Adapting a book to make a film: how strategy is adapted through professional practices of marketing middle managers

Abstract

For an organisation to be competitive its strategy must be highly responsive to both environmental challenges and customers continuously shifting demands. Yet many organisations treat strategy making as an exclusively top management concern, even though the top management team is often remote from the daily interactions and communications taking place at the organisation, market, and customer interface. We challenge the assumption that strategy making ‘belongs’ to top managers and argue that marketing middle managers, possessing expert market and customer knowledge and insights, adapt top manager’s strategy to shifting customer demands in a changing environment. We explore this argument by adopting a strategy-as-practice perspective and analysing marketing middle manager’s practices across three case companies operating in a dynamic retail environment. Our research enables two key contributions. Our primary confirmation is to demonstrate that marketers are not passive implementers, but active adapters of top management strategy through three critical practices of sensing, challenging, and transmitting. We use the novel analogy of how adapting a book to make a film involves minor changes to the story line and characters to suit the new medium and to illustrate the strategically relevant and influential role marketing plays in adapting the strategy developed by the top management team for implementation. By demonstrating the value of the strategic practices of functional middle managers we also contribute to the growing debate of the need for greater inclusion and transparency in strategy making.     

Social Alliance and Employee Voluntary Activities: A Resource-Based Perspective

The corporate social responsibility literature devotes relatively little attention to the strategic role played by employee voluntary activities (EVAs) in social alliances. Using the resource-based perspective of the organization to frame the data collection and the analyses, this article investigates: (1) the role of EVAs in the development of corporate and non-profit organizations (NPOs) competitive assets and (2) the management approaches to how both parties can develop their own resources by combining them with the shared resources with the purpose of enhancing its competitive advantage in its own sector. The database is composed of 70 specifically designed interviews with managers of UK-based firms and NPOs. The analyses suggest, among other things, that the majority of corporate and non-profit managers find that EVAs generate substantial tangible and intangible benefits for their respective organisations, creating genuine synergies. We also find evidence of a general preference for the management approaches of such programmes in both types of organisation.     

Knowledge of Inter-customer Relations as a Source of Value Creation and Commitment in Financial Service Firm's Intermediation

This paper develops a knowledge perspective on value creation in organisations that employ mediating technology to facilitate inter-customer relations. Mediators, individually and collectively, build networks of customers between whom linking can take place, and they provide services that facilitate inter-customer exchanges. Earlier research has shown the importance of size and standardisation in mediation. A different stream of research has shown that contextual knowledge is important for problem solving and innovation in organisations. Combining theories of mediating technology and situated problem solving, the paper posits that inter-customer relations constitute the fundamental context for value creation of firms using the mediating technology. LISREL is used to test relationship-level, cross-sectional hypotheses that link knowledge of inter-customer relationships, added value, and customer commitment to bank services for small firms. This work extends Thompson's work on mediating technology with implications for organisation action by demonstrating that mediators' knowledge of inter-customer relationships is an important resource in intermediation. Three contributions are made to strategic management and organisation theory. First, the paper provides a deeper understanding of the relationship between knowledge and committed customers. Second, fundamental resources are developed for firms using mediating technology. Finally, the use of the situated knowledge concept is extended to inter-customer relations, thus explaining performance beyond the contexts to which the concept has previously been applied. The findings have implications for segmentation practices, organisation domain decisions and the corresponding organisational structures, and practices that can provide effective service to inter-customer relations rather than to atomistic independent customers.     

Making bottom-up and top-down processes meet in public innovation

Innovations in an organisation derive from multiple sources. In the public sector, users and the policy sphere provide important but often unconnected impulses for innovation. These impulses are transmitted to the organisation by grassroots employees who interact with users and managers who implement policy requirements. The paper examines the actors and activities that coordinate bottom-up and top-down initiatives and promote their development into innovations. It creates a theoretical framework that combines the views of employee-driven innovation and strategic reflexivity and supplements them with an analysis of coordination in innovation processes. The functioning of this framework is illustrated in the context of children's day care services. The results highlight the central role of middle managers and provide new knowledge regarding their ‘bridging’ activities in innovation. The adjustment of bottom-up and top-down processes requires the personal involvement of managers, and the creation of communication arenas, networks and mediating tools.     

Learning,knowledge productivity and strategic progress

Learning that yields strategically valuable knowledge is vital to an organisation’s progress towards its strategic goals. In increasingly turbulent environments, all types of knowledge have value; the development of knowledge must therefore be a responsibility shared by all organisational members, includ‐ing human resource development professionals. A literature review across three related fields points to the importance of an integrative approach to learning and knowledge processes in an organisation, if they are to aid strategic progress. It suggests the particular importance of corporate vision, of organisational context and of management action, and also indicates some roles and tasks for HRD professionals.     

