Category predication work, discursive leadership and strategic sensemaking

Participation in strategic change processes is frequently assumed to have a number of positive consequences for decision quality, affective responses to change and success of strategic change implementation. To date little research has successfully established the validity of these claims. The fact that results from research into the effects of participation in other contexts are inconclusive is adding to the ambiguity concerning participation's efficacy in a strategic change context. This article uses data from a major strategic reorientation of a national telecommunications firm in order to assess the outcomes of participation in strategic change. Findings indicate a strong positive relationship between participation and goal achievement and organizational commitment, and a strong negative relationship with resistance. The results also suggest that the effects of participation are moderated by the changes' compatibility with organizational culture and the personal goals of change recipients.

This thesis is concerned with the management processes concerned with complex strategic decision in organisations. The research has sought to explore these processes by taking as its focus the reconstruction of decision processes a) on the basis of an historical study of an industry and in particular a major company in that industry; and b) the perception and understanding of strategic decision processes and change by managers involved in companies in that industry. The main body of analysis and theoretical contributions arise from the detailed analysis of extended depth interviews with managers carried out in 1980 and 1983 which trace thirteen years of the strategic development of a firm. In so doing, extensive use is made of verbatim accounts by managers of events and their interpretation of events. This is then compared with data gathered from.similar interviews with managers of two other companies and examined in the light of existing research and theory in the field. The thesis both provides a detailed insight into the processes associated with the identification and resolution of complex strategic issues and also generates a body of theory concerning the mechanisms by which strategic decisions and the processes of strategic change are interwoven with the cultural and political fabric of organisations. The thesis is divided into four parts. The first part deals with the background to the research, provid1ng a fuller summary of the purpose, structure and content of the thesis and a discussion of relevant previous research and the methodology employed herein. The second part mainly provides case studies of the industry and the main company studied. The third part is a detailed presentation and analysis of data. The fourth part is a synthesis of the findings and consolidation of the theoretical interpretation advanced in the thesis.

This empirical study takes a processualist approach (Mintzberg and Waters, 1985; Pettigrew et al., 1992) to investigate the role of middle managers in the strategic change process in a UK NHS trust. The research focuses upon a specific aspect of strategic change, that of the emergence of a marketing ‘strategy’. Such a strategy is seen as an exemplar for other change attempts in the UK NHS. This follows calls for more empirical studies of middle management (Dopson and Stewart, 1990). It also addresses the ‘unjust’ neglect of the public sector by academics carrying out research from a strategic management perspective (Ferlie, 1992; Lyles, 1990). The implications for a future research agenda are drawn out from the present study. These relate to the level of analysis of the strategic change process, conceptual frameworks brought to bear upon analysis, how theory and practice can be brought together and the preferred methodological approach in doing this. While the research site is one drawn from the UK, the analysis may well have resonance in other countries where the health service specifically and the public sector in general have also come under increasing pressure to change.

Self-renewal, self-organization, autopoiesis and related concepts have become quite popular in strategic change research. These concepts point at the importance of deeper structures of rules governing human behavior in organizations. This article describes the results of a study dealing with the role of management teams in strategic change processes, using the perspective of self-renewal. The results are summarized in a conceptual model of managerial behavior in the context of strategic change. The key concept is the repertoire of top management, which involves a set of recursively applied rules that govern managerial behavior. Management repertoires become institutionalized and relatively successful in particular contexts. The model describes forces contributing to the inertia, breakdown and formation of repertoires of management teams. The most important implication is that management teams could profit from trying to recognize the deeper rules governing their behavior. Managers should also try to prevent their own management team from becoming either extremely homogeneous or heterogeneous. In addition, they should use informal networks as much as the formal hierarchy.

