| Strategy Process: Cultures Consequences |
| | Hauser, Markus | U. of Pennsylvania | markushauser@hotmail.com | 215-898-2278 |
| | Puranam, Phanish | U. of Pennsylvania | puranam@management.wharton.upenn.edu | 215-898-1231 |
| | House, Robert E. | U. of Pennsylvania | house@wharton.upenn.edu | (215)-898-2278 |
| | In an era of increasing international competition, does national culture have an impact on the process by which firms
make strategic choices? Or do the forces of competitive and institutional isomorphism bring about a homogeneity in strategy
process across firms from different countries? If culture does indeed have an impact on strategy process, does it do so
in systematic ways which can be predicted? We seek to answer these questions using data from organizations in 22 countries,
collected as part of a multi-stage, cross-cultural research project.
We examine four theoretical constructs which classify strategy process, derived from a review of the literature:
the extent of formalization, proactiveness, the locus of decision making, and the degree of goal congruence in strategy formulation.
Our results indicate that there exist significant systematic effects of specific cultural dimensions on the modes
of strategy process extant in business organizations. Our findings lend support for the continuing research interests
of organizational scientists in cross-cultural phenomena, and also draw the attention of strategy and international management
scholars towards an area which requires further research.
|
| | Keywords: Strategy process; National Culture; Cross Cultural research |
| Organizational Change Processes in Global MNCs. A Comparative Case Study |
| | Wright, Martyn | Warwick Business School, University of Warwick | irobmw@wbs.warwick.ac.uk | +44-1203-524267 |
| | Edwards, Paul | Warwick Business School, University of Warwick | irrupe@wbs.warwick.ac.uk | +44 1203 524270 |
| | This paper uses evolutionary economic theory to analyze patterns of
organizational change and inertia in two large multinational corporations
(MNCs) - Alcan aluminum and 'EUROIL', one of the world's largest oil
companies. An international research team from Université Laval, Canada
and Warwick University, England, studied both companies over a period of
several years using a comparative case study methodology. In each company,
senior managers at corporate and national headquarters were interviewed.
Extensive interviews of plant management, supervisors and shopfloor
operatives were also conducted at three plants in Alcan and one plant
in EUROIL.
We show that the rate of organizational change was much greater at Alcan,
where measures were taken to reduce production capacity and employment,
to lower operating costs, and to restructure the corporate control system
to give greater responsibility to plant managers. In addition, there was
a disposal of 'non-strategic' downstream assets and the spread of
teamworking across several, although not all, plants. EUROIL was
characterized by a much greater degree of organizational continuity. In
line with evolutionary economic theory, we show that changes were driven
by two main factors. First, Alcan experienced much more intense and more
focused product market pressure, compared with EUROIL. Second, Alcan had
structured networks of personal interaction, and a guiding management
philosophy, which encouraged the diffusion of best practice at plant level.
At EUROIL, such systems were less developed and at plant level, there was
greater reliance upon a series of ad hoc initiatives.
|
| | Keywords: MNCs; Organizational Change |
| The Impact of Cultural Values on Employee Job Satisfaction and Organizational Commitment in Self-Managing Work Teams |
| | Kirkman, Bradley L. | U. of North Carolina, Greensboro | brad_kirkman@uncg.edu | (336)-334-3096 |
| | As a result of global competition and downsizing, multinationals increasingly use self-manging work teams (SMWTS) in foreign affiliates. Using a field survey in the United States, Belgium, Finland, and the Philippines, we examined the extent to which resistance to the team- and self-management-related aspects of SMWTs mediated the relationships between employee cultural values and both job satsifaction and organizational commitment.
We found that resistance: (1) fully mediated the relationship between collectivism and both job satisfaction and organizational commitment; (2) partially mediated the relationship between power distance and organizational commitment; (3) partially mediated the relationship between doing orientation and both job satisfaction and organizational commitment; and (4) fully mediated the relationship between determinism and organizational commitment.
