AN EVALUATION OF PROCESS‐ORIENTED SUPPLY CHAIN MANAGEMENT FRAMEWORKS

Supply chain management (SCM) is implemented by integrating corporate functions using business processes within and across companies. Several process‐oriented frameworks for SCM have been proposed but only two of these provide sufficient detail to enable implementation. We evaluate the Supply‐Chain Operations Reference (SCOR) framework and The Global Supply Chain Forum (GSCF) framework using four criteria and identify their relative strengths and weaknesses.     

Talent Management and HRM in Multinational companies in Beijing: Definitions,differences and drivers

Talent Management (TM) has attracted increasing attention from academics and practitioners in recent years, but there are many gaps and omissions left for further theoretical and empirical development. One line of debate has been whether TM is merely a re-packaging of what already exists, not being distinct from traditional HRM practices or disciplines. The paper has three main components: (i) a review of how ‘Talent’ and TM has been conceptualised in the literature and the outline of a framework we have derived therefrom which identifies four main perspectives on TM: exclusive-people; exclusive-position; inclusive-people; social capital; (ii) the presentation and analysis of our research findings relating to TM perspectives and practices in seven multinational corporations (MNCs) in Beijing; (iii) a concluding discussion which compares and contrasts our findings with the extant literature and our framework. Six of the companies had adopted ‘exclusive’ perspectives, seeing TM as ‘integrated, selective’ HRM. For some, this involved an ‘exclusive-people’ focus on certain groups of ‘high-performing’ or ‘high-potential’ people, whilst for others it meant an ‘exclusive-position’ focus on certain ‘key’ positions in the organization. Just one organization had adopted an ‘inclusive-people’ approach. Two of the companies emphasized ‘organizationally focussed competence development’, concentrating upon smooth talent flows and development, and moving towards a ‘social capital’ perspective which took cognizance of networks, contexts and relationships as well as human capital. The implications of our findings for research and practice are outlined.     

An empirical study about the impacts of China's accession to the WTO on the telecommunications industry in China

Post‐China's accession to the World Trade Organization (WTO), China's telecommunication industry now needs to face a much stronger competition in a relatively open market that has a number of diverse rivalries. There are specific benefits and risks associated with both domestic telecommunication (telecom) companies and foreign investors in the telecommunication or information technology area. To meet with these new challenges and take advantage of the competitive, strategic advantages to penetrate the market, both China's telecom industry and foreign investors must understand the impacts of China's accession to the WTO on its telecommunication industry and hence make the necessary adjustments and/or implementation improvements. In specific, we carefully examine the impacts such as prices, quality, and local protectionism in this article. We draw the findings based on the data collected from a survey and the resulting statistic analysis.     

The relationship between organizational culture and market orientation in the Greek telecommunication companies

The modern business environment is characterized by intense competition, which has led telecommunication companies to a continuous race towards gaining and maintaining a competitive advantage. In order to succeed, telecommunication companies “cultivate” market orientation and market oriented cultures as non-imitable characteristics, capable to ensure long–term corporate viability and growth. This paper provides an insight into the Greek telecommunication industry by: a) revealing the coordination between market orientation strategies with corresponding culture, b) the relationship between extrovert-type cultures with performance and c) how special traits of telecommunication providers (size and age) influence the degree of market orientation and the dominant culture type (introvert or extrovert). The paper contributes: a) to the creation of national cultural profile in the telecommunication industry, which can become a starting point in a wider trial to create a European industry profile, b) to the empirical testing of the correlation between culture and market orientation and c) to the examination of the extent to which background factors (such as firms’ age and size) should be taken into account during the implementation of a business strategy.     

Transforming under deep uncertainty: A strategic perspective on risk management

Companies increasingly face the need for transformation in today’s rapidly changing business environment, characterized by major shifts in technology, regulation, and customer behavior. A lack of strategic risk insight and foresight leaves many incumbents insufficiently prepared in the face of such deep uncertainty. We argue that traditional risk management falls short because it predominantly focuses on strategy execution while leaving strategy formulation largely untouched. Moreover, an administrative-heavy risk management process can create strategic inertia and a misleading sense of control. In today’s dynamic business context, companies must not only increase the speed and impact of their strategy execution but also continuously explore the development of new strategies in response to disruptive events or emerging opportunities. Our research shows how leading companies develop a strategic risk management (SRM) capability to increase their resilience and agility in response to deep uncertainty. SRM takes a strategic, forward-looking perspective and focuses on strengthening processes, people, and practices for purposefully integrating risk into the strategy formulation process. This article offers a framework with three proven configurations of content and timing integration, risk management roles, and leading practices that enable effective SRM.     