Strategic Change Valuation

Section Three - Case Studies

New energy enterprises are important production and operation units engaged in the nature of new energy in the national economy. With the development of modern society, it is crucial to have a deep understanding of new energy enterprises, especially in the face of changing environment, and how to carry out strategic transformation of new energy enterprises. In a constantly changing environment, strategic change is a key issue and a central issue in the field of management and strategy. Time is the foundation of all research on strategic change, whether or not it is recognized by existing research. In this paper, the factors that influence strategic change in new energy companies are critically reviewed from a temporal perspective. Firstly, the development status of new energy enterprises is analyzed, the strategic change is defined, and then the influencing factors are obtained by integrating the relevant studies of the time dimension in the change activities. Based on the time perspective, the dynamic understanding of the strategic change process of new energy enterprises can be improved.

Today’s organizations are confronted with the deepest downturn since the great depressions after The World War II. These distortions have necessitated the need for organizations to consider the issue of organizational change. The objective of this study is to examine the impact of strategic change and organizational transformation process in Nigerian organizations; using selected companies from the Telecommunications industry in Nigeria as a case of study. The data collection tool employed by the researcher was the questionnaire approach and the sampling technique employed by the researcher was the Taro Yemmane sampling technique while the hypothesis formulated was tested using the Z-test statistics. The results from the test of the hypothesis showed that strategic change in the Nigerian Telecommunications industry leads to successful organizational transformation. Based on this, the researcher concluded that organizational change can usher in a host of unwelcome and unavoidable side effects and result in the need for the organization to improve productivity, increase morale or re-define the culture of the organization. It was against this backdrop that the researcher recommended that employees need to be allowed to actively take part in meetings and workshops at the onset where the envisaged changes are discussed and management needs to solicit constant feedback from staff throughout the process and take their views into account when restructuring.

Projects are used to implement strategic change, particularly in infrastructure contexts where societal value unfolds over long time horizons. Existing project management literature searches for bridges with change management, understanding the importance of a continuous project process, yet focusing on discontinuities in multi-actor scenarios and defined stage-gates. The internal mechanisms of public owner organisations remain underexplored, yet are of paramount importance, due to the role of the public organisation in the front-end phase and as a warrantor along the whole project's process. This study addresses this gap by investigating how discontinuities arise within a Norwegian public infrastructure agency as it implements a sustainability-oriented strategic change programme across its projects’ development. Drawing on an engaged scholarship approach, combining document analysis, semi-structured interviews, and participatory workshops, the study identifies and categorises four intra-organisational sources of discontinuity (P–I–M–S): (P) changes in personnel, (I) information transfer, (M) lack of performance measurement, and (S) misalignment in long-term strategic ambitions. These discontinuities, emerging during a change programme implementation, reveal the gaps along the continuity spine in the project’s process. In response, the paper argues for deliberate, early integration function (PMO-like) to resolve the discontinuities that arise. By unfolding the mechanisms internal to the public organization in the implementation of the strategic change across the project process and the specific discontinuities, the study offers an empirically informed perspective on the longitudinal integration in projects, with implications for both practitioners and researchers. • Infrastructure projects function as vehicles for long-term strategic change. • Continuity is essential to keep projects aligned with organisational strategic intent. • Discontinuities arise early within the public administration itself, even before external actors enter the process. • These discontinuities create early misalignments and generate downstream challenges for future management entities. • An internal integration function (e.g., a PMO) is needed to secure coherence across phases and sustain strategic alignment.

Purpose – This research aims to describe leadership practices that fit into Egypt national culture, in Multinational Companies (MNCs) work environment. Taking two of the top companies in leadership field as an example, this research helps in presenting guidelines for the best leadership practices for MNCs, operating in Egypt.Design/methodology/approach – This research employed qualitative case study, using semi-structured interviews. Two-case studies were conducted to reach more comprehensive findings. Findings –Leadership practices associated with Egypt’s national culture are macro managing employees; involving employees in decision making; providing clear vision and objectives; maintaining context which includes providing clear rules and guidelines, coaching employees, maintaining a follow up system on employees performance and maintaining a clear rewarding and penalizing system; and focusing on humane aspects which includes managing conflicts, keeping employees in harmony and considering individuals’ differences. Implications– This research highlights a gap between theory and practice. Some of the presented leadership practices presented in this research contradict with the literature’s classification for Egypt’s’ national. This indicates that further research work should be conducted to generalize findings.Originality/value –The research emphasizes that there is a shift in people’s perception towards best leadership styles and practices. The cultural aspects identified in this research challenges the classification of Egypt as high power distance and masculine society. Further, findings present new prospective for some of the leadership practices. The paper also proposes that short-term orientation is also a cultural aspect associated with workplace. Keywords: National culture, Humane-orientation, Short-term orientation, Leadership practices, Individualized consideration, Employees’ performance, Case study, Interviews analysis techniques DOI : 10.7176/DCS/9-3-07 Publication date :March 31 st 2019