International researchers have demonstrated relationships between cultural values and both job satisfaction and organizational commitment, and they have advised multinational managers to locate facilities where employees' job satisfaction and organizational commitment is likely to be highest (based on cultural values). In contrast to this thinking, our findings indicate that, in many cases, it is employee reaction to management initiatives -- not the cultural values themselves -- that determines the level of satisfaction and commitment. We thus conclude that managers contemplating facility-locations may be benefit more by considering -- not the likely job attitudes of the location's
employees, but -- how (if at all) to properly implement U.S.-based management initiatives. Our findings thereby help to explain, too, why SMWT implementation may not always live up to the expectations generated by successful implementation in the United States. |
| | Keywords: self-managing work teams; cross-cultural management; resistance to change |
| The Impact of Personality and Expatriate Adjustment Competencies on Turnover Intent |
| | Nicholls, Chantell E. | U. of Western Ontario | cnicholls@ivey.uwo.ca | (905) - 855 - 3464 |
| | Rothstein, Mitchell G. | U. of Western Ontario | mrothste@ivey.uwo.ca | (519)-661-3298 |
| | Bourne, Andrea | U. of Western Ontario | n/a | (519)-661-3298 |
| | Premature return is one of the most costly yet prevalent problems for international assignees. Failure to adjust to the different living and working environment has been identified as a major reason for this problem. Theoretical models developed to explain expatriate withdrawal processes have highlighted work and non-work contextual antecedents and have demonstrated the importance of factors unique to the international domain, such as adjustment to the foreign work environment, degree of cultural novelty, and spousal adjustment. Additionally, some international HR theorists have stressed the importance of individual characteristics reflecting tolerance for uncertainty and ambiguity, relational skills, and personal flexibility. In the present paper, we develop and test a model of antecedents to expatriate job satisfaction, organizational commitment, career satisfaction, and turnover intent with a sample of 84 expatriates working in China. A personality construct called "need for closure," describing individual differences in tolerance for ambiguity and uncertainty, and a set of empirically-derived expatriate adjustment competencies developed through a critical incident technique were evaluated as antecedents to turnover intentions, mediated by work attitudes. Need for closure related to the adjustment competencies but did not act as an antecedent to turnover intent. |
| | Keywords: Expatriate; Adjustment; Turnover |
| Organisational Commitment in Malaysia and Australia |
| | Noordin, Fauziah | Queensland U. of Technology, Gardens Point | f.noordin@student.qut.edu.au | +61-7-3864-1636 |
| | Zimmer, Catherine | North Carolina State U. | cathy_zimmer@ncsu.edu | 919-515-9028 |
| | Williams, Trevor A. | Queensland U. of Technology | t.williams@qut.edu.au | 61-7-3864 1298 |
| |
Interest in cross-cultural management has recently been extended to
organisational commitment. The purpose of this study is to explore
the boundary conditions of the three-dimensional organisational
commitment theory of Allen and Meyer (1990) by examining its relevance
outside the US. The theory has been tested in the contexts of Canada
(Allen and Meyer, 1990; Meyer and Allen, 1991), Belgium (Vandenberghe,
1996) and South Korea (Ko, Price and Mueller, 1997). To date, there have
been few investigations of all three dimensions of Allen and Meyer's (1990)
scale and on the subdimensions of continuance commitment have been included
in only one study. More importantly, there have been few investigations of
organisational commitment which include more than one country or culture in
the one study. Our study investigated all three dimensions of organisational
commitment in surveys of middle managers in Malaysia and Australia. Using
multi-group confirmatory factor analysis, we find that for both countries,
the model that fits the data best was the four-factor oblique one. The study
also reveals that the same measurement model does not hold for both countries.
This suggests that the model in each country must be looked at separately and
the differences in parameter estimates investigated further.
|
| | Keywords: Organisational commitment; Australia; Malaysia |
| Interlocking Directorates as Corporate Governance in Third World Multinationals: Theory and Evidence from Thailand |
| | Au, Kevin | Chinese U. of Hong Kong | kevin@baf.msmail.cuhk.edu.hk | (852)-2609-7802 |
| | Peng, Mike W. | Ohio State U., Columbus | pengshaohong@hotmail.com | (614) 292-2666 |
| | Wang, Denis | Chinese U. of Hong Kong | denis@baf.msmail.cuhk.edu.hk | (852)-2609-7780 |
| | Given the paucity of corporate governance research on Third World
multinational enterprises (MNEs), we focus on interlocking directorates
as corporate governance in Thailand-based MNEs in this study. Drawing upon
resource dependence theory, we hypothesize that, compared with non-MNEs,
MNEs in Thailand (1) have more densely connected interlocks, (2)occupy more
central locations in the interlocks network, (3) have more ethnic Chinese
directors, and (4) appoint more military directors. Data from the top 200
listed firms in Thailand support three of the four hypotheses. The article
closes with a discussion of the theoretical, methodological, and empirical
contributions of the study, as well as its practical implications,
limitations, and directions for future research. |
| | Keywords: Interlocking directorate; Multinationals; Thailand |