Showing papers by "Danny Miller published in 1999"

People matter: commitment to employees, strategy and performance in Korean firms

Abstract: The human element of enterprise is argued to be a vital resource for strategy execution. We show in a study of Korean businesses how an organization’s commitment to its employees’ well-being (OCE) can aid in the profitable execution of its positioning strategies. We found that OCE, by itself, sometimes has a weakly positive association with return on assets (ROA). But far more important, we found that ROA is strongly and positively influenced by the interaction between OCE and the dedicated pursuit of Porter’s (1980) strategies for achieving competitive advantage: these are cost leadership, marketing differentiation and innovative differentiation. In short, dedicated positioning strategies appear to be executed more effectively where organizations exhibit a high level of commitment to their employees; and conversely, OCE is apt to have a strong impact on ROA only in the context of a dedicated, that is intensive and thorough, positioning strategy. Copyright © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Learning across the life cycle: experimentation and performance among the hollywood studio heads.

Abstract: Guided by notions from the literature on organizational learning, this paper investigates how product- line experimentation and organizational performance change across the careers of top managers....

Linked sequence development and global climate change: The Upper Mississippian record in the Appalachian basin

Abstract: The character and relative stratigraphic position of paleoclimatic indicators within Upper Mississippian strata of southern West Virginia suggest a link between eustasy and patterns of continental- to global-scale atmospheric circulation. At the cyclothem scale, annual rhythms in marine facies, and paleovertisols and lacustrine carbonates in terrestrial units indicate that seasonal, semiarid climatic conditions prevailed during highstand progradation. In contrast, leached paleosols and coals that underlie sequence boundaries and occur within transgressive heterolithic facies are suggestive of humid climatic conditions during late highstand through early transgression. Milankovitch-band, glacial-interglacial cyclicity may explain both sequence development and the evidence for Late Mississippian climate fluctuations in the Appalachian basin. Shifts from seasonal to humid climatic conditions are attributed to systematic variation in monsoonal circulation, whereby seasonal moisture became restricted to the equatorial belt during the lowstands of each ∼400 k.y. glacial-interglacial cycle.

Notes on the Study of Configurations

Abstract: I still believe, after all these years, that the approach of configuration holds much promise for the study of organizations in general and strategy in particular. But progress in the field has been halting, in part because of the rather simplistic views of what configurations are and how to study them. These views are held not only by some critics of the configuration approach, but also by some of its supporters. One caricature suggests that the approach ties itself to dogmatic typologies, claims the existence of just a few discrete but curiously fundamental types, and contends that organizational change requires firms to jump across wide chasms separating one configuration from another very different one (see, for example, Donaldson 1996, pp. 108-129). Nothing could - or should - be further from the truth. So let us begin by addressing these misconceptions. First, configurations at their most useful represent common, thematically driven alignments of elements or dimensions. The predictive power of configurations resides in the fact that most alignments are unlikely while relatively few are far more common (Miller/Friesen 1984, Meyer/Tsui/Hinings 1993). Of course a great many alignments may be possible. But the nature of the most common alignments and the dynamics and themes that underlie them can help researchers to make sense of the complexity of modern organizations. The variety of the most common alignments also reveals an instructive range of organizations and organizational phenomena, and their possible normative implications (Dess/Lumpkin/Covin 1997, Dory et al. 1993, Hinings/Greenwood 1988, Ketchen et al. 1997). The existence of common configurations does not imply that these are discrete or that in changing, companies have to make a large jump from one configuration to another (Hinings/Greenwood 1988, Cooper et al. 1996). In our Organizations book, for example, Peter Friesen and I made it clear that empirically derived configurations overlap along many dimensions and are usually connected on a snake-like data surface. Order is reflected by the few dimensions it takes to describe the surface versus the many that are used to describe a company. In other words, configurations are reflected by densely occupied regions of the data space, each showing different multivariate relationships. Changing companies must remain on this surface, but this does not preclude incremental movements within or across configurations. Such dense regions posed an interesting question to us: Just why did the same or very similar score patterns across a great number of variables occur with great regularity? In trying to answer this question, we looked at detailed case studies of the firms within each of these densely populated regions (Miller/Friesen 1984). We found that most groups of firms tended to be driven by central themes that aligned many aspects of strategy, structure, culture, and process. Unfortunately, the literature on configuration remains underdeveloped and there is a great deal of work to be done to further isolate and explore these central themes. I will review the two principal approaches in the configuration literature. The first and most common develops conceptual typologies; the second generates empirical taxonomies. I will address some of the shortcomings of this literature and make a few remedial suggestions before proposing a third approach - studying configuration as a variable or quality that can create or destroy competitive advantage. My thesis is that often what