deux oligopoles œuvrant sur les marchés internationaux (un dans l’industrie de la publication et l’autre dans l’industrie de l’agrégation) composés essentiellement de firmes privées, notamment des firmes d’investissement privé, et qu’elles évoluent dans un marché à faible croissance. Nous avons également constaté que la dynamique de ce microcosme est mue par un ensemble d’alliances stratégiques.
This study investigated the impact of political environment on business performance of multinational companies in Nigeria. To achieve this purpose, a review of extant literature was made which was supported by hypothesis. The population of this study consists of quoted manufacturing companies in Nigeria. About twenty-seven (27) of such companies were identified and the necessary data were sourced from the Nigerian Stock Exchange Fact Book of 2012 and the World Development Indicators of World Bank Group. Political environment was measured as the degree of political stability and absence of violence while business performance was measured by the profitability of the companies for the period 1999-2013. Our findings showed that political environment has a negative significant impact on business performance of multinational companies in Nigeria. Based on the above, we suggest that the Nigerian government should avoid frequent changes in government policies and programmes, and ensure stability of democratic institutions and political integration. These are necessary to make the political terrain stable and out of violence for business growth and development.
Every organization regardless of its size, product or service must recruit applicants to fill vacant positions. The efficiency and effectiveness of any work place whether the private or public sector largely depend on the calibre of the work force. Within the framework of bureaucratic theory, the paper examined recruitment policies in Nigerian federal civil service and its implication on employee performance with a view of determining the challenges facing poor employees performance and recruitment of competent and qualified candidates into the service. The primary question that was explored is whether there is a relationship between recruitment policies in the federal civil service and employees’ performance. It established that, there is a significant relationship between recruitment policies and practices and employees performance in Nigerian federal civil service. The paper concludes that federal civil service is faced with poor recruitment policies and practices which have affected service delivery in service. Given the identified constraints, it recommends among others, that the current recruitment policy in the civil service that calls for uniform qualifications do not specify classification of degrees, diplomas and certificates should be modified to make provision on preference for candidates with outstanding results at all levels of education
La capacité d’un entrepreneur à développer un modèle d’affaire pertinent est le plus souvent identifiée au prisme de valeurs individuelles (dynamisme, volontarisme, leadership, …). C’est oublier qu’elle puise aussi dans la variété des ressources et compétences d’un écosystème local, source de relations complexes avec des acteurs situés dans l’environnement immédiat de l’entrepreneur, et ce, avec des bénéfices mutuellement profitables (entrepreneur, acteurs publics et privés, territoire). À partir de trois exemples, cet article développe l’idée que l’existence ou la constitution d’un écosystème entrepreneurial local est la clef du succès d’un projet entrepreneurial individuel. Pour l’entrepreneur, il s’agit donc d’identifier et de s’appuyer sur ce territoire pour mobiliser des ressources et des relations de proximité, les plus faciles d’accès. Pour les pouvoirs publics, il ne s’agit plus financer massivement de grands programmes de développement dont elles auraient décidé au préalable des objectifs, mais d’accompagner les initiatives locales et créer les conditions de leur réussite.
Les stratégies de coopétition consistent à coopérer et à rivaliser simultanément avec le même partenaire-adversaire. Management peu étudié dans les recherches antérieures, cette recherche 1 se propose de répondre aux questions suivantes. Comment deux firmes concurrentes s'organisent-elles pour coopérer ? Comment gèrent-elles les tensions liées à la nature paradoxale de la coopétition ? Pour y répondre, une étude approfondie du programme conjoint lancé, dans le secteur des satellites de télécommunications, par Astrium (groupe EADS) et Thales Alenia Space (groupe Thales) est menée. L'étude de cas montre que, pour réaliser à bien ce programme, les deux entreprises ont constitué ensemble une équipe-projet dédiée au programme, l'« équipe-projet coopétitive » (EPC), séparée du reste de l'organisation et gouvernée par une structure mixte (Astrium et TAS).
