The Dynamics of International Market Withdrawal

This study focuses on the decision-making process of international market withdrawal within the scope of international market portfolio management. A comparative study of eight withdrawal cases in four multinational firms results in a six-phased decision-making model that is driven by threat-rigidity behavior, failure-induced learning and political dynamics. Two types of international market withdrawal are identified. On the one hand, a tactical withdrawal is the outcome of threat-rigidity and exploitative learning at the level of executive management. A strategic withdrawal, on the other hand, is characterized by a process of failure-induced exploratory learning initiated by middle level challengers. In contrast to a tactical withdrawal, which remains an isolated decision and does not interfere with other international ventures of the business unit, a strategic withdrawal turns out to be a germ of strategic (re)orientation of the business unit’s entire international market portfolio. Whether a market withdrawal turns out to be tactical or strategic ultimately depends on the autonomy, the amount and the relevance of challengers’ market and business knowledge.Economics ;

National culture and management: the Greek luxury hotel GMs' case

This paper explores the interplay between managerial work and national culture. More specifically it investigates General Managers' (GMs) work in Greek luxury (4 and 5*) hotels from a contextual perspective, focused in national culture. The wider context of the discussion in this paper revolves around the 'global-local' question from an international hospitality industry perspective. During the second half of the twentieth century, the idea for the creation of a truly global management cohort found warm support from north American multinational companies who experienced a rapid pace of internationalisation in the past four decades. Hospitality and tourism were among the first internationalised industries in the aftermath of World War Two (Nickson, 1998; Nickson and Warhust, 2001). The dominant Anglo-Saxon view for universal management practices through the employment of ‘best practices’ in international hotel operators, has been challenged since the advent of cross-cultural management and international human resources management (IHRM) theorists in the early 1980s. Those theorists believe that it is difficult to imagine that a single practice or set of practices would emerge as 'best' in any sense of the word, particularly in globalised organisations (Thomas, 2008). Thus, the dynamic and complex nature of the management function in global hospitality business today and the realisation that what works effectively in one country may not be as efficient in another, has led management scholars and practicing managers in continuous efforts to enhance their understanding of this context and its effects on international (hotel) managers. This paper focuses in the Greek context since the country is among the most popular tourist destinations in the world. Today the hospitality and tourism sector in Greece contributes approximately 15 % of the National Gross Domestic Product (G.D.P.) ranking third in the E.U. after Spain (18.38 %) and Portugal (15.40 %) according to the W.T.T.C. (2010). The hospitality and tourism sector occupies in total eight hundred eight thousand employees, 18% of the country’s entire labour force (SETE, 2003). The authors of this paper argue that managerial work in Greek luxury hotels cannot be unaffected from the strong national context, despite the great pressures for standardisation and homogenisation with the international hospitality industry standards. The existing literature indicates that the Greek context influences managerial work to a certain degree (Bourantas and Papadakis,1996; Makridakis et al. 1997; Papalexandris and Nikandrou, 2000). The high rates of “in-group-collectivism” (Hofstede, 1980/1991; Tromernaars, 1993; Javidan and House, 2001), the values of ‘filotimo’ (Triandis et al. 1968; Broome, 1996), Trust (Fukuyama, 1995) and Humanism (Lessem and Neubauer, 1994; Hampden-Turner and Trompernaars, 1994) are characteristics that differentiate Greek GMs’ behaviour comparing to the so called ‘western’ management style in international hotels. This context also influences the way GMs perform their roles (Mintzberg, 1973 / 1994) and the competencies framework (Dulewicz and Herbert, 1991/1999) required to perform these roles. A qualitative research was conducted in 16 luxury (4 & 5*) city and resort hotels in four popular destinations: Athens, Thessaloniki, Crete and Rhodes. In total 32 GMs and their assistants participated in this country case study. The research tool included in-depth semi-structured interviews, the employment of a Personal Competencies Framework (PCF) questionnaire, non participant observations and collection of company documents related to managerial work. All data were triangulated in order to enhance the validity and reliability of this study. This research's findings indicated that the 'base requirements' of managerial work in Greek luxury hotels appear to be similar and compatible with the international industry standards. What actually changes is the level of formality exercised in managerial and HRM practices. A key theme that emerges from this study is the critical role of the hotel’s ownership status. Thus, local companies (family and local chain hotels) employ a great number of managerial and HRM practices that incorporate a high level of informality, meaning the absence of written rules and procedures. On the other hand, Greek national chains and MNCs demonstrate a high level of formality, regulated by written policies and rules. The Greek context influences the hotel managers' conceptions of work roles and competencies to a great extent in family and local hotel chains, and to a moderate extent to Greek national chains. A handful (less than ten in Greece) of managed MNC hotel chains do not seem to be influenced by the Greek context; on the other hand franchised MNCs are managed in the same manner as national Greek hotel chains. Overall, the influence of the Greek context was evident to a certain degree, in all Greek owned hotels. Based on the research findings, three distinctive profiles of luxury hotel GMs where identified: the 'native' GM; the 'Glocal' GM; and the 'Greek Global' GM. As a concluding point it can be argued that both divergence and convergence contextual forces coexist and shape the GMs' work in Greek luxury hotels. Further research is needed to fully understand and appreciate the effects of those forces in GMs' work