The micro-foundations of strategic ambidexterity: Chinese cross-border M&As,Mid-View thinking and integration management

Chinese cross-border mergers and acquisitions (M&As) display several unique properties in relation to the ways in which their international business operations are organised and managed. Their seemingly puzzling ‘light-touch’ integration approach can be significantly understood from a strategic ambidexterity perspective: on the one hand, the ‘light-touch’ enables the exploitation of the targets’ existing knowledge bases; on the other hand, elements of the ‘light-touch’ facilitate the exploration of the new knowledge arising from the collaboration between targets and acquirers. However, an important theoretical gap remains: why do Chinese companies deploy such a strategic ambidexterity approach in their post-acquisition integrations? This paper aims to fill this gap by proposing Mid-View thinking as a micro-foundation of strategic ambidexterity in integration management from a cultural and philosophical perspective. To illuminate our conceptualization and argument, we conducted qualitative in-depth interviews with CEOs/high-level managers of acquired German companies. Communication approach and organizational control—as two critical aspects in integration management—reveal how Mid-View thinking can serve as a micro-foundation of strategic ambidexterity. We conclude this paper by presenting its theoretical contributions, managerial implications, and future research directions.     

The end of silence? Qualitative findings on corporate auditory identity from the UK

Sensory dimensions of corporate identity such as auditory identity are nearly absent in academic literature so far. This paper addresses this shortage by presenting qualitative findings from interviews with brand consultants and managers on the nascent topic of auditory identity. Findings include, inter alia, strong support for the construct definition of auditory identity as proposed in this paper. Moreover, factors driving corporate auditory identity management at an organisation are examined. Furthermore, based on the conceptual similarity between visual and auditory identity consequences as perceived by managers are discussed. Moreover, findings addressing type of company, type of business and industry sector are presented. Finally, findings advocating corporate auditory identity as a valid ingredient of corporate identity management are presented and academic and managerial implications are given.     

The Question of Ethical Hypocrisy in Human Resource Management in the U.K. and Irish Charity Sectors

Whilst there is a growing volume of literature exploring the ethical implications of organisational change for HRM and the ethical aspects of certain HRM activities, there have been few published U.K. studies of how HR managers actually behave when faced with ethical dilemmas in their work. This paper seeks to enhance the foundations of such knowledge through an examination of the influence of organisational values on the ethical behaviour of Human Resource Managers within a sample of charities in the U.K. and the Republic of Ireland. A qualitative research design is adopted utilising semi-structured interviews. Findings highlight ethical inconsistency in people management in the charity sector arising from the clear application of strong and explicit organisational values to external client groups but their limited influence on people management strategies and practices within the organisation. Many of the ethical issues faced by HRM professionals in both countries arise from this inconsistency. In their handling of ethical dilemmas, the HRM professionals exhibit a combination of a care ethic and a concern for justice but it is also clear that in situations of management intransigence, a desire to be conscience driven often gives way to a contingent approach. Whilst respondents considered it inappropriate for the HRM function to be the conscience of the organisation, it is seen to have a key role in providing management with advice on ethical action. However, the ability of HRM to influence ethical behaviour is highly dependent on the status of the function within the organisation.     

Holding up the mirror: The impact of strategic procurement practices on account management

Procurement has grown up. It is now a strategic business function that increasingly recognizes the importance of strategic supplier relationships, a reflection of key account management. It is time to assess the impact of this shift on the profession and practice of account management. This paper examines customer adoption of strategic procurement and then discusses the implications this has for account managers at the suppliers serving these customers. New techniques are emerging in these special relationships, including the use of psychological contracts and co-measurement and monitoring. Perceived fairness will also have a major impact on the customer's view of their suppliers. Account managers must recognize these changes or fall victim to supplier delusion: the belief that they are performing better than they really are.     

Exploring the Boundaries of Human Resource Managers’ Responsibilities

This article addresses two longstanding challenges for human resource (HR) managers; how far they can and should represent the interests of both management and workers and how they can gain the power to do so. Adopting a Kantian perspective, it is argued that to pursue an ethical human resource management (HRM), HR managers need to go some way to resolving both. Three possible avenues are considered. Contemporary approaches to organisation of the HR role associated with the work of Ulrich are explored as a means of enhancing power, but rejected on the basis of research evidence as unlikely to succeed. Promotion of worker outcomes in the context of developing the link between HRM and performance offers the potential for a more ethical HRM but has not been seized by most HR managers. Finally, implementation of legislative and moral requirements to promote quality of working life is explored through the case of bullying at work. This highlights the boundaries of the HR role in a context of limited power and leads to the conclusion that it is unrealistic to look to HR managers, or at least HR managers alone, to achieve an ethical HRM.     