Coopérer avec ses amis ou avec ses ennemis Quelle stratégie pour l'innovation produit ? Cette recherche 1 s'inscrit dans les nouvelles approches de l'innovation qui mettent l'accent sur l'importance des stratégies de coopération. Les auteurs étudient le lien entre les différentes stratégies de coopération et l'innovation produit, en fonction du type de partenaire avec qui la coopération est établie. Deux grands types de coopération sont étudiés et confrontés : la coopération avec des non-concurrents et la coopération avec des concurrents (coopétition). Les recherches antérieures ayant abouti à des résultats contradictoires, ils proposent ici des hypothèses de recherche qui introduisent une variable supplémentaire dans l'analyse : la nationalité des concurrents. Ils testent les hypothèses sur un échantillon d'entreprises françaises issues de la base de données CIS (2004) et présentent les principaux résultats.
In this study we draw on the social network and international entrepreneurship literatures to examine the role of structural and relational embeddedness of international networks in firm internationalization. Based on a sample of 169 small- and medium-sized enterprises in the Czech Republic, we found that firms with chief executive officers who had developed strong and diverse international networks exhibited greater knowledge of foreign markets prior to internationalization. However, contrary to our expectations, no relationship was found between network density and such knowledge. In addition, our findings indicate that foreign market knowledge prior to the first international venture had a positive impact on venture performance.
This paper brings together the recent literature on industry platforms and shows how it relates to managing innovation within and outside the firm as well as to dealing with technological and market disruptions and change over time. First, we identify distinct types of platforms. Our analysis of a wide range of industry examples suggests that there are two predominant types of platforms: internal or company-specific platforms, and external or industry-wide platforms. We define internal (company or product) platforms as a set of assets organized in a common structure from which a company can efficiently develop and produce a stream of derivative products. We define external (industry) platforms as products, services, or technologies that act as a foundation upon which external innovators, organized as an innovative business ecosystem, can develop their own complementary products, technologies, or services. Second, we summarize from the literature general propositions on the design, economics, and strategic management of platforms. Third, we review the case of Intel and other examples to illustrate the range of technological, strategic, and business challenges that platform leaders and their competitors face as markets and technologies evolve. Finally, we identify practices associated with effective platform leadership and avenues for future research to deepen our understanding of this important phenomenon and what firms can do to manage platform-related competition and innovation.
The authors review the progress of three rapidly growing macro management literatures—in technology innovation, entrepreneurship, and strategic management—that have in common the use of a “demand-side” research perspective. Demand-side research looks downstream from the focal firm, toward product markets and consumers, to explain and predict those managerial decisions that increase value creation within a value system. Typical characteristics of demand-side, macro-level management research include clearly distinguishing value creation from value capture, emphasizing product markets as key sources of value-creation strategies for firms, viewing consumer preferences as dynamic and sometimes latent, and recognizing that managers’ differing decisions in response to consumer heterogeneity contribute to firm heterogeneity and, ultimately, value creation. The authors review recent demand-side findings showing that strategies based on consumer heterogeneity can result in competitive advantage even if the firm holds only obsolete or mundane resources, these advantages can be sustainable without resource- or ability-based barriers to imitation, successful innovations can be consumer driven rather than resource or technology driven, and consumer knowledge can play a key role in entrepreneurial idea discovery. These seemingly counterintuitive findings from demand-side research indicate the promise of future demand-side work for generating new knowledge useful to scholars and managers. The authors suggest directions for future demand-side research based on their review. What’s more, the research they review represents a start—but only a start—toward integrated theories that could attend to both the demand side and the producer side of the value creation equation.
This paper critically examines available theoretical models which have been derived from statistically established patterns of association between contextual and organizational variables. These models offer an interpretation of organizational structure as a product of primarily economic constraints which contextual variables are assumed to impose. It is argued that available models in fact attempt to explain organization at one remove by ignoring the essentially political process, whereby power-holders within organizations decide upon courses of strategic action. This `strategic choice' typically includes not only the establishment of structural forms but also the manipulation of environmental features and the choice of relevant performance standards. A theoretical re-orientation of this kind away from functional imperatives and towards a recognition of political action is developed and illustrated in the main body of the paper.