An ‘Algorithmic Links with Probabilities’ Concordance for Trademarks with an Application Towards Bilateral IP Flows

Trademarks (TMs) shape the competitive landscape of markets for goods and services in all countries. As a key element of branding, they can inform consumers about the quality and content of goods and services. Yet, researchers are largely unable to conduct rigorous empirical analysis of TMs in the global economy because TM data and economic data are organised differently and cannot be analysed jointly at the industry or sector level. We propose an ‘algorithmic links with probabilities’ (ALP) approach to match TM data to economic data and enable joint analysis with these data. Specifically, we construct a NICE class‐level concordance that maps TM data into trade and industry categories forward and backward. This concordance allows researchers to analyse differences in TM usage across both economic and TM sectors. We apply this ALP concordance for TMs to characterise patterns in TM registrations across countries and industries and to investigate some key determinants of international technology flows by comparing bilateral TM registrations and bilateral patent grants. We find that international patenting and TM flows are jointly determined by trade‐related influences with significant differences in intellectual property usage across industry sectors and income levels.     

A supply chain management framework for services

While services represent the largest sector of the global economy, 86.8% in the United States, most supply chain management (SCM) research is focused on product flows. Executives in manufacturing firms have benefited from frameworks created to implement SCM processes, but this is not the case for their counterparts in service companies. The two most cited SCM frameworks for services have methodological and conceptual deficiencies. Drawing upon the service-dominant logic of marketing and using an empirical research approach, we developed supply chain structure maps for nine service firms. Our findings indicate that the supply chain structure maps of service companies are comparable to those in the product-based literature, which supports the service-dominant logic. Then, we identified the six key processes that constitute a framework to manage service supply chains. The customer relationship management and the supplier relationship management processes form the critical links in the supply chain, and the other four processes are coordinated through this linkage. The SCM framework for services provides direction for executives in service firms who need to increase cross-functional integration within their firms and with other members of the supply chain. For academics, 12 avenues for future research are identified.     

Sluggish giants,sticky cultures,and dynamic capability transformation

Using a theoretical framework derived from contemporary literature this paper investigates whether large and culturally dominant firms can transform their capabilities over time. Strategic capabilities, as articulated in theory, include resource accumulation and resource configuration. To these is added the capability of resource utilization which comes about because of tacit and inimitable intra-firm coordination skills and is a key performance measurement metric. This article evaluates whether large firms in the U.S. telecommunications industry have been able to effect a transformation in their strategic performance over a 16 year period of time: 1975 to 1990. Since the late 1960s and early 1970s many measures have been undertaken to restructure the industry environment, and these culminated in the 1984 divestiture by AT&T of this 22 Bell Operating Companies (BOCs) to seven Regional Holding companies (RHCs). Simultaneously a series of steps opened competition in many markets for not only the RHCs but for the other local operating companies, of which there are approximately 25 large ones, which in many cases are bigger than some of the companies belonging to the RHC fold. The local operating companies have faced a major transformation in their environment in the last 10 years. Once protected monopolies, they now face increasing competition in many market segments, which were once their profit sanctuaries enabling them to cross-subsidize many unprofitable operations. For the larger operating companies once owned by AT&T there was the shock of divestiture and re-birth, providing them an opportunity to engage in entrepreneurially oriented behavior. Thus, the U.S. telecommunications industry provides a useful laboratory within which to analyze performance and capability transformation. Additionally, one of the key issues that the literature is concerned with is the transformation in the performance of existing organizations. This article provides evidence on the key issue of corporate performance transformation for the principal firms that comprise one of the most important industries of contemporary times. It is a transformation that continues at an even faster pace today.The results show that in a dynamic setting size no longer materially influences negative performance. Inertia arguments about the ability of large firms to effect change are not validated in the context of a dynamic U.S. telecommunications industry. With a larger variety and pool of resources available, larger firms can undergo transformation through a process of dynamic learning as effectively as smaller firms. The relative transformation of the erstwhile Bell Operating Companies is a testimony to this assertion. The results have some implications for downsizing. Received wisdom means that less is better and smaller is swifter. Downsizing means dispersal of assets and resources, particularly human resources which embody firm-specific skills and knowledge. Which types of resources are lost in this process is critical to the eventual success of such endeavors. With downsizing, the ability of large firms to transform themselves via internal learning may be lost. Dynamic learning implies information scale economy exploitation, and to the extent that critical mass is reduced through downsizing there is lesser diffusion of information and knowledge. As a qualitatively important part of this human capital mass is reduced, there is less impact of future learning as firm-specific knowledge, which could be combined with emergent information to create new capabilities disappears. In such circumstances whether large firms can transform themselves successfully is a salient issue that ought to be further evaluated.     