Middle managers' role in transferring person-centered management and care

This paper presents a study of the role of middle managers in the knowledge transfer related to a person-centered management and care approach at a physical rehabilitation center. This qualitative research comprises a multi-case study, representing the six middle managers of the organization studied. The main findings generated by this research indicate that despite top management's efforts to disseminate a person-centered approach throughout the organization, the knowledge transfer process mainly depends on the absorptive capacity of middle managers. When middle managers have the capacity to absorb the person-centered approach, often because it is compatible with their values and current practices, this capacity is expressed mainly through their behavioral exemplarity. The results of the study also engender an intervention model illustrating the key role of middle managers in the transfer of a person-centered management and care approach. The model includes macro- and micro-contextual elements that facilitate the transfer.     

Quality Management: A Key Process in the Service Industries

Project management is a developing area in the service industry, as more unique and customer-tailored services are being developed. This paper presents a benchmarking research study, aimed at improving project planning capabilities in the service industry. Based on data collected from 275 project managers from several industries, including 79 from the service sector, project management strengths and weaknesses within the service industry were investigated. It was found that project managers from the service sector excel in cost and procurement planning processes, compared to project managers from other industries. On the other hand, project managers from the service sector achieve the worst score in quality management processes. Moreover, in the service industry quality management was found to have the most significant impact on project success. Hence, managers in the service sector would benefit from acquiring proper knowledge and techniques relating to quality management in the planning phase of projects. It was also found that the success level of projects performed in the service sector depends most on the qualifications of the project manager. A project manager in the service sector gets very little support from the organisation itself. Support processes should focus on the main weaknesses of the service industry, mainly ‘developing project management procedures’ and ‘increasing the extent of training of their project managers’. The paper presents and analyses strengths and weaknesses of the service industry in project planning and suggests a detailed roadmap for improvement.     

Optimization Modeling for Logistics: Options and Implementations

Logistics optimization has significantly grown in popularity over the last few decades. Improvements in computing power, modeling software, and the willingness of companies to invest time in the modeling effort have allowed models that were once too unwieldy to solve to optimality to be solved quickly. This has led to a more wide‐spread recognition by logistics managers of the potential advantages of using optimization. The scope of logistics optimization in companies and organizations has expanded to address strategic, tactical, operational, and collaborative decision making. Spreadsheets, an analytical tool familiar to managers, have played a crucial role in the expanded modeling efforts of companies. Although optimization’s role in logistics has grown tremendously, there still are areas that remain to be explored that will allow it to achieve an even larger and more successful role in the management of companies. Additionally, there are some models that are still too large or too complex to currently solve to optimality, despite the advances in computing power and modeling/solving software.     

Strategically embedding CRM

Scepticism and disappointment have replaced initial enthusiasm about customer relationship management (CRM). The disappointing results of CRM projects are often related to difficulties that managers encounter in embedding CRM in their strategy and organisation structure. Fred Langerak and Peter C Verhoef believe that distinguishing between strategic and tactical CRM might lead to more effective understanding and implementation of CRM.     

Managing employee performance in an emerging economy: perceptions of Vietnamese managers

This qualitative study explores employee performance management (PM) in Vietnam from the perspectives of Vietnamese managers in three case study organizations: a state-owned enterprise, a joint venture and a private Vietnamese company. Findings suggest that western PM practices and techniques are being utilized in all three organizations and that PM is seen as an essential and strategic component of human resource management policy. These findings suggest an increasing awareness of PM in Vietnamese enterprises and a desire to improve competitiveness by developing a highly skilled and high-performing workforce.     

Corporate Responsiveness to Social Pressure: An Interaction-Based Model

The study introduces an interaction-based model that illustrates the iterative process of corporate responsiveness to social pressure. The model is then applied to a recent case of international relevance. The study implies that corporate management can apply three types of management approaches when managing relations with society, depending on their perception of social pressure: tactic, strategic or no action. This is then reflected in their practice of public relations (PR). Ethical leadership is considered to be manifested by the proactive practice of PR, which aims at mutual understanding between the organisation and the stakeholders. The firm??s interaction with the stakeholders does not guarantee that social pressure would actually be relieved. Rather, PR fails in its task of establishing and maintaining favourable relationships if it does not meet stakeholders?? expectations. Identifying emerging issues, relevant publics and preferable communication methods within a given context is the precondition for strategic, proactive management of stakeholder relations. This is especially relevant in the international business environment where the firm is challenged with increased institutional distance and pressure.     

