Baan Company’s Corporate Web Strategy – An Effort To Reach Main Street

During the 1990s Baan Company became a market leader in the enterprise applications industry. Its mission was to become an independent software manufacturer, serving a global market. To speed up growth, Baan developed its Baan Web strategy which implied a far-reaching renewal of its corporate strategy. Burgelman and Grove (1996) define the moment of choosing a new strategy as a strategic inflection point. Their framework named “Dynamic Forces in Firm Evolution†explains that ssuccessful development and implementation of a new corporate strategy is a process of aligning five dynamic forces. The focus of this study is on the vital role of the internal selection environment. This force regulates the allocation of the company’s scarce resources – cash, competences/capabilities and senior management attention – to strategic action. It is the crucial force in the continuing alignment processes that have to take place. Every company has a unique combination of distinctive competences (Burgelman) or dynamic capabilities (Teece). The study explains that to execute a new strategy successfully new competences/capabilities have to be developed based on existent ones. The development of Baan’s corporate strategy is analyzed and discussed with reference to the Technology Adoption Life Cycle (Moore). The study concludes with the management implications of a strategic inflection point.globalization;growth;dynamic capabilities;ERP;software;business web;corporate strategy;distinctive competences;strategic inflection point

Aligning strategy typology and human resource management in a transitional environment : the case of Huabo Group

In a transitional society like China, it is a challenge to align an enterprise human resource management with its strategy while adapting to a dynamic external environment. There is limited studies in this regard, particularly on how private enterprises may align human resource management with strategy typology in a changing environment of emerging economy. Guided by the theoretical framework of strategy typology and human resources management alignment proposed by Miles and Snow (1984), this study investigates Huabo Group, a pharmaceutical distribution firm in Chongqing of China as a case study because this firm has developed and grown in a very dynamic, complex and hostile environment due to the rapid change of Chinese pharmaceuticals industry. Thus it provides a very illustrative sample to examine strategy typology and human resources management alignment in emerging market like China. Based on quantitative and qualitative data through survey and interview/focus group, this study: (1) finds and justifies the prospector strategy of Huabo Group under transitional external environment; (2) identifies and discusses the gaps and issues of aligning Huabo’s human resources management and prospector strategy; (3) proposes strategies to improve its human resources system to better align and support its strategy for the enterprise sustainable growth in a rapid changing environment. The study provides an illustrative case from Chinese pharmaceuticals industry to manage the challenges of aligning human resource management with organizational strategy while adapting to external environment in emerging economy, thus enriching theoretical literatures. The research results provide valuable reference for similar enterprises to give consideration to human resources management alignment during strategy adjustment under rapid changing emerging market like China.Numa sociedade em transição, como a chinesa, alinhar a gestão de recursos humanos de uma empresa com a sua estratégia e em simultâneo adaptar-se ao ambiente dinâmico externo constitui um desafio. A investigação sobre este assunto tem sido limitada, especialmente sobre como as empresas privadas podem alinhar a gestão de recursos humanos com uma tipologia de estratégia num ambiente mutável de uma economia emergente. Guiado pela matriz teórica da tipologia estratégica de Miles e Snow (1984), este estudo investiga o Grupo Huabo, uma empresa de distribuição farmacêutica em Chongqin na China, tomando-o como um caso de estudo por esta empresa se ter desenvolvido e crescido num ambiente hostil, complexo e muito dinâmico devido às rápidas mudanças na indústria farmacêutica chinesa. Desta forma, constitui um caso muito ilustrativo para examinar o alinhamento entre a tipologia estratégica e a gestão de recursos humanos num mercado emergente como o da China. Com base em dados quantitativos e qualitativos decorrentes de questionário e entrevistas/grupos focais, este estudo: 1) descobre e justifica a estratégia prospetora do grupo Huabo no quadro de um ambiente externo em transição, 2) identifica e discute as discrepâncias e os desafios de alinhar a gestão dos recursos humanos da Huabo com a estratégia prospetora, e 3) propõe estratégias para melhorar o seu sistema de recursos humanos com vista a um melhor alinhamento e apoio estratégico que favoreça o crescimento sustentável da empresa num ambiente em mudança rápida. O estudo faculta um caso ilustrativo da indústria farmacêutica chinesa para gerir o desafio do alinhamento da gestão de recursos humanos com a estratégia organizacional no quadro da adaptação a um ambiente externo numa economia emergente, assim enriquecendo a literatura teórica. A investigação constitui uma referência útil para empresas similares que queiram considerar o alinhamento da gestão de recursos humanos durante o ajustamento estratégico em condições de mercado emergente em rápida mutação tal como o da China