Collaborative Strategies in the Event of Technological Discontinuities: The Case of Nokia in the Mobile Telecommunication Industry

The paper examines the extent to which collaboration between large and small companies has been able to deal with the effects of discontinuous technological change. In applying an evolutionary perspective, the paper examines the process by which technological competencies and resources of large firms evolve and its effects on the characteristics of their collaboration with smaller companies. In focusing on the issue of complementary between local and international sourcing of capabilities and resources in the mobile telecommunication industry, it combines an empirical analysis of the structure of Finnish Science Parks with an examination of internationalisation strategies of large Finnish companies. The papershows that Nokia has increasingly become engaged in sourcing capabilities internationally, this might, however, pose some long-term problems for the local embeddedness of the company in Finland.     

Dynamic Embeddedness in Chinese Firm Internationalization

This article presents a multilevel framework to analyze the motivations and location choices of Chinese OFDIs. We contribute to theory‐integration on Chinese OFDI flows and patterns by suggesting a framework that combines country‐, industry‐ and firm‐level analyses and by reflecting aspects from the resource‐based view (firm‐specific advantages), institutional‐based view (push/pull home‐ and host‐­country factors), and network‐based view (network relations). We also explicitly incorporate “time” as a variable into our framework by introducing and explaining the concept of dynamic embeddedness as an interaction dimension to reflect the inherent dynamics on all levels and actors. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

From Supply Chains to Supply Ecosystems: Implications for Strategic Sourcing Research and Practice

Traditionally, sourcing decisions such as what to buy and from whom to buy it were viewed as clerical in nature. Today, however, many executives view sourcing decisions as strategic and these decisions are being made from more prominent positions within firms. Indeed, over time more companies are embracing the concept of strategic sourcing—making acquisition decisions with the intent of creating value and achieving a competitive advantage. In this article, we introduce the Special Topic Forum articles on strategic sourcing and performance. Each offers important implications for strategic sourcing research and practice. An overall implication is that some traditional supply chains appear to be giving way to supply ecosystems, which represent a set of interdependent and coordinated organizations that share common adaptive challenges and that collectively shape the creation and nurturing of a sourcing base that contributes to competitive advantage and superior performance. We offer several theoretical perspectives that hold promise for explaining supply ecosystem functioning and outcomes. In terms of practice, firms need to adapt their strategic sourcing to this evolution or run the risk of being weakened.     

民用航空制造业供应链协调管理的策略研究——以波音公司为例

随着我国民用航空制造业的发展,其供应链的协调管理成为一个迫切需要研究的课题。本论文研究了波音公司在供应链协调方面的策略,以资借鉴。     

传输通信接入技术分析

目前,通信业处于急剧变革的时代,业务的发展导致电信网产生巨大的变革,未来的业务发展也对传输网络的技术提出了新的要求.本文主要分析阐释了"多业务传送平台(MSTP)、自动交换光网络(ASON)、城域波分(DWDM)、光传送网OTN、末端接入技术"等五种主流技术及它们的应用.     

