Patrick T. Gibbons

Corporate Entrepreneurship The Roles of Ideology and Social Capital

This article posits that entrepreneurial behavior within an organization can only be effectively created and controlled through an appropriate corporate culture. Corporate culture is viewed as a social structure that possesses two facets that are central to entrepreneurship. The first facet is a superstructure that provides an ideology to which organizational participants can commit to. The second is a sociostructure that facilitates the emergence of social capital, which can provide a form of sustainable competitive advantage.

Influences on Strategic Planning Processes Among Irish Smes

In this study we argue that the approach to strategy formation reflects organizational and individual influences. The study, based on questionnaire responses from 359 firms, examines a number of organizational and individual factors influencing the type of strategy formation process adopted. The constructs of strategic posture, organization structure, management ownership, and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) experience are measured. Three models predicting strategy formation approaches are explored. First, an organizational model emphasizing the impact of strategic posture and organization structure is analyzed. Second, a model is tested dealing with CEO and top management team characteristics reflecting the effects of agency costs and experience base. Finally, an integrative model combining both organizational and individual factors is evaluated. The results highlight the importance of organizational factors and show, for instance, that entrepreneurial firms tend to adopt more formal strategic planning approaches, while conservative firms adopt more incremental approaches. In addition, both management shareholding and CEO experience are negatively related to formal strategic planning activities.

The Stock Market Reaction to the Hiring of Management Consultants: A Signalling Theory Approach

Drawing from signalling theory, this study examines how the stock market reacts to the public announcement of the hiring of management consultants and whether it differentially values clients on the basis of their financial profitability and the brand-name of the engaged consultant. An event study analysis of 118 client firms that publicly announced the hiring of management consulting firms finds that the stock market, on average, responded positively and significantly to the engagement news. Regression analysis further reveals that the stock market reaction tended to be the highest for client firms that had the highest profitability levels. In addition, the stock market reaction to the hiring announcement was not related to the consultants brand-name reputation; clients engaging the most reputable consultants (e.g. McKinsey & Company, Bain, Boston Consulting Group, Booz-Allen Hamilton) did not realize any different market response than those clients that employed the other consultants. Overall, most client firms that publicly announced the hiring of management consultants experienced a rise in their market value and those that had the highest financial profitability realized the highest increase. Further, the findings imply that there may be boundaries to reputational spillover benefits in partnering relationships.

Developing subsidiary contribution to the MNC--Subsidiary entrepreneurship and strategy creativity

10 Article history: 11 Received 28 January 2009 12 Received in revised form 8 March 2010 13 Accepted 9 March 2010 14 Available online xxxx 5 Despite its theoretical and managerial significance, subsidiary entrepreneurship and its effects 16 on subsidiary contribution remain underexplored in the literature. We propose that subsidiary 17 entrepreneurship encourages more creative strategic responses to escalating environmental 18 change. We explore the direct and mediating effects of subsidiary entrepreneurship on 19 subsidiary contribution to the MNC, particularly subsidiary strategy creativity. We use 20 structural equation modelling to test our propositions on data generated from surveying the 21 population of Irish subsidiaries of foreign MNCs, and find strong support for our theoretical 22 predictions. The managerial implications of subsidiary entrepreneurship in generating creative 23 strategy, prompting strategic initiatives and improving performance are discussed. 24

Impacts of Organizational Evolution on Leadership Roles and Behaviors

This paper explicates a link between the concepts of leadership, followership, and environment. In particular, the paper develops a conceptual scheme to facilitate the identification of leader-follower relationships which are best suited to specific environmental contingencies. This typlogy is then used as a basis to identify some of the specific interventions that would be appropriate in moving from one environmental situation to another.

The influence of subsidiary context and head office strategic management style on control of MNCs: the experience in Australia

This study examines the control issues related to three major flows among MNC subsidiaries: knowledge flows, product flows and capital flows. It also investigates the relationship between the strategic management style of headquarters and the control approaches employed. The results show the dominance of output control, even in situations where researchers have argued that they should not be relied upon. The study also found that as knowledge flow increases, reliance on financial control decreases and reliance on socialisation control increases. Consistent with other studies, the dominant management style is the strategic control style, while the least popular is the financial control style. The paper calls for using alternative theoretical lenses, such as institutional theory, to provide additional insights not available through the contingency lens.

STRATEGIC POSTURE, TECHNOLOGY STRATEGY AND PERFORMANCE AMONG SMALL FIRMS

This paper investigates the performance effects of both aggressive technological posture and automation in a sample of 336 small and medium-sized enterprises. The paper seeks to test whether firm strategic posture mediates the relationship between technology policy and firm performance. Findings suggest that strategic posture does not mediate the relationship between technology policy and ROI, but does mediate the relationship between technology policy and sales growth.

How subsidiaries are battling to survive and grow

Purpose – This paper aims to enhance the understanding of how subsidiary CEOs can move their units activities up the value chain and reduce the risk of subsidiary closure and relocation of its activities.Design/methodology/approach – The entire population of over 1,100 subsidiaries of multinational corporations (MNCs) located in Ireland were sampled for this study, representing a diversified pool in terms of foreign ownership. Respondents were largely subsidiary CEOs. In addition, 24 subsidiary CEOs/directors from a cross section of eight subsidiaries were interviewed.Findings – CEOs/directors are taking active steps to enhance their subsidiarys role within the MNC and to move their activities up the value chain. These include positioning to extend subsidiary autonomy, building information networks, creating a climate for entrepreneurship and promoting strategy development processes.Research limitations/implications – Results from the survey are subject to the standard limitations and a larger pool of i...

The symbolic aspects of corporate entrepreneurship: The case of a mature organization

Abstract This paper reports on a case study of autonomous strategic behavior in a mature, conservatively managed, low technology organization. The autonomous behavior studied is the firms adoption of a high technology product offering. The paper conceptualizes the organizational change induced by the initiative as a paradigm shift. The study specifically addresses the change agents symbolic actions in unfreezing, changing, and refreezing the organizations paradigm. The paper extends previous work on the political aspects of change agent behavior in the same organization.

Managing Humanitarian Action: An Introduction

Global Humanitarian Assistance reached record levels in 2014 at