Industrial restructuring and early industry pathways in the Asian 1st generation NICs: The Singapore garment industry

This article aims to contribute to an understanding of the industrial dynamics/evolution of mature export production complexes in the first generation Asian NICs, employing an evolutionary economic perspective. Over the past decade and longer the first generation Asian NICs, Singapore included, have been confronted with imperatives necessitating deep restructuring. We observe that industrial decline, associated with failed restructuring caused by lock-in, does not fit these countries, its industrial regions and early industries. Yet research has hardly begun to look at adjustment and address deeper evolution from tenets in the framework of evolutionary economics although such an approach is made not less but rather more relevant by continued resilience. We analyse the pathway(s) of one early industry, i.c. the apparel industry, in Singapore, through the 1980s and 1990s. The withering away in the Singapore context of an industry such as apparel is not inevitable. From a juxtaposition of the line of thinking in evolutionary economics emphasizing hindrance and decline due to path dependency and lock-ins with an alternative line emphasizing the possibility to adjust through renewal and the limited operation of lock-ins, we argue why the latter rather than the former has been the case.evolutionary economics, industrial restruction, Asia, NICs

Barriers to the implementation of enterprise strategic transformation based on path dependence theory: the case of Jiangsu High Hope Group

With the deepening of economic globalization and the improvement of the trade structure mode, China has gradually become a global trade power, enjoying increasing space for the development of its foreign trade enterprises. However, under the comprehensive influences by external factors, China's foreign trade enterprises are faced with huge pressure to survive. Foreign trade enterprises in the new situation must continue to carry out strategic transformation in order to survive and develop. However, in the dynamic environment, the traditional enterprise strategic transformation is faced with serious path dependence, which leads to obvious inertia, which seriously hinders enterprise strategic transformation implementation and even leads to transformation failure. Existing studies only focus on enterprise strategic transformation, whereas this thesis discusses the inertial factors that hinder enterprise strategic transformation implementation from the perspective of path dependence. In other words, this thesis incorporates the theory of path dependence into the theory of strategic transformation, and probes into enterprise strategic transformation from the perspective of path dependence. Proceeding from theory and demonstration and with Jiangsu High Hope Group as the research object, this thesis studies the path dependence factors that hinder Jiangsu High Hope Group's strategic transformation implementation. Relevant suggestions on addressing path dependence barriers to the case company's strategic transformation are put forward from five aspects, namely, enterprise structure, enterprise employees, enterprise core competencies, enterprise culture and external environment, in view of the fact that the case company’s path dependence hinders its strategic transformation implementation.Com o aprofundamento da globalização económica e a melhoria do modo de estrutura comercial, gradualmente, a China tornou-se em uma potência comercial no mundo, desfrutando de um espaço cada vez maior para o desenvolvimento de empresas de comércio exterior (ECE). No entanto, sob as influências abrangentes de fatores externos, as ECE da China enfrentam uma pressão enorme para sobreviver. Na situação nova, as ECE devem continuar a realizar a transformação estratégica (TE) para sobreviver e se desenvolver. Entretanto, no ambiente dinâmico, a TE da empresa tradicional é confrontada com uma séria dependência de trajetória (DT), o que leva à inércia óbvia, o que prejudica seriamente a implementação da TE da empresa, até leva ao fracasso da transformação. Os estudos existentes concentram-se apenas na TE da empresa, enquanto esta tese discute os fatores de inércia que impedem a implementação da TE na empresa a partir da perspetiva da DT, ou seja, esta tese incorpora a teoria da DT na teoria da TE e investiga a TE da empresa a partir da perspetiva da DT. Partindo da teoria e da investigação empírica e tendo como objeto de pesquisa o Grupo Jiangsu High Hope, esta tese estuda os fatores de DT que impedem a implementação da TE do Grupo. As conclusões mais relevantes sobre como lidar com barreiras de DT para a TE da empresa em causa são apresentadas em cinco vertentes, nomeadamente, a estrutura empresarial, os colaboradores de topo de empresa, competências essenciais da empresa, cultura empresarial e o ambiente externo. Este caso lustra bem em como a DT da empresa constitui dificuldade de implementação da TE