The traditional view of inter-firm dynamics suggests that relationships are either competitive or cooperative in nature. However, it is apparent that in practice, firms can compete and cooperate with each other at the same time. The term used to refer to a relationship between two firms that simultaneously involves both competition and cooperation is "coopetition." Although there is evidence to suggest that organizations have been involved in coopetitive relationships for some considerable time, it is only relatively recently that the subject has found increased favor in the academic literature. It would appear, however, that the literature concerning coopetition is still limited in scope, and in order to address the issue, this paper presents an agenda for researchers interested in the subject of coopetition. The agenda is generated by reconciling a review of the literature on coopetition with a similar review of the literature relating to competition and cooperation. The agenda also incorporates two innovative ideas based on anecdotal evidence and personal observations.
The aim of this research is for us to better understand collective strategies. To do so, the competitive behaviour of businesses in the French fish-canning industry from the 1960s to the 1980s is studied in depth. This study allows us, on the one hand, to define the conditions under which this type of strategy can emerge and stabilise and, on the other, to show the endogenous nature of its dissolution.
Purpose
– The basic purpose of this paper is to establish and test the relationship between organizational culture and strategic alliances in a manufacturing supply chain that consists of alliance companies (manufacturers) and alliance partners (suppliers and customers). The relationships have been analyzed from the manufacturer's perspective.
Design/methodology/approach
– This paper specifically addresses: the relationship between the culture type of alliance company and the degree of integration (trust, communication, and commitment) between the alliance companies and partners; the relationship between the culture type of alliance company and value creation in the alliance company; and the relationship between the degree of integration and value creation in the alliance company. A questionnaire was constructed and distributed to 109 companies that had some form strategic alliance with their suppliers and/or customers. The data collected were tested using analysis of variance and correlation analysis.
Findings
– The culture type of the alliance company has a significant effect on the degree of integration and value creation. The degree of integration has a significant relationship with value creation. Specifically, the following have been found: ad hocracy culture favors a higher level of communication and commitment with the suppliers; hierarchy culture favors a higher level of commitment with suppliers and helps build a higher level of trust with customers and suppliers; and clan and ad hocracy cultures help in achieving a higher degree of value creation.
Originality/value
– Identifying the link between the culture and strategic alliances in a supply chain can help decision makers choose the right kind of alliance partners and decide appropriate strategies that need to be adopted to form and maintain alliances.
Large US companies are increasingly interested in complexity theory, especially what complexity can offer as a new management paradigm. The key to this new approach is an understanding of complex adaptive systems (CAS), especially the superior performance that can be achieved when such systems operate on the edge of chaos. Pushing an organization to these limits enables it to achieve new rates of innovation and to continuously reinvent itself. Whereas conventional economic discussions of the firm focus on the search for an efficient allocation of resources, the CAS paradigm is concerned more with adoption and rapid change. Four lines of inquiry into the competitive advantage of possible through a CAS approach are suggested: 1. comparing evolutionary strategies among companies in sectors where knowledge if growing exponentially, 2. examining ecosystem density as a source of strategic advantage, 3. charting evolutionary landscapes to explain innovation performance in the pharmaceutical and IT sectors, and 4. examining the tensions between adaptability and intentionally over multiple dimensions within firms managing with CAS principles, to chart boundaries in relation to performance.
Malgré l’intérêt suscité par les écosystèmes d’affaires (ESA) en management stratégique, aucune recherche n’a, à ce jour, été menée sur les ESA en tourisme durable. Afin de combler cette lacune, l’article propose d’en définir les contours et les déterminants. Une étude qualitative réalisée auprès des entreprises touristiques de Porquerolles (Parc national de Port-Cros) révèle l’intérêt d’un écolabel certifié par tierce partie accréditée. Ce type de label facilite non seulement l’implémentation du tourisme durable (aux niveaux organisationnel et méta-organisationnel), mais également la création d’une structure d’alignement favorisant l’émergence d’un ESA en tourisme durable, sous certaines conditions relevant de la gouvernance de la destination.
