David M. Brock

The development of subsidiary-management research: review and theoretical analysis

This article begins with a summary of the foundations of four streams of multinational management literature pertaining to the subsidiary. The most recent of these streams, namely Subsidiary Development, receives special attention. We look at the way in which the literature on subsidiary-management has evolved, and investigate how the streams have built upon each other. Autonomy is investigated as a growing theme in the literature and report word counts to validate our literature-based propositions. We also examine the literature in the light of national cultural differences, revealing considerable country bias. Finally, we look into the potential future directions of the field.

Restructuring the Professional Organization : Accounting, Health Care and Law

In recent years the professions have undergone radical transformation. With the advent of rapidly changing markets, more sophisticated and demanding clients, deregulation and increased competition, the generalist professional partnerships have given way to larger, more corporate forms of organization, comprising increasingly autonomous specialist business units. This volume critically examines these changes through an examination of the archetypes which characterize accounting, health care and law practitioners. With examples drawn from Australia, Canada, the UK and the USA, Restructuring the Professional Organization will be of interest to all students of organization studies seeking to understand the issues and problems confronting the professions as they move to the new millennium. Topics covered include: * a review of the models of professional organization *drivers of change in professional organizations * internal dynamics of changes in these organizations * new organizational forms and archetypes.

MERGERS AND ACQUISITIONS: A REVIEW OF PHASES, MOTIVES, AND SUCCESS FACTORS

Mergers and acquisitions (M&As) have become an increasingly broad-based phenomenon, and their numbers are growing dramatically in the United States, Europe, and elsewhere throughout the globe. Still, research shows us that less than 50% of M&As succeed. At the same time scholarly research on M&As abounds, presenting the opportunity to step back and review what we have learned and what we still do not know. Although the field of M&A research is far too broad and complex to be covered in one review essay, we attempt to begin at the beginning, covering some historical and background issues before surveying three topics fundamental to successful M&As. First, in order to lay the foundations for better understanding of M&A processes in general, we overview various approaches from those that include just two phases – premerger and postmerger – to those with seven phases – including aspects of due diligence and integration phases. The second topic refers to M&A motives such as entering a new market, gaining new scarce resources, achieving synergies, and so forth. The third issue is M&A success factors. Here we synthesize a large body of research that has pointed to many different managerial and organizational factors that are generally associated with M&A success, for example, relative size of M&A partners, managerial involvement, culture, and organizational structural issues. While no review of these topics can claim to be comprehensive, we do attempt to present a good variety of literature approaches representing not only elite scholarly journals but also some important practitioner-oriented books and articles.

Your forward is our reverse, your right, our wrong: rethinking multinational planning processes in light of national culture

Planning processes are potentially important governance mechanisms in multinational enterprises (MNEs). However, the complex multi-level and multi-cultural nature of these organizations may result in compatibility or clashes of culture between the various units of the MNE with respect to planning processes. In this theory building paper we develop a model that outlines how national culture will affect planning processes at both home and host country levels. This framework is applied to show how different planning outcomes may emerge due to these cultural differences. Finally, aspects of language, nontraditional structures, implications and limitations of the model are also discussed.

Archetypal Change and the Professional Service Firm

This chapter explores archetypal change in the context of professional service firms. To understand recent and ongoing changes in professional service firms, we briefly show how the professional archetype has evolved since the 1960s. We then present four theoretical models to describe processes by which institutionalized archetypes can change, and possibly coexist in the same field. Three professional archetypes are described, each in the context of historical development and the change model described earlier. At the one extreme is the traditional professional partnership; at the other the larger, multidisciplinary, corporate, global professional network, or GPN; in between is the “Star” form – relatively specialized, flatter structure, resisting significant growth, with fixations on excellence, and being the leader in a professional niche.

Multinational Strategy and Structure: A Review and Research Agenda

A review essay, including a background to the Special Issue. We sketch out the major changes that we see underway in the strategies and structures of MNEs. Some of these are developed in the papers that follow; others are based on extant literature and empirical observation. The five papers in the special issue are introduced in context of an integration-responsiveness framework, and we delineate some of the contributions of each paper.