Tourism supply chain & strategic partnerships for managing the complexity in tourism industry

The paper aims to investigate the possible relationship between Tourism Supply Chain and Strategic Partnership, read as a way to reduce and better manage the complexity in Tourism Industry. This last has been analysed under multi-disciplinary approaches (economic, sociological, psychological, anthropological and geographic) to better understand its main components. A synthesis of origin of Tourism Supply Chain term was provided. VRIO framework and PEST analysis was used with the aim to better understand the strategic decision of integration the chain with a single or multiple rings. Starting from this, a theoretical framework from a holistic analysis is provided

Business economics of knowledge and innovation: an empirical analysis of the role of firms' search diversity

Die Wissensinfrastruktur von Unternehmen spielt eine entscheidende Rolle in der Wettbewerb- Innovation-Dynamik, die interne und externe Wissensmanagementfähigkeiten verkörpert. Diese Dissertation konzentriert sich auf den Wissenserwerb, der nach Chesbroughs trendverändernder Formulierung von Open Innovation (als Suche nach und Nutzung von externem Wissen) zu einem herausragenden Element der Wissensinfrastruktur von Unternehmen wurde. Externe Wissensstrategien als Komponenten externer Wissensmanagementfähigkeiten können zwei Formen annehmen; Search Breadth (spiegelt die Anzahl der Quellen wider, die von Unternehmen erkundet werden) und Search Depth (die Bedeutung verschiedener Quellen, die erkundet werden). Bei der Analyse des Zusammenhangs zwischen Suche nach externem Wissen und Innovation, wird jedoch neben der zugrundeliegenden Allgemeingültigkeit des erworbenen Wissens vor allem die primäre Diversität der Wissenssuche als einflussreich auf die Dynamik verschiedener Arten von Innovation hervorgehoben. Diese Dissertation schlägt eine Suchstrategie vor, die die Vielfalt in der Suche dynamischer und rigoroser erfasst als andere Such Modi und analysiert die Auswirkungen der strategischen Search Diversity auf verschiedene Arten von Innovations. Es gibt drei originelle analytische Richtungen, die in dieser Arbeit untersucht werden, jede davon hat ihre eigenen neuartigen Analyseebenen: 1. Diversität der Wissenssuche und technologische Innovation verlängert auf: Einführung hybrider Suchstrategien zur Neutralisierung von Gegenwirkungen einzelner Suchstrategien, Integration von des moderierenden Mechanismus des Technologieerwerbs in die Beziehung zwischen Search Diversity und technologischer Innovation und Analyse der Rolle von Mergeranteils der Industrien in der Industrie-Search Diversity als endogenes Konstrukt 2. Diversität der Wissenssuche und organizational Innovation verlängert auf: Integration von Marktmechanismen in dieser Beziehung und Integration des exogenen Mechanismus der organisatorischen Innovationsdichte von Unternehmen in verschiedenen Industrien in diesem Rahmen 3. Diversität der Wissenssuche und Logistikinnovation verlängert auf: Integration von der moderierenden Rolle der Marktwettbewerbsintensität in dieser Beziehung und Integration des exogenen Mechanismus der Logistikinnovationsdichte der Industrien in diesem Rahmen.Competition is the driving force behind innovation and innovation is the reaction of firms to gain competitive advantage. There are different ways in which innovation and competition in the market interact based on the structural and interorganizational relations in industries. Whether firms intend to be first movers in the market or they intend to raise rivals’ costs for being innovative, it is the undeniable role of information that directs the consequences of all such scenarios. For firms to sustain and prosper while competing in their offerings it is vital to introduce processes and skills based on the knowledge they acquire -from market responses (demand and supply side) to all competing choices - to solve their future problems. Innovation as the upshot of competition is a dynamic process of knowledge analysis. How this knowledge is obtained and analyzed on its way to creativity depends on many interacting contextual, environmental and structural factors. Environmental turbulences on one hand draw firms’ attention into being innovative not to get behind in competition (Hannan & Freeman, 1977; Burgelman, 1991; Romanelli & Tushman, 1994; Child, 1997). On the other hand, how such strategies towards idea production yielding to sustainable competitive advantage is very much dependent on contextual framework of the firms (Burns & Stalker, 1961; Lawrence & Lorsch, 1967; Pugh et al., 1969; Blau, 1970; Perrow, 1970; Mintzberg, 1979; Chesbrough & Teece, 1998). Different paths directing those attributes and forces (environmental and contextual) into development of innovation are predominately determined by enterprises’ capacity in knowledge creation and knowledge aggregation (Aygris & Schoen, 1978; Nonaka & Takeuchi, 1995). In other words, it is the environmental dynamisms which provide synergies for firms to innovate (as a perspective for creating competitive advantage), there are enabling factors of innovation as a process (context) and there are functional ecosystems throughout which innovation becomes an output. As literature suggests (Cui, et al., 2005, Hock-Doepgen et al., 2021) such functional ecosystem constitutes the so-called knowledge infrastructure which embodies internal and external knowledge management capabilities. Internal capabilities constitute technology, culture and structure and external capabilities encapsulate knowledge acquisition, conversion and application. Innovative changes can take form in association with either of the elements embodied in knowledge infrastructure. Thus, innovation