Oded Shenkar

Working Abroad, Working with Others: How Firms Learn to Operate International Joint Ventures

Successful international joint ventures entail both learning to operate across national boundaries and learning to cooperate. Hypotheses grounded in organizational learning theory were tested with event-history analysis and data on 1,493 expansions of 25 large Dutch firms between 1966 and 1994. Experience with domestic joint ventures and with international wholly owned subsidiaries contributed to the longevity of international joint ventures, but prior experience with international joint ventures did not.

Treasures in the China house: a review of management and organizational research on Greater China

Abstract Management and organizational research on Greater China, which not only includes mainland China but also Hong Kong, Taiwan, and overseas Chinese in Southeast Asia, has experienced rapid growth in the past 2 decades. Yet there is no comprehensive review of this literature mapping out the contributions and guiding future research. Intending to fill this gap, this article first examines publications in top-tier, academic journals during the period of 1978–1997 to identify leading individual and institutional contributors to this literature. Then we briefly review substantive research in organizational behavior, strategic management, and international management, highlighting key findings and pointing out future directions. The article concludes with a call for more sustained research in this area attempting to make larger contributions to the mainstream literature.

International joint ventures' problems in China: Risks and remedies

Abstract As in other countries, international joint ventures have recently become the most popular form of foreign direct investment in China. This paper analyses the problems which emerged in those ventures in the Peoples Republic in terms of their uniqueness or recurrence in various countries. It is suggested that many of the problems are a product of the structural complexity of joint ventures rather than merely of the cultural and political differences between the foreign and Chinese parent environments. Implications for management are discussed.

Reputation, Image, Prestige, and Goodwill: An Interdisciplinary Approach to Organizational Standing

Reputation, image, prestige, and goodwill are concepts used by different disciplines, e.g., economics, marketing, sociology, and accounting, to denote the general standing of organizations among their counterparts. In this paper, the various concepts are reviewed and compared in terms of semantics, organizational cost, determinants, and implications, among others. An interdisciplinary, multiconstituency framework of organizational standing is developed, and research propositions are delineated.

Structure and importance of work goals among managers in the People's Republic of China.

The article focuses on a study which explored goal-setting among corporate executives in China. Information is presented about the effects of cultural factors on Chinese work ethics and attitudes. ...

The Cultural Context of Negotiations: The Implications of Chinese Interpersonal Norms

This article discusses distinctive characteristics of Chinese negotiating behavior as compared to that typical of the United States. Following a review of relevant research; the authors found that Confucian philosophy continues to provide the foundation of Chinese cultural traditions and values, with the tenets of harmony, hierarchy, developing ones moral potential and kinship affiliation having relevance for interpersonal behavior. An analysis of three key interpersonal norms illustrates the impact of culture on the negotiation process: emotional restraint and politeness as basic to communication, an emphasis on social obligations, and the interrelationship of the life domains of work, family, and friendship. Based on these norms, the authors offer recommendations for preparing, conducting, and concluding negotiations with ones Chinese counterparts.

Failure as a Consequence of Partner Politics: Learning from the Life and Death of an International Cooperative Venture

While it is widely recognized that international cooperative ventures suffer a high rate of failure, current theories, namely transaction costs, partner selection, bargaining and learning, offer limited and disjointed reasoning for it. Each of these theories is focused on a single aspect and on a limited phase in the venture’s life, neglecting the process that leads to eventual termination. To study this process, an in-depth analysis of the demise of an international cooperative venture in China traces the critical events in the venture’s life cycle. The analysis shows that escalation of partner political behavior played a key role in the venture’s failure. An integrative political process model incorporating the dynamic aspects of the relationships between parents within their environmental context is developed.

Cultural distance asymmetry in expatriate adjustment

Purpose – The current literature implicitly assumes a symmetric impact of cultural distance (CD) on expatriate adjustment. By using distance as a predictor of adjustment, the literature has rendered the direction of the flow irrelevant: a US expatriate in Germany is presumed to face the same hurdle as a German expatriate in the USA. Not only is there no evidence to justify that suggestion, but logic and related findings suggest just the opposite. The aim of the present paper is to test the proposition that such impact is asymmetric, that is, the impact of CD is contingent on the direction of the assignment.Design/methodology/approach – Using a two‐flow sample of US expatriates in Germany and German expatriates in the USA, we examine and compare the psychological and socio‐cultural adjustment of each group of executives.Findings – Controlling for the length of assignment, we find that German expatriates in the USA were better adjusted, both socio‐culturally and psychologically, than American expatriates in...

Strategic Responses to Competitive Pressure: The Case of Township and Village Enterprises in China

This study assesses the configuration between strategic orientation and industrial environment for Chinese township and village enterprises (TVEs), the organizational form which has played an increasingly important role in Chinese economic development and structural reform. We argue that the complexity, dynamism, and hostility of the industrial environment influence TVE managers’ perception of competitive pressure, which in turn affects the firm’s strategic orientations such as innovativeness, proactiveness, risk-taking, and analysis. Our analysis, based on a survey of TVE managers in Tianjin and Jiangsu, demonstrates that complexity and dynamism of industrial competition have a systematically positive impact on TVEs’ innovativeness, proactiveness, risk-taking, or analysis. Environmental hostility is not significantly associated with any strategic orientations adopted by Chinese TVEs. Implications of the findings are discussed.

The Firm as a Total Institution: Reflections on the Chinese State Enterprise

All organizations manifest some features of a total institution; however, no other commercial organization is as close to that metaphor as the Chinese state-owned enterprise (CSE). After establishing the similarity between the CSE and the total institution, the present paper uses four types of total institution to describe the CSE: a work camp, a religious order, a prison and a boarding school. The functions of each of the four for the Chinese system are considered, and individual and group repercussions are assessed. Finally, a typology of organizational totality is proposed, and theoretical implications are drawn.