Global integration and local responsiveness in multinational subsidiaries: Some strategy, structure, and human resource contingencies

In this paper we analyze di ferent aspects of organization and management in multinational subsidiaries, and investigate some organization design premises in these contexts. We develop some theoretical arguments for linkages between strategy, structure, and aspects of human resource management. Data were collected from a sample of 259 multinational subsidiaries, mainly from the Asia-Pacific area. Our findings generally support the association of organizational and human resource contingencies with subsidiary e fectiveness in more localized than in more globalized situations. We conclude by discussing these findings and attempting to further the understanding of the management of multinational subsidiaries in the contemporary competitive environment.

Building global capabilities: A study of globalizing professional service firms

This paper examines how globalizing service firms can build the capabilities needed for effective international operations. Beginning with a brief review of relevant literature, it then provides theoretical bases for exploring managerial and organizational capabilities in the globalizing professional service firms (PSF). Against a backdrop of institutional theory, aspects of the resource-based view of the firm are incorporated to help understand what it may take for a firm to transfer its capabilities across national borders and across foreign intra-firm boundaries. We then consider evidence from the recent globalization of PSFs in five managerial and organizational areas in which contemporary PSFs should and do develop capabilities to improve their effectiveness in the global context.

Strategy, autonomy, planning mode and effectiveness: a contingency study of business schools

The aim of this project was to investigate whether combinations of strategies, planning modes and levels of autonomy are associated with superior college effectiveness relative to other combinations of these variables. It was hypothesized that a college pursuing a prospector strategy ‐ with an emphasis on continuously seeking new client segments and/or developing new offerings ‐ would be more effective with longer‐term and more externally oriented planning, and with more autonomy for its dean. Conversely, a college pursuing a defender strategy ‐ relying on traditional client segments and offerings ‐ would be more effective with shorter‐term and more internally oriented planning, and with less autonomy for its dean. Generally, the hypotheses pertaining to the prospector‐type strategy were supported, while those involving the defender strategy were not supported. Discusses implications for practitioners and researchers.

The Reconstructed Professional Firm: A Reappraisal of Ackroyd and Muzio (2007)

In ‘The Reconstructed Professional Firm: Explaining Change in English Legal Practices’, Stephen Ackroyd and Daniel Muzio (2007) present us with some interesting data and several refreshing ideas about changes to professional service firms. The paper has two parts. The first part documents changes to English law firms, for example, reduced ratio of support staff to professionals in some cases and deteriorating conditions of work; supporting the argument that, because too many lawyers are trying to enter the profession, evolving aspects of occupational closure tend to filter and retard the flows of professionals into and through law firms. Thus, for English law firms, the authors argue (2007: 732) that ‘it is more accurate to think in terms of a reconstructed professional firm (RPF)’ than some variant of the managed professional business, or MPB. Parenthetically, the ‘oversupply of recruits’ (2007: 739) mentioned may have been a factor in the 1980s and 1990s, but recent research indicates to the contrary both in the USA — where there may ‘not be enough lawyers to feed the hiring appetite’ (Press 2007) — as well as in the UK (Novarese 2007; reporting on the June 2007 Legal Week Employee satisfaction survey, http://legalweek.com. In the final section, labeled ‘Concluding discussion’, Ackroyd and Muzio (2007: 741) attempt to position their findings ‘in contrast to the work of archetype theorists’. Whereas the authors could have usefully built on their RPF ideas, instead they seem obsessed with distancing their work from managerialism and archetypes. This essay thus develops the following three arguments. First, I show how Ackroyd and Muzio’s characterization of the relevant archetype research stream is simplistic. This leads to my arguing that they thus miss the opportunity to interpret their fascinating findings in a more constructive way. Finally, I suggest how research on the professional service firm (PSF) could benefit from taking up this dialogue.