is not only a breakthrough product or technology being introduced into the market but it also comprises introduction or adoption of new business models or processes. Hence searching for knowledge from the outside world, assimilating it with internal stock and incorporating it into the innovation process plays substantial role in the success of firms’ innovative journeys. Although acquiring knowledge from external environment was exercised in practice (Teece, 1986; March, 1991) even before open innovation was theorized in the seminal work of Chesbrough (2003) (as searching and utilizing external knowledge), it was after his trend changing formulation that it became organized as a prominent element of firms’ knowledge infrastructure. Open innovation implies that knowledge development for successful innovation campaigns cannot be limited to firms’ internal capacities (Gassmann & Enkel, 2004; Dahlander & Gann, 2010) such as their internal R&D investments (Dominici & Levanti, 2011; Varga et al., 2014) and employees’ individual potentials (as partials of context) (Galende & De la Fuente, 2003). Rather, for firms to be able to catch up with the fast-changing market circumstances it is required to extend their search domain outside their boundaries. In fact, external sources of knowledge are the parties who shape up enterprises’ surroundings. Thus, acquiring information from those actors enriches firms’ (industries) idea cultivation to tackle environmental forces and to gain competitive advantage over their rivals. External knowledge strategies as components of external knowledge management capability can take different forms. Search breadth (reflecting number of sources being explored by firms) and search depth (referring to importance of different sources to explore) as prominent external knowledge acquisition practices have attracted much academic attention in open innovation literature (Katila & Ahuja, 2002; Laursen & Salter, 2006; Greco et al., 2015). Nevertheless, when analyzing how search for external knowledge affects technological and non-technological innovative transformations, in addition to the underlying generality of the acquired knowledge, it is the elemental diversity in knowledge search that is mostly emphasized to be influential on dynamics of different types of innovation rather than other aspects (Kaplan, 1998; Hargadon, 2002; Flor et al., 2018). This study proposes and codifies a search approach (as a component to search breadth) which captures diversity in search in a more dynamic and rigorous way than other search modes do. This novel search approach is utilized to analyze the impact of diversifying search (as a search strategy) for external knowledge on different types of innovation outcomes for enterprises. The role of knowledge (acquisition or development) as the most strategic resource of firms (Grant, 1996) on their way to innovative outcomes has been vastly highlighted. Furthermore, the effect of traditional external search strategies on some (rather than all) types of innovation has been treated but the dynamic role of competition in that type of literature has not been comprehensively taken into account. This thesis’s further novelty lies in investigation of how heterogenous knowledge if acquired from external sources is incorporated to explain desirability to initiate diversity of innovations in interaction either with firms’ internal knowledge management capabilities (such as technology) or with market dynamisms (such as competition intensity).Since uncertainties inherent in innovative attempts raises the desirability for variety in innovation (Nelson & Winter, 1977), I shed light on how such varied spectrum of innovations is explained by diversifying strategies in search for knowledge as an open innovation process. There are three main and original analytical directions investigated in this thesis each of which has their own novel layers of analysis: 1. Knowledge search diversity and technological innovation 2. Knowledge search diversity and organizational innovation 3. Knowledge search diversity and logistics innovation. The first direction extends towards: a) Introduction of hybrid search strategies for neutralizing counter-effects of individual search strategies on their way towards technological innovation. Such approach is developed based on the comparison made between the established patterns of search breadth and technological innovation and that of search diversity and technological innovation according to the outcomes of empirical analyses. b) Integration of the moderating mechanism of technology acquisition (machinery and software) into the relationship between search diversity and technological innovation. c) Integration of the industrys’ merger share into the search strategies framework and analyzing its role in industrys’ search diversity as an endogenous construct. The second direction extends towards: a) Integration of the moderating mechanisms of market competition intensity and demand uncertainty into the relationship between search diversity and different modes of organizational innovation. b) Integration of the exogenous mechanism of industrys’ organizational innovation density into the correlation of search diversity and of the moderating mechanisms with introduction of organizational innovation by firms in different industries. The third direction extends towards: a) Integration of the moderating role of market competition intensity into the relationship between search diversity and logistics innovation. b) Integration of the exogenous mechanism of industrys’ logistics innovation density into the correlation of search diversity and of the moderating mechanism with the introduction of logistics innovation by firms in different industries