The study of foreign policy decision-making seeks to understand how states formulate and enact foreign policy. It views foreign policy as a series of decisions made by particular actors using specific decision-making processes. The origins of this focus on decision-making are generally traced to the 1950s and 1960s, with the literature increasing in complexity and diversity of approaches in more recent decades. Foreign policy decision-making is situated within foreign policy analysis (a subfield of international relations subfield), which applies theories and methods from an array of disciplines—political science, public administration, economics, psychology, sociology—to understand how states make foreign policy, and how these policies translate into geopolitical outcomes. The literature on foreign policy decision-making is often subdivided based on assumptions about the process by which actors make foreign policy decisions—primarily falling into rational and nonrational decision-making; about who is assumed to make the decision—states, individuals, groups, or organizations; and about the influences believed to be most important in affecting those decisions—international factors, domestic political factors, interpersonal dynamics, etc. While much of the literature focuses on foreign policy decision-making in the United States, there have been attempts to apply models developed in the US context to other states, as well as to generate generalizable theories about foreign policy decision-making that apply to certain types of states.
Abstract Despite the increasing significance of collaborative interorganizational
networks, understanding of leadership phenomena in these contexts is still scarce.
How, and in what form will leadership emerge in such (a priori) non-hierarchical
contexts with peerlike work settings, if at all? Through an interpretive grounded
theory study conducted in collaborative interorganizational networks, we found that
the networks either remained at the stage of leaderless cooperation (leadership void)
or developed shared leadership. We then sought to understand the underlying
mechanism of collaboration that might explain the different (non)leadership phenomena.
Our study’s main result is the empirically grounded identification of two
distinct forms of network participation with specific network identities as its core,
which are related to the distinct leadership-related phenomena in our networks. (1)
Task-based network identity, which includes an individualistic network identity, a
single achievement motivation, and a largely instrumentalist orientation towards
network participation, is related to a leadership void (non-leadership emergence, i.e.
a form of leaderless cooperation). (2) Joint-motivational network identity, which
includes a collectivistic network identity, joint network motivation, and a largely
value-laden attitude towards network participation, is related to shared leadership.
Our findings shed new light on collaboration and leadership phenomena in
interorganizational networks, concurrently providing progress on conceptualizing
shared leadership, in particular by introducing joint-motivational network identity
as a new concept related to shared leadership development. We discuss implications
for the management of collaborative interorganizational networks and advance
theory on plural forms of leadership such as collective or shared leadership.
This section presents the third volume of Max Weber's fundamental work Economy and Society which has been translated into Russian for the first time. The third volume includes two works devoted to the sociology of law. The first, 'The Economy and Laws', discusses differences between sociological and juridical approaches to studies of social processes. It describes peculiarities of normative power arenas (orders) at different levels and demonstrates how they influence the economy. The second, 'Economy and Law' ('Sociology of Law'), reviews the evolution of law orders (primarily, the three "greatest systems of law" including Roman Law, Anglo-American Law, and European Continental Law) in the context of changes in the organization of economy and structures of dominancy. Law is considered an influential factor of the rationalization of social life which in turn is affected by a rationalized economy and social management. The Journal of Economic Sociology here publishes an excerpt from the chapter 'Law, Convention and Custom' in this third volume, which shows the role of the habitual in the formation of law; explains the importance of intuition and empathy for the emergence of new orders; and discusses the changeable borders between law, convention and custom. The translation is edited by Leonid Ionin and the chapter is published with the permission of HSE Publishing House. © 2018 National Research University Higher School of Economics. All rights reserved.