Facilitating and inhibiting factors behind strategic change: Evidence in the Spanish private banking industry, 1983–1997

Several theoretical schools are competing within the field of strategic management knowledge. On a general disciplinary level, theoretical contributions to strategic management have their roots in such different (sub)disciplines as industrial organization economics, decision theory, marketing theory, interorganizational theory (including resource dependence), economic history, population ecology etc. Looking at one important issue in strategic management, namely the strategic change process, Mintzberg (in Fredrickson 1990) has identified three main groups of schools: 1 Rather normative schools which emphasize analytical, rational and sequential aspects of strategic processes. 2 Descriptive schools, which describe the process from a specific theoretical perspective. 3 Synthesizing schools, which try to integrate different apparently contradictory theories.

Organizations have been defined as a “nexus of contracts”. These contracts specify or imply what the organization expects from each stakeholder group to help it achieve its primary objectives and what each stakeholder expects from the organization in return for its cooperation. Within this contracting framework, one of the most important managerial functions is to establish and maintain stakeholder relationships. Collaboration represents a new way of thinking and operating for most organizations. Slowly, internal systems and structures are changed to support this new way of being. Employees are more involved in decision making, cross-functional teams become commonplace, corporate reward system recognize the value of cooperation and group performance. The transition to a more collaborative organizations also takes place at the individual level as managers and employees grapple with old paradigms and develop new mind-sets as well as new skill sets. Aligning internal systems and structures requires an ongoing effort. No organization will ever be completely ready for collaboration because organizational readiness is multidimensional. Senior management must visibly and consistently support stakeholder collaboration, employees must understand their role in relationship building, multiway communications systems must be accessible, and rewards and recognition must be tied to the success of stakeholder relationships, not just to short-term financial indicators. Most organizational change efforts fail to produce expected results because business does not cope well with the emotional aspects of change. Organizations must involve their staff in creating a desirable and attainable vision and then support employees to make changes happen. Managerial tasks such as planning, budgeting, organizing, staffing, controlling, and problem solving, while important, are not the keys to successfully facilitating a strategic transformation or change process. There are various tools that can be used to help make the transition to a more collaborative organization. The success of organization depends on its ability to generate satisfaction and loyalty among organization customers, users, employees and the stakeholders. Seeing the organization as a set of inter-related processes is particularly useful rather than fixed line hierarchy as it is necessary to maximize and utilize the whole organization. Processes describe the numerous connections that cut across the organization, the interaction of staff and departmental activity and the flow of work that actually occurs, to ultimately deliver stakeholder satisfaction.

Service transition: A viable option for manufacturing companies with deteriorating financial performance?

ABSTRACTThis study describes the strategic change efforts of a university in the United Kingdom which changed its form and resource deployments to focus on the production of interdisciplinary research. A problem-oriented case study method was used to chronicle and analyse the leadership strategies and tactics employed and their consequences. We found that the reliance on a vertical leadership (controlling) strategy led to external legitimization but not internal legitimacy. We also found instances these strategies created unintended consequences which inhibited the strategic change initiative. In particular, horizontal leadership (enabling) strategies that spoke to the academic heartland were muted. We concluded that in universities undertaking major strategic change efforts controlling influence actions may be necessary but they are insufficient to levers of strategic change. The study is particularly important because it contributes to an understanding of strategic change in universities at a time when most such efforts fail to meet their objectives and there is a limited empirical literature to draw upon.