Enriching strategic variety in new ventures through external knowledge

To build profitable market positions, new ventures have to address multiple challenges on several fronts. These ventures can compete by being simple (focused) or applying varied ways to compete. The likelihood of these ventures remaining competitive depends on their ability to build novelty into their products and operations, an activity that requires infusing knowledge into their operations. Most ventures, however, have limited knowledge bases and the reach (scope) of their external connections is limited, a factor that prompts them to tap into different external sources in their local areas. This article reports an empirical study of 140 new ventures located in seven regional clusters in Spain. The results show that new ventures can enrich the variety of their strategic repertoire by accessing diverse sources of external knowledge and being exposed to external novel knowledge, while absorptive capacity moderates this relationship. The degree of social development of these clusters also has a positive impact on the strategic variety of new ventures, exhibiting an inverted U-shape curve

Scientists as Midwives to Cluster Emergence: An Institutional Work Framework

The question of how embedded actors can create institutions that support cluster emergence remains unsolved in the cluster and national innovation systems literature. The present paper extends the recent literature on institutional entrepreneurship and institutional work to solve this paradox of embedded agency in the context of science-based clusters. Building on a longitudinal single case study of a functional foods cluster in Finland, we present an institutional work framework for cluster formation. We argue that, in addition to ideational, material and bridging work, authentic leadership work is critical for cluster emergence. The results of the study highlight the opportunities that scientists have to act as midwives to cluster formation, but they also show that well-functioning clusters need a broader support base.Peer reviewe

Change Drivers In The New Millennium: Implications For Manufacturing Strategy Research

Drawing on multiple sources, we identify technological, global and workforce trends that will affect the formulation and implementation of manufacturing strategy in the next decade. We then describe several theories from economics, sociology, and psychology and show how they can be used to enrich our interpretations of the effects of these trends. Throughout, we offer suggestions for future research in manufacturing strategy

Formulating Strategic Direction For A Gated Residential Community

Over the past two decades, a growing number of Americans have decided to live in gated residential communities. Academic research and case studies tend to focus on explaining this growth phenomenon from a range of perspectives, yet surprisingly little has been written about the preservation and growth of existing gated communities. In response to this gap in the literature, the purpose of this paper is to illustrate the use of strategic planning as a means of addressing issues that pertain to sustaining and growing gated residential communities. This paper applies principles of strategic management to the process of planning for residential preservation and growth. The residential context is a golf-focused gated community located in the mountains of western North Carolina. It uses focus groups as a qualitative means of identifying important strategic issues. These issues serve as the basis for designing a survey for community residents. The survey results provide quantitative information that enables development of strategies targeted toward preservation and growth of the community. Results from this paper suggest that traditional strategic planning techniques provide an effective method that common interest housing developments can use to help identify and respond to issues affecting their viability and growth

Patterns In The Diffusion Of Strategies Across Organizations: Insights From The Innovation Diffusion Literature

Firms often adopt strategies in spite of mixed evidence about the strategy's performance and of evidence that the strategy leads to inefficient outcomes. Here, we describe the conditions prompting the spread of inefficient strategies through a population of firms, as well as the characteristics of individual firms that affect their propensity to adopt efficient and inefficient strategies. We focus on one pattern that appears common to strategic adoptions: a pattern where the number of unsuccessful adoptions exceeds the number of successful adoptions. We note how the failure to consider diffusion patterns in empirical strategic research limits use of that research as a source of prescriptive theory

The Development And Deployment Of Electronic Personal Health Records: A Strategic Positioning Perspective

The purpose of this study is to examine the impact of strategic position on the ability of an entrepreneurial firm to successfully develop and deploy electronic personal health records technology within the US healthcare industry. The study contributes by juxtaposing a longitudinal view of how the focal firm proposed and acted on different strategic positions in an attempt to achieve development and deployment success. In doing so, the study also elaborates on Porter’s recognition that firms need to make trade-offs when choosing a strategic position, as the purposeful limitation of service offerings can protect against the degradation of existing value creating activities. While the fragmented nature of the healthcare industry provides opportunities for entrepreneurial firms, such complexity within the ecosystem should not be underestimated as a reason for concern for small firms. Total economic burden due to chronic diseases and other healthcare-related expenses is massive for the USA. Consequently, prevention and early detection of future disease states has become a core component of the current healthcare reform debate. EPHRs are considered one core component of a broader healthcare strategy to improve health outcomes and lower costs. By deepening our understanding of how best to develop and deploy such interventions, society will surely benefit. The longitudinal nature of the authors’ study provides a unique opportunity to understand the dynamic interrelationships between context, position, and performance within the US healthcare industry

Technology Clusters Versus Industry Clusters: Resources, Networks, And Regional Advantages

The tendency of firms to cluster within a region has been observed for quite some time. However, it is only over the past two decades that business researchers have focused much attention on clusters, particularly in terms of their entrepreneurial and innovative characteristics and potential. At the same time, regional developers around the world have put much effort in promoting the formation of clusters. A gap in such efforts is an understanding of the differences among types of clusters. This article draws a distinction between two generic types of clusters: technology-based and industry-focused. Using the resource-based view as the organizing framework, we argue that the two generic cluster types create very different regional resource profiles over time, accumulating resources in a different manner, cultivating different capabilities, and deriving different sources of regional advantage. As concluded in the study, these differences are likely to have implications for firms located in the regions as well as for economic developers and public policy officials charged with developing cluster strategies

The Relationship Between Undergraduate Attendance And Performance Revisited: Alignment Of Student And Instructor Goals

We revisit the relationship between attendance and performance in the undergraduate university setting and apply agency theory in the instructor–student context. Building on agency theory propositions in the educational setting advanced by Smith, Zsidisin, and Adams (2005), we propose that the student and instructor must align goals to promote the student’s achievement of performance learning outcomes, and attendance functions as a behavior- based alignment mechanism to encourage the convergence of faculty and student interests. Further, we propose that attendance does not equally affect lower-and higher-performing students and that absences are also negatively related to students’ cumulative grade point average. We test these hypotheses with data from undergraduates enrolled in management courses at a state university in the southeast. Our results show that attendance is positively related to exam performance, there are more pronounced negative effects of an absence for lower-performing students than for higher performers, and absences are negatively related to a student’s cumulative grade point average. We discuss the implications of our findings for students, instructors, and universities as well as practice in teaching and learning

How Unions Affect Shareholder Wealth In Firms Announcing Layoffs

We investigate whether investor anticipation of future performance differs between union and nonunion firms following corporate layoff announcements. Using event­ study methodology and multivariate regression analysis, we find that the stock market reaction to layoff announcements is negatively related to nonunion firms and positively related to union firms