La dégradation des écosystèmes est souvent interprétée comme une problématique de surexploitation de biens communs. Or, dans les écosystèmes cultivés, il n’existe pas de ressources communes dont chacun percevrait la nécessité pour autoriser une forme de gouvernance locale. A quelle condition une action collective serait-elle alors possible ? Nous présentons un cas empirique dans lequel des acteurs ont tenté de concevoir collectivement un agro-écosystème durable à partir de connaissances récentes en écologie. Nous montrons que les acteurs ont identifié un « inconnu commun » leur permettant d’ouvrir un espace pour l’exploration collective. Cette recherche, qui propose d’étendre les biens communs aux inconnus communs, met en évidence une diversité d’enjeux de gestion encore sous-estimés dans la littérature sur les biens communs et propose des pistes pour y faire face.
Knowledge of waste composition and production is a requirement to build an efficient waste management scenario. Analysis of this data at a detailed level of observation (regional or communal) is useful to create adapted local scenarios, thus optimizing the overall waste management. However, working at a detailed level of observation multiplies the number of scenarios to build. In this article, we use Principal Components Analysis (PCA) to identify similarities between local administrative areas. By grouping administrative areas based on their waste production, this analysis is an efficient way to reduce the number of local waste management scenarios to define and it also favors cooperation among similar administrative areas. To illustrate our methodology, we focus on the specific case of Reunion Island, which is composed of 24 municipalities. The PCA analysis enabled to identify 5 groups of municipalities, thus reducing the number of required scenarios to build drastically.
Understanding of mechanisms in independent retailers’ sustainable development strategies: A qualitative study
The objective of this article is to analyze mechanisms in building sustainable development’s strategies of three French independent retailers (Leclerc, Intermarché and Système U) by crossing two dimensions of the business ecosystem with the Triple Bottom Line (people, planet and profit). A study of internet sites followed by in-store observations and interviews among sustainable development managers, store managers and consumers highlight the dominant role of technological innovation (product innovation, eco-design), the place for cooperation (internal with employees and external with suppliers) and differences between consumers’ perceptions and retailers practices regarding sustainable development in stores.
Universities are a key institution in the U.S. innovation system, and an important aspect of their involvement is the role they play in public-private partnerships. This note offers insights into the performance of industry-university research partnerships, using a survey of precommercial research projects funded by the Advanced Technology Program. Although results must be interpreted cautiously because of the small size of the sample, the study finds that projects with university involvement tend to be in areas involving new science and therefore experience more difficulty and delay, yet are more likely not to be aborted prematurely. Our interpretation is that universities are contributing to basic research awareness and insight among the partners in ATP-funded projects.
Alliances present a paradox for firms. On the one hand, firms engage in a large number of alliances to secure and extend their competitive advantage and growth; on the other hand, their alliances exhibit surprisingly low success rates. In this paper, we discuss how firms can address these failures by identifying some of the primary drivers of alliance success. First, we discuss how firms can achieve success with any individual alliance by considering critical factors at each phase of the alliance life cycle. Second, we show how firms can increase their overall alliance success by developing and institutionalizing firm-level capabilities to manage alliances. Third, we highlight emerging issues in the alliance context, including the need to recognize a new class of alliances between firms and not-for-profit organizations or individuals, the benefits of taking a "portfolio approach" to alliance strategy and management, and the opportunity to transfer one's alliance capabilities to the effective management of other interfirm relationships, including acquisitions.
This research investigates whether an upper-echelon perspective incorporating a unique managerial attribute, namely, Confucian dynamism (CD), which draws from China's cultural heritage, can enrich Dunning's ownership-location-internalization (OLI) framework. This study examines the activities of 233 internationalized Chinese private firms. Its findings suggest that the CD of individual decision-makers negatively affects the adoption of equity modes (direct association); and lessens the effects of ownership and location advantages on the adoption of equity modes. However, it does not influence the relationship between internalization advantages and equity modes (moderation associations). The contribution of this study is that it effectively complements the "rational" OLI framework through the inclusion of CD and its interactions with OLI variables to provide a more comprehensive account of the international entry mode decisions of Chinese private firms.