Integrating Knowledge Modelling in Business Process Management

In this paper we present a new approach for integrating Business Process Management and Knowledge Management. We focus on the modelling of weakly-structured knowledge-intensive business processes. We develop a framework for modelling this type of processes that explicitly considers knowledge-related tasks and knowledge objects and present a workflow tool that is an implementation of our theoretical meta-model. As an example, we sketch one case study, the process for granting full old age pension as it is performed in the Greek Social Security Institution. Finally we briefly describe some related approaches and compare them to our work and draw the main conclusions and further research directions

Progressivity and Flexibility in Developing an Effective Competition Regime: Using Experiences of Poland, Ukraine, and South Africa for developing countries

The paper discusses the role of the concept of special and differential treatment in the framework of regional trade agreements for the development of a competition regime. After a discussion of the main characteristics and possible shortfalls of those concepts, three case countries are assessed in terms of their experience with progressivity, flexibility, and technical and financial assistance: Poland was led to align its competition laws to match the model of the EU. The Ukraine opted voluntarily for the European model, this despite its intense integration mainly with Russia. South Africa, a developing country that emerged from a highly segregated social fabric and an economy dominated by large conglomerates with concentrated ownership. All three countries enacted (or comprehensively reformed) their competition laws in an attempt to face the challenges of economic integration and catch up development on the one hand and particular social problems on the other. Hence, their experience may be pivotal for a variety of different developing countries who are in negotiations to include competition issues in regional trade agreements. The results suggest that the design of such competition issues have to reflect country-particularities to achieve an efficient competition regime.special and differential treatment, progressivity, flexibility, competition law

Risks and opportunities in adolescence: Understanding adolescent mental health difficulties

Widespread concerns about adolescent mental health difficulties have generated intense debate and resulted in adolescence being high on the policy agenda. Recent government investments aim to ameliorate widely criticised services for adolescence, and redress the negative images of young people. In order to explore the current state of knowledge regarding adolescent mental health, and relate this knowledge to practice, this paper explores three key questions: are adolescent mental health problems increasing, are adolescents dislocated by new and different contexts, and what are the levels of mental health difficulties in adolescence? The paper suggests that evidence that adolescents are 'getting worse' is not convincing, but it is clear that the contexts for adolescence have changed radically and this affects adolescent developmental processes. Adolescent mental health difficulties require a current, developmentally relevant and oriented approach to enhance effective understanding and intervention. Adults in general and professionals in particular need to be able to engage with and not take flight from the impact of adolescent emotionality

Cultivating Collaborative Improvement: An Action Learning Approach

As competitive pressure mounts to innovate in the global knowledge economy, many organizations are exploring new ways of collaborating with their supply chain partners. However, the process of implementing collaborative initiatives across disparate members of supply networks is fraught with difficulties. One approach designed to tackle the difficulties of organizational change and inter-organizational improvement in practice is `action learning¿. This paper examines the experiential lessons that arise when cultivating collaborative improvement in an interorganizational learning environment. The authors, acting as action researchers, facilitated a practical learning program in an Extended Manufacturing Enterprise involving a large system integrator in the automotive industry and three of its\ud suppliers. Based on this experience, a practical learning model is offered to promote and facilitate inter-organizational change as part of a collaborative improvement process