Smart Specialisation – Towards a New Generation of Regional Innovation Strategies

Inteligentna specjalizacja stała się jednym z zasadniczych wątków współczesnych koncepcji zarządzania rozwojem regionalnym. W oryginale oznacza sztywny podział ról między regiony–liderzy innowacji i pozostałe regiony. Te pierwsze specjalizują się w tzw. technologiach ogólnego zastosowania i/lub ich kombinacji (np. bioinformatyce), drugie zaś w tzw. „koinwencji zastosowań”, czyli w imporcie technologii ogólnego zastosowania i wdrażaniu ich w jednym lub kilku obszarach regionalnej gospodarki. Tego typu koncepcja niesie ze sobą pewne niebezpieczeństwo, bo – jak wynika z doświadczeń międzynarodowych: 1) wysoki poziom innowacyjności wymaga wyrównanego poziomu konkurencyjności kompetencyjnej i technologicznej; 2) szybkość konwergencji konkurencyjności kompetencyjnej jest wyższa niż szybkość konwergencji konkurencyjności technologicznej, czemu również sprzyja dotychczasowy charakter międzynarodowego transferu technologii między liderami innowacji i pozostałymi regionami, ograniczający się (najczęściej) do technologii mniej lub bardziej przestarzałych. Stąd adaptacja koncepcji inteligentnej specjalizacji wymaga od każdego z regionów podwójnego wysiłku: a) znalezienia takich nisz technologicznych, w których mogą osiągnąć rolę lidera innowacji, i tym samym specjalizować się w rozwijaniu technologii ogólnego zastosowania; b) znalezienia takich sektorów / grup pokrewnych sektorów, gdzie mogą się specjalizować we wdrażaniu technologii rozwijanych przez innych liderów innowacji. Procedura określania takich obszarów inteligentnej specjalizacji uwzględnia przewagi konkurencyjne województwa, jego podstawowe zasoby (konkurencyjność technologiczną i konkurencyjność kompetencyjną) i potrzeby modernizacyjne jego bazy społeczno-ekonomicznej oraz globalne uwarunkowania

