How do executive teams make rapid decisions in the high-velocity microcomputer industry? This inductive study of eight microcomputer firms led lo propositions exploring that question. Fast decision makers use more, not less, information than do slow decision makers. The former also develop more, not fewer, alternatives, and use a two-tiered advice process. Conflict resolution and integration among strategic decisions and tactical plans are also critical to the pace of decision making. Finally, fast decisions hased on this pattem of hehaviors lead to superior performance. In October 1984, Gavilan Computer filed for bankruptcy protection under Chapter 11. Despite a $31 million stake from venture capitalists, Gavilan experienced delays and indecision that ultimately cost the firm its early technical and market advantages. The firm's leading-edge technology hecame a "me too " one and competitors flooded its empty market niche. As the firm died, one executive mourned: "We missed the window " (Hof, 1984).

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Emerging (or "inchoate") industries differ significantly from mature industries. Inchoate industries are characterized by few producers, underdeveloped markets, unclear technologies, and uncertain regulatory forces. Traditional, linear-adaptive approaches to business strategy derived from the study of mature industries, such as Miles and Snow (1978) and Porter (1980), are not applicable to inchoate industries. In this paper, we argue that an interpretive approach to studying organizing and strategy-making -- specifically Daft and Weick's model of organizations as interpretive systems (1984) -- is better suited to the context of industry emergence. Daft and Weick's typology of interpretive stances distinguishes the manner in which managers attempt to make sense of equivocal and uncertain environments, and hence is independent of an industry's maturity level. This study is the first attempt to operationalize the Daft and Weick typology. Propositions and preliminary evidence pres...

Complex dynamic control tasks (CDC tasks) are a type of problem-solving environment used for examining many cognitive activities (e.g., attention, control, decision making, hypothesis testing, implicit learning, memory, monitoring, planning, and problem solving). Because of their popularity, there have been many findings from diverse domains of research (Economics, Engineering, Ergonomics, Human Computer Interaction (HCI), Management, Psychology), which remain largely disconnected from each other. The objective of this article is to review theoretical developments and empirical work on CDC tasks, and to introduce a novel framework (Monitoring and Control framework) as a tool for integrating theory and findings. The main thesis of the Monitoring and Control framework is that CDC tasks are characteristically uncertain environments, and subjective judgments of uncertainty guide the way in which monitoring and control behaviors attempt to reduce it. The article concludes by discussing new insights into continuing debates and future directions for research on CDC tasks.

This paper attempts to establish the applicability of the Miles and Snow typology of strategic orientation to small, entrepreneurial organisations. It posits that congruence between strategic orientation and decision making comprehensiveness of the strategic planning process is a superior determinant of firm performance to planning alone. An empirical study in the Regional Airline industry was conducted to investigate this proposition. Results support the importance of the congruence construct in determining performance in small, entrepreneurial ventures. Keywords:

release from the author.) 1 2 This report examines the factors which influence the foreign operating mode decision of a firm and the performance implications of this choice. The study addresses these questions by first deriving an eclectic model of the foreign operating mode choice. It is posited that the operating mode choice can best be studied through an integration of four separate theoretical lenses: international strategic motivations, dominant logic theory, transaction cost economics, and options theory. This theoretical integration allows the formulation of a template model and propositions which predict a firm’s operating modality, and also provides for a contingency framework which links the operating mode choice to performance. This template model is then refined through an iterative multiple case analysis across 35 ‘high-tech ’ manufacturers headquartered in the San Francisco Bay Area which have recently established operations in the Asia/Pacific Rim. The iterative case analysis allowed a refinement and validation of the template decision

We extend the Western strategic management literature on environmental scanning to the entrepreneurial context by surveying business owners in two countries. Specifically, using the framework of Daft, Sormunen and Parks (1988), we test how perceived environmental uncertainty in seven environmental sectors and information accessibility influence scanning frequency of venture owners in the U.S. and India, two dissimilar entrepreneurial settings. Overall, entrepreneurs in India scan more frequently than do U.S. entrepreneurs, and the perceived rate of environmental change and accessibility of information are associated with their scanning. In the U.S., only perceived information accessibility prompts scanning. These results, which depart from inferences drawn from samples of managers in the Western literature, offer potential for extending scanning theory by cross-culturally broadening the theoretical nexus between organization theory, strategy and entrepreneurship in more fully understanding scanning behavior. Key Words: entrepreneurship, scanning, strategy 2 The literatures of organization theory and strategic management are replete with discussion of the influences of environmental complexity and volatility on organization decision-making, structure and

Due the inherent complexity in the management of relational services in intensely competitive changing environments the limitations of an ideological stance to an single strategy paradigm for the management of quality needs to be addressed. In this article, the problem of developing strategies to deal with complexity is discussed and a multiparadigm approach to the management of quality is outlined as a solution. Various theoretical strategy paradigms employed to manage quality are considered and the advantages and limitations of these paradigms are highlighted. Finally the research implications are discussed and a case study is used to demonstrate the need for an integrative multi-paradigm approach to the management of quality to deal with complexity. Key Words:

Emerging (or “inchoate”) industries differ significantly from mature industries. Inchoate industries are characterized by few producers, underdeveloped markets, unclear technologies, and uncertain regulatory forces. Traditional, linear-adaptive approaches to business strategy derived from the study of mature industries, such as Miles and Snow (1978) and Porter (1980), are not applicable to inchoate industries. In this paper, we argue that an interpretive approach to studying organizing and strategy-making – specifically Daft and Weick’s model of organizations as interpretive systems (1984) – is better suited to the context of industry emergence. Daft and Weick’s typology of interpretive stances distinguishes the manner in which managers attempt to make sense of equivocal and uncertain environments, and hence is independent of an industry’s maturity level. This study is the first attempt to operationalize the Daft and Weick typology. Propositions and preliminary evidence presented here are based on a cross-case cluster analysis of eight organizations in the Web publishing industry. INTERPRETIVE STANCE 2 Increasingly, managers and scholars are recognizing that emerging industries represent a critical strategic and competitive arena. Hamel and Prahalad (1994) observe the most important strategic problems of today concern those industries currently in the embryonic stage. Yet there is very

express our thanks to the participants in seminars at the University of Gallen and the European Business School in 2003 for their helpful and supportive comments. We owe gratitude to the senior management of Novartis S.A. for their encouragement and the time they took to discuss our data with them. The views expressed in this paper are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of Novartis S.A. or any other organization. The two authors are listed in alphabetical order. They have contributed equally to the paper. Ident. no.10654 ANTECEDENTS OF CONSISTENCY BETWEEN RESOURCE ALLOCATION DECISIONS AND CORPORATE STRATEGY CONCEPT This paper investigates the antecedents of consistency between corporate strategy concept and individual resource allocation decisions in the Swiss pharmaceutical companies Ciba and Sandoz from 1989 through their merger to form Novartis in 1996. We present a model from which we derive hypotheses regarding the influence of organizational and decision-specific factors on consistency. We test these hypotheses using data on 493 resource allocation decisions, applying maximum likelihood ordered logit estimation. Results indicate that factors specific to individual