Micropolitical dynamics of interlingual translation processes in an MNC subsidiary

An analysis of the process whereby a Polish subsidiary of a North American pharmaceutical company translated a set of corporate values into Polis

Sensemaking, Sense-censoring and Strategic Inaction: The Discursive Enactment of Power and Politics in a Multinational Corporation

In this paper we contribute to knowledge of power and politics in international business by developing the understanding of the role of discourse and sensemaking in the subsidiary–headquarters relationship. Based on an ethnographic action research study in a British subsidiary of an American multinational corporation, we conduct an ethnomethodologically informed discourse analysis of the accounts, stories and metaphors through which power and politics in the subsidiary–headquarters relationship were created as social facts. We then broaden the analytic frame to trace longitudinally how these facts led the subsidiary managers to hide, dilute or restrict their ‘local sense’ from the headquarters, including their knowledge of the local market and their preferred strategic direction for the firm: a process we term sense-censoring. We reveal how the subsidiary used power and politics as reasoning procedures to decide against pursuing a preferred course of action, despite a strongly held belief to the contrary, due to anticipated reactions or counter-actions, thereby transforming potential strategic action into inaction. Sense-censoring is significant for international business management, we propose, because it impacts upon knowledge flows, innovation diffusion and organizational learning. We conclude by outlining the implications of systems of sense-censoring and strategic inaction for the management of global–local relations in multinational corporations

Global Transfer and Indian Management A Historical Hybridity Perspective

<p>The goal of this paper is to contribute to a better understanding of Indian management and to challenge more generally ahistorical and essentialist notions of indigenous management perspectives.</p><p>Drawing selectively on postcolonial theory, we suggest that a historical hybridity perspective serves as a crucial heuristic device to understand the nature of Indian management and its globalization related transition.</p><p>Discussing the example of the local mismatch and transfer outcome related to a global transfer initiative in a German subsidiary in India, we illustrate the analytical value of a historical hybridity perspective.</p><p>Our paper concludes that the postcolonial notions of 'hybridity' or 'inbetweenness', are crucial to understand the nature of management in India and in emerging markets more generally as they move us beyond reductionist Eastern vs. Western or indigenous vs. global dichotomies.</p>