This article revises and expands the theory of collective strategy to include firms in fragmented industries. Collective strategy in fragmented industries may be less visible, but it is no less extensive than in concentrated industries because repetitive patterns of pairwise interorganizational activity can aggregate into emergent collective strategy. This implies that collective activity is a ubiquitous strategy, permeating all types of organizations in fragmented industries. The article offers a process model and a mechanism for aggregating pairwise activity into collective activity based on an extension of the prisoner's dilemma game. A curvilinear relationship between environmental factors and cooperative behavior is proposed. Propositions suggest that the effects of cooperation on performance shift from the firm level to the population level as colonization is completed.
Population ecologists, emphasizing the powerful constraining influence of environment on organizational autonomy, challenge the validity of the notion of strategic choice, which is so central to the field of business policy. This criticism may apply legitimately at the level of single organizations, but it does not reduce the importance of strategic choice at the collective level of analysis. A framework for analyzing strategic actions undertaken jointly by members of interorganizational collectivities is offered, based on a social ecological approach.
According to the Institutionalist approach, rules are required for the emergence and functioning of a market. In this paper, we empirically validate that companies recognise the ability of norms to organise a new market. We observe that those who are most active in the development of standards are leaders and innovators in the technology space. These businesses must cooperate because consensus is needed to establish institutional standards, but at the same time, they compete with each other to promote their own technology and choose the direction that is most beneficial to them. Thus, 'coopetition' to establish norms appears to be a required phase of entrepreneurship strategy.
This paper reviews the writing on metaphor in organizational analysis. It aims to synthesize developments and draw out trends. It argues that the implications of metaphor, as spelt out by poets, philosophers and linguists, do not seem to have been considered as fully as they might have been by many writers in organizational analysis. It explores possible reasons why this might be the case and what this suggests about dominant assumptions in the field. It concludes by looking at some avenues for research that arise from the study of metaphor from a more humanities-based perspective.
Many organizations are made up of other organizations that have decided to act collectively - as with research and development consortia, industrial alliances, trade associations, and formal political coalitions. These collective organizations can be characterized by their differing strategies: some are general in scope, while others specialize on a more narrow purpose. What explains the prevalence of generalism and specialism among collective organizations? We develop an ecological model in which collective organizations compete over member organizations. Assuming that an organization joins a collective when its objectives match that of thr collective, our model predicts a generalism bias in the ecology of founding and growth among collective organizations. This outcome is predicted to be path dependent, however, emerging over time according to relatively minor differences in initial conditions. These predictions are supported in an analysis of founding and growth rates among US R&D consortia, and the model helps to account for the numbers, sizes, and strategic diversity of these consortia.
The organization set is a basic concept for analyzing the relations between an organization and its environment. This article pro vides a theoretical basis for using it to study the way that organizations adapt their environments to their own needs, rather than responding to situational demands. First, the network of interorganizational relations is conceptualized in terms of dimensions of social integration. Subsequently, organizational strategies appropriate for dealing with problematical aspects of organization set integration are identified. The character-defining consequences of the combination of strategies an organization uses are illustrated from an empirical study of the National Economic Development Office.
This study provides evidence that collective strategy is prevalent in small firms in fragmented industries. COMPUSTAT data were combined with afield survey of small manufacturingfirms to test hypotheses concerning the relative frequencies of various collective strategies, the effects of environmental variables on collective activity, and the contribution of collective behavior to firm performance. Results indicate that agglomerate and organic collective strategies are the most frequently employed, and that munificent environments were positively associated with collective behavior and performance. Complex environments were negatively associated with collective strategy and no effect was found for volatile environments. The study also discusses methodological issues concerning the use of the COMPUSTAT database, and the usual practice of omitting cases with missing financial information.
This study examines opportunities and risks of collective strategies. Some dysfunctional outcomes of collective strategies include their tendencies: to reduce strategic flexibility; to increase the impact of external disturbances; to lower organizational adaptability; and to attract new entrants. A model is developed which provides an integrated analysis of the consequences of collective strategy; it highlights the dialectical relationship between collective and competitive strategies. Possibilities for avoiding or muting the dysfunctions of collective strategies are discussed.