International acquisition processes: A cultural analysis of GE Appliances’ business transformation

International acquisitions of large, well-established western organizations by Chinese companies are now common. The cultural differences between the actors are often critical amid these processes. However, they can also be an opportunity for transformation and renewal for the acquired businesses. Regarding the dimension of organizational culture, this article analyzes the transformation of a 100-year-old American firm, General Electric Appliances (GEA), after its acquisition by the Chinese multinational company Haier. As a result, the company went from a nonrevenue growth business to a double-digit growth company in only 5 years. To study this transformation, we apply a cultural analysis framework based on Edgar and Peter Schein’s work. This article contributes to the debate on corporate cultural analysis in the context of international acquisitions by providing managers and scholars with a detailed account of GEA’s transformation.     

Stakeholder Engagement: Keeping Business Legitimate in Austria’s Natural Mineral Water Bottling Industry

Stakeholder maneuvers such as Internet media attacks or consumer boycotts can have devastating effects on companies. By contrary, vital relationships between companies and their stakeholders can be highly beneficial. A review of the existing stakeholder-management literature suggests to engage stakeholders in business activities in a positive manner. However, the types of successful engagement activities differ across industries. The purposes of this article are to develop an explanatory framework based on the literature findings, to introduce stakeholder-engagement literature to a segment of the water sourcing industry, and to unfold industry’s stakeholder-engagement measures. Based on a content analysis of 11 cases, we investigate if and how companies in the natural mineral water bottling industry in Austria inform, communicate, and therefore engage with stakeholders. It became evident that fewer than three of eleven companies published information on sustainability or corporate social responsibility reports, open house days, workshops, or international community activities. Most companies maintained a website for their bottled natural mineral water or communicated quality consciousness. We conclude that most companies in the Austrian mineral water industry could increase their stakeholder-engagement activities to positively respond to challenging business environments.     

“三因素”理论在客户满意度研究中的探析

随着市场竞争日益加剧,企业获得和保有客户的能力经受着不断的市场冲击,企业获得一个新客户所需的费用大大超过保持一个老客户所需费用,这使得企业界越来越重视客户满意、以及产品和服务的客户满意研究。利用著名的双因素理论提出三因素满意研究模型,并以电信ISP提供的上网账号服务为例进行分析,为企业和市场研究人员提供了更新的客户满意度研究的视角。     

Identifying supply chain solutions in the UK house building sector

This paper identifies the problems of the UK housing industry and offers solutions to improving its overall performance and competitiveness. The terrain scanning methodology, which is a supply chain diagnostic, is used to gain an in-depth understanding of various business participants and supply chain processes. A quasi-Delphi study is used to identify areas for improving business and supply chain processes. The findings reveal that a change of “mind-set”, a shift toward process orientation and improved communications, are essential actions that need to be addressed by the UK housing sector to improve its performance and competitiveness. The paper concludes by suggesting that these three actions will assist UK housing companies in their move towards implementing supply chain management strategies.     

对我国通信运营商竞争与合作的博弈分析

本文认为,由于存在个人理性与集体理性之间的矛盾,短期内通信运营商在价格竞争博弈中可能选择相互压价的非合作策略,但是从长远来看,还有实现合作的可能性;选择互联互通对于通信运营商各方来说都是有利的。文章提出,在电信产业的发展中,政府应当发挥积极作用,制定市场规则,并公正地执行规则,从宏观的角度对通信运营商进行积极的引导,促成通信运营商走向良性竞争,实现共赢;要最终解决我国通信运营商之间存在的恶性价格战、互联互通障碍等问题,需要对国有通信运营商的公司治理结构进行改革,使通信运营商成为真正以赢利为目的的市场主体。     

Institutional and corporate drivers of global talent management: Evidence from the Arab Gulf region

This study analyses how talent management (TM) is molded by institutional and corporate drivers. We borrow from the vast institutional literature to understand how organizations adopt and implement TM practices within the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) context. This context is valuable not only because it tackles an under-researched region, but also because the type of variables found further our understanding of TM processes in non-Western contexts. Companies abide by localization rules to sustain their “legal” legitimacy, while trying to improve efficiency through actions that enhance their economic sustainability. Companies try to strike a strategic balance between local adaptation and global assimilation of their TM processes. We conclude by presenting a framework that portrays how various forces impact the TM process.