A hybrid approach to achieve organizational agility: An empirical study of a food company

Purpose: In today’s intense global competition, agility is advocated as a fundamental characteristic for business survival and competitiveness. The purpose of this paper is to propose a practical methodology to achieve and enhance organizational agility based on strategic objectives. Design/methodology/approach: In the first step, a set of key performance indicators (KPIs) of the organization being studied are recognized and classified under the perspectives of balanced scorecard (BSC). Critical success factors are then identified by ranking the KPIs according to their importance in achieving organizational strategic objectives using the Technique for Order of Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution (TOPSIS). In the second step, three houses of quality (HOQs) are constructed sequentially to identify and rank the main agile attributes, agile enablers, and improvement paths. In addition, in order to translate linguistics judgments of practitioners into numerical values in building HOQs, fuzzy logic is employed. Findings: The capability of the proposed methodology is demonstrated by applying it to a case of a multi-national food company in Iran. Through the application, the company could find the most suitable improvement paths to improve its organizational agility. Research limitations/implications: A limited number of KPIs were chosen due to computational and visual constraints related to HOQs. Another limitation, similar to other agility studies, which facilitate decision making among agility metrics, was that the metrics were more industry-specific and less inclusive. Practical implications: A strong practical advantage for the application of the methodology over directly choosing agility metrics without linking them is that through the methodology, the right metrics were selected that match organization’s core values and marketing objectives. While metrics may ostensibly seem unrelated or inappropriate, they actually contributed to the right areas where there were gaps between the current and desired level of agility. It would otherwise be impossible to choose the right metrics without a structured methodology. Originality/value: This paper proposes a novel methodology for achieving organizational agility. By utilizing and linking several tools such as BSC, fuzzy TOPSIS, and quality function deployment (QFD), the proposed approach enables organizations to identify the most appropriate agile attributes, agile enablers, and subsequently agile improvement paths

An integrated core competence evaluation framework for portfolio management in the oil industry

Drawing upon resource-based theory, this paper presents a core competence evaluation framework for managing the competence portfolio of an oil company. It introduces a network typology to illustrate how to form different types of strategic alliance relations with partnering firms to manage and grow the competence portfolio. A framework is tested using a case study approach involving face-to-face structured interviews. We identified purchasing, refining and sales and marketing as strong candidates to be the core competencies. However, despite the company's core business of refining oil, the core competencies were identified to be their research and development and performance management (PM) capabilities. We further provide a procedure to determine different kinds of physical, intellectual and cultural resources making a dominant impact on company's competence portfolio. In addition, we provide a comprehensive set of guidelines on how to develop core competence further by forging a partnership alliance choosing an appropriate network topology

Governance architectures for inter-organisational R&D collaboration

Inter-organizational relationships are becoming an increasingly important source of competitive advantage and innovation. This study looks at these relationships in the context of inter-organizational R&D collaborations in the European automotive industry. Previous work led to the proposal of a competence-based portfolio framework that explains the design of the inter-organizational architecture and an indicative relationship strategy. This framework comprises four distinct types of governance architecture and relationship strategy. This paper reports on the first confirmatory transfer study, conducted at Jaguar Land Rover, in the UK. The study illustrates developmental paths and patterns in the evolution of inter-organizational relationships using empirical insights. Their configuration and dynamic evolution is contingent upon the ‘engageability’ of the partner companies’ competences based on their attractiveness, transferability and maturity. The study shows that the contingency framework is transferable and practically useful, as well as yielding further practical narrative about inter-organizational practice