Chinese Workers in Comparative Perspective

[Excerpt] As the “world’s factory” China exerts an enormous pressure on workers around the world. Many nations have had to adjust to a new global political and economic reality, and so has China. Its workers and its official trade union federation have had to contend with rapid changes in industrial relations. Anita Chan argues that Chinese labor is too often viewed from a prism of exceptionalism and too rarely examined comparatively, even though valuable insights can be derived by analyzing China’s workforce and labor relations side by side with the systems of other nations. The contributors to Chinese Workers in Comparative Perspective compare labor issues in China with those in the United States, Australia, Japan, India, Pakistan, Germany, Russia, Vietnam, and Taiwan. They also draw contrasts among different types of workplaces within China. The chapters address labor regimes and standards, describe efforts to reshape industrial relations to improve the circumstances of workers, and compare historical and structural developments in China and other industrial relations systems

Learning from environmental actors about environmental developments: the case of international organizations

This article makes a case for viewing international governmental organizations (IOs) as corporate agents capable of learning. In doing so, it attempts to go beyond prevailing conceptions of IOs as means or settings for multilateral negotiation and bargaining. The proposed theoretical framework argues from an organizational learning perspective. By integrating notions from neo-institutionalism and policyanalysis it tries to capture the impact of IOs' publicness on learning processes. The focus is on IOs' relations with stakeholders and constituencies for the development and implementation of transboundary policies. These interactions are seen as a means to learn about external demands, expectations and expertise. Their impact on the internal dynamics in IOs tends to be of a dual nature: enhanced adaptability in its margins and buffering the organizational core from environmental fluctuations. Hence, some skepticism is appropriate in assessing IOs' capacity to engage in profound changes as a result of learning. It rests on the contention that the social constitution of the organization-environment nexus and its linkages with intraorganizational processes is of crucial importance for IOs' ability to learn about environmental changes and developments. Emphasis is placed on the contested and controversial nature of knowledge absorption and the limiting effect of administrative routines and procedures on IOs' absorptive capacity. -- Im vorliegenden Aufsatz wird der Versuch unternommen, internationale gouvernmentale Organisationen als lernfähige korporative Akteure zu betrachten. Damit soll gezeigt werden, dass internationale Organisationen weder als Instrumente mitgliedstaatlicher Interessen noch als Arenen multilateraler Verhandlungsprozesse hinreichend verstanden werden können. In der Perspektive des Organisationslernens wird danach gefragt, wie internationale Organisationen im Zuge des Interaktionsgeschehens mit Akteuren aus ihrem Umfeld über äußere Veränderungen und Trends lernen. Dabei geht es um die Vermittlung als auch die Interpretation der von außen an internationale Organisationen herangetragenen Erwartungen, Anforderungen, Ideen und Wissen. Ziel des Papiers ist die Entwicklung eines theoretischen Analyserahmens, der das Interaktionsgeschehen zwischen internationalen Organisationen und den ihre Umwelt repräsentierenden Akteuren als Auslöser für organisationale Lernprozesse begreift und gleichzeitig auch institutionelle, kulturelle und politisch-interessenbezogene Bedingungen berücksichtigt. Die aus dem Spannungsfeld zwischen Organisation und Umwelt resultierenden Lernprozesse sind dualer Natur: Erhöhte Anpassungsfähigkeit in den Grenzbereichen internationaler Organisationen geht mit Abpufferung des Organisationskerns von Umweltfluktuationen einher. Diese Einschätzung gründet auf der Prämisse der sozialen Konstituierung des Organisations-Umwelt Nexus und dessen Verbindungen mit organisationsinternen Prozessen. Darüber hinaus wird die politische Bedingtheit organisationaler Wissensprozessierung und der Einfluss administrativer Routinen und Verfahren auf die Aufnahmefähigkeit internationaler Organisationen betont.