Strategic Decision Making: from Crisis to Opportunity

Managers can perceive and categorise problems as crisis, threat, familiar everyday nuisance or even opportunity. This article focuses on the extent to which this categorisation determines the process the organisation goes through in tackling the problem. Using the case history of a big externally-triggered decision in a chemical company to illustrate these distinctions, the authors show that the characteristics of the processes can vary a lot according to how the problem is perceived: and across many dimensions – procedural rationality, generation of alternatives, politicisation, timing and lateral and horizontal communication. They argue that top managers should not only pay particular attention to the manner in which strategic issues are perceived and labelled within the company and its systems, but even in some circumstances should 'manipulate' the information provided from external or internal systems. The case described here also illustrates the crucial role of middle managers in providing expertise and information during the making of strategic decisions. Finally, it points to ways in which management teams can avoid destructive conflict and engage in constructive conflict.     

Strategic Choice and Organisational Context in HRM in the UK Hotel Sector

Human resource management in the UK hotel industry is typically held to be informal, instrumental and associated with poor employment relations. Some studies, however, have identified incidences of more formal, high-commitment HRM indicating greater diversity in employment practices. Using original research undertaken in south-west England, this article examines this diversity and the influence of organisational context in the formation of HRM strategy. By identifying patterns of employee relations practice it is possible to examine the influence of market factors and establishment size and the extent to which there is scope for strategic choice in HRM. The research indicates that whilst larger hotels operating in stable product markets might be more likely to display formal or strategic approaches to employee relations compared to the industry as a whole, this sub-sector still appears significantly divided in the extent to which managers feel able, willing or compelled to invest in associated practices.     

How Knowledge Management Capabilities Help Leverage Knowledge Resources and Strategic Orientation for New Product Advantages in B-to-B High-Technology Firms

ABSTRACT

Purpose: Current understanding of how new product development (NPD) teams use knowledge management capabilities to acquire, disseminate, and apply knowledge resources to achieve competitive advantages is limited by a lack of compelling theory supported by empirical evidence. This study provides a theoretical framework and empirical validation for how an NPD team manages knowledge resources and strategic orientation to enhance its knowledge management capabilities, which, in turn, lead to business-to-busienss (B-to-B) new product advantages.

Methodology/approach: A total of 100 sets of data was collected from B-to-B firms in U.S. high-tech industries. In order to validate the proposed hypotheses, we estimated the main effects using path analysis in AMOS, and tested for interaction effects using interaction term regressions.

Findings: Our findings show that the two dimensions of NPD knowledge management capabilities—acquisition and application—are important but differential drivers of product quality superiority and product differentiation. In testing whether NPD management capabilities matter for two product advantage constructs, we confirmed that product quality superiority can be enhanced by both NPD knowledge acquisition and application capabilities, whereas product differentiation can be increased strongly by NPD knowledge acquisition capabilities.

Research implications: Our research confirms the importance of strategic orientation as a driver of NPD knowledge management capabilities, which enhances understanding of how strategic factors operate under a resource-based view. Our results further provide direct empirical support for the knowledge-based view of firms, in that an NPD team’s abilities to manage and deploy knowledge-based resources by acquiring and applying NPD knowledge lead to competitive advantages, for outcomes of quality superiority and differentiation.

Practical implications: Our findings have relevance for managers in three ways. First, NPD knowledge acquisition and application capabilities have differential impacts on product quality superiority and differentiation. Second, in exploring NPD resource factors as antecedents, managers should manage levels of NPD market intelligence, resource tacitness, and NPD resource deployment differentially to directly improve NPD teams’ acquisition and application capabilities. Third, managers should not underestimate the importance of market and technological orientations in enhancing NPD knowledge management capabilities. Market orientation drives both NPD knowledge acquisition and application capabilities; technological orientation drives NPD knowledge application capabilities. Originality/value/contribution of the paper: An NPD team’s knowledge management capabilities generally, but differentially, mediate the relationships of knowledge resources and strategic orientation factors with new product competitive advantage. However, simply enhancing NPD knowledge management capabilities is not a panacea for developing product competitive advantage in B-to-B settings, because of their differential effects.     

A resource-advantage perspective on the orchestration of ambidexterity

Strategic resources are key inputs to strategy that can form the basis of superior service performance, yet there is scarce research on the strategic resources used by managers to realise ambidexterity: the simultaneous pursuit of alignment and adaptability. In this article, we draw on a qualitative case study of a leading European airline and examine the resource bundles used by managers in their orchestration of ambidexterity. Adopting a resource-advantage perspective, the study illustrates elements of human, organisational, and informational capital that are mobilised by managers in their incorporation of alignment-oriented and adaptability-oriented activities. By moving beyond a linear association between strategic resources and ambidextrous organisations, we argue that managers' orchestration of ambidexterity is central to how service organisations manage their strategic resources and enhance competitiveness. Overall, we highlight the micro managerial level as an important point of observation to extend current thinking on the ‘how’ of ambidexterity in service organisations.