Juha-Antti Lamberg

Managerial cognition, action and the business model of the firm

– The purpose of the paper was to outline a generic framework for the business model and illuminate its linkages to managerial cognition., – The paper reviewed the focal literature focusing on the actions and evolution of a firm and built a synthesis that describes the different components of a business model., – The main finding was that a business model is essentially both a cognitive phenomenon as well as being built on the material aspects of a firm., – The paper proposes that the business model can be scrutinized in future studies, especially from the viewpoints of cognition, thus creating new avenues for intra‐firm evolutionary studies., – The paper found several implications for practising managers. First, the concept itself creates possibilities for self‐analysis and scenario building. Second, the understanding that a business model is systemic helps managers to evaluate their actions vis‐a‐vis the evolutionary path of the business model. Third, the outlined business model is useful in executive education as it creates a cognitive map of the various aspects of business activities., – The paper offers new insights into the functions and evolution of firms and will be of interest to both researchers and practising managers.

Vices and Virtues of Corporate Political Activity The Challenge of International Business

The authors give a critical reading of the research interests of state-of-the-art corporate political activity (CPA) literature. They demonstrate that a noncritical tendency in the literature to view CPA as a strategic activity, aimed at making profit, may encourage firms to sociopathic behavior in their political activities. Using psychiatric literature, the authors explore the nature of sociopathic CPA. They draw on a recent discussion initiated by virtue theorists, exploring firm moral agency in order to suggest the opening of several new research areas, within CPA literature, more sensitive to moral questions.

Stakeholder management and path dependence in organizational transitions

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to offer an explanatory process model of stakeholder management. The model shows how and why path dependence is manifested in stakeholder management issues.Design/methodology/approach – The paper integrates stakeholder theory with key ideas from path dependence literature. The resulting propositions are examined in the context of a longitudinal case study of the United Airlines and US Airways abandoned merger in 2000‐2001Findings – The papers analysis demonstrates that initial conditions are accentuated by the sequence of actions, offering a plausible explanation for process outcomes.Practical implications – On the practical side, the paper provides a problem‐solving tool for stakeholder management to analyze the stakeholder linkages during strategic initiatives.Originality/value – The paper addresses an important research gap, exploring how stakeholder‐related path dependencies influence the process of conflict escalation.

The River Metaphor for Strategic Management

This article introduces a new metaphor for strategic management, namely, that of the strategy river. In comparison with the frequently used concept of path-dependency, the strategy river emphasizes time and timing, co-evolutionary interplay between strategies and institutional environments, strategic momentum and the systemic nature of decision-making. Based on the scrutiny of its theoretical underpinnings, we argue that the strategy river metaphor is based on an alternative paradigm of organizational evolution. Furthermore, the river metaphor is perceived with respect to many realities of managerial decision-making.

The Evolution of Corporate Political Action: A Framework for Processual Analysisx

Variance theories have dominated corporate political action (CPA) research because the pioneering works in the 1970s and 1980s. Process theories offer an entirely new perspective on CPA research, as they are able to explain processes across a number of levels of analysis and link actions to contexts. We add to the existing CPA literature by offering a process model that can be useful especially in historical and evolutionary analysis. Our model depicts CPA as a complex system in which a firm’s actions are affected by various factors across organizational, industry, and institutional levels of analysis. As political actions also influence these factors, the process is in essence systemic and path dependent. Our model supplements existing research by offering the possibility to explain the long-term consequences of CPA vis-à-vis wider societal changes and by promoting longitudinal research strategies. In addition to the theoretical model, we provide a historical analysis of the evolution of the Finnish paper and pulp industry to illustrate the applicability of the framework.

Alternative Paths to Competitive Advantage: A Fuzzy-Set Analysis of the Origins of Large Firms

Scholars have documented the importance of national-level factors for the competitive success of firms on a global scale. These studies typically identify multiple factors that are behind the emergence of large and successful firms in particular national clusters. However, there has been relatively little research identifying whether such factors are all collectively necessary to produce the outcome, or whether only a few of the factors in different combinations might be sufficient to generate the shift in competitive advantage manifested in the market power of large “flagship” firms. In this paper, we study the evolution of one industry across six countries in which the competitive position of national firms changed considerably during our 100-year analysis period. The results of our combined historical and fuzzy-set analyses show that an unequal distribution of resources may lead to alternative causal pathways to competitive advantage of the largest firms.

The Evolution of Competitive Strategies in Global Forestry Industries

Foreword. List of Contributors. Part I. 1. Evolution of Competitive Strategies in Global Forestry Industries: Introduction J.-A. Lamberg, J. Ojala. Part II. 2. The Giant: International Paper 1898-2000 J.-A. Lamberg. 3. A Company and The State: Enso-Gutzeit J.-A. Lamberg. 4. Comparing the Strategic Evolution of Georgia-Pacific, Mead, and Weyerhaeuser A. Ahola. 5. The Challengers: Kymmene, United Paper Mills, and Metsaliitto J. Ojala, J.-A. Lamberg. 6. Strategy Formation in the Swedish Forest Industry: Comparing SCA and MoDo A. Melander. 7. Two Family Firms in Comparison: Ahlstrom and Schauman during the 20th Century J. Ojala, K. Pajunen. 8. Entrepreneurial Organization or Family Firm: A Strategic Analysis of Gulf States Paper Corporation P.M. Kreiser. Part III. 9. Managerial Cognition and Action in the Context of the Forestry Industry P. Sajasalo. 10. Consolidation by Game-Playing: A Gamesmanship Inquiry into Forestry Industry J. Nasi, Pasi Sajasalo. Part IV. 11. The Ephemera of Success: Strategy, Structure and Performance in the Forestry Industries J. Ojala et al. References. Appendix: Competitive Activities of Forestry Industry Firms: A Coding Manual for Event History Analysis J.-A. Lamberg et al. Index.

Beyond the metaphor: The morphology of organizational decline and turnaround

This study is based on the thesis that Vladimir Propps (1928/2001) theory of folktale structure functions not only as a morphology of folktales, but also as a structural, deep-level model of any process that includes crisis and recovery. We essentially suggest that corporate decline and turnaround processes can be emplotted into a folktale-like structure that supports Propps theory and thereby helps uncover deep-level mechanisms governing the process. The developed model describes seven mechanisms that drive the organization from initial strategic harmony to disharmony, and furthermore to the construction of a new strategic harmony, thus creating a perspective for the interpretation of long-term organizational decline and turnaround processes. Theoretical and practical implications are offered.

Materializing the Societal Effect: Organizational Forms and Changing Patterns of Dominance in the Paper Industry

This paper reports an empirical study on the co-evolution of competitive conditions dominating firms and organizational forms in the paper industry1. It has two main theoretical implications. First, with respect to research on national business systems and the societal effect, we suggest that the country of origin imprints firms especially by allowing them to develop distinctive organizational forms. Second, we show that the competitive conditions, dominant forms and dominant firms remain in constant flux even in mature industries. There is, therefore, a need for co-evolutionary research to continue to combine long-term perspectives and intensive research designs in the study of specific industries.

A Historical Investigation of the Strategic Process within Family Firms

Purpose of this paper: The primary purpose of this paper was to perform an in-depth analysis of the strategic process that occurs within family firms. Design/methodology/approach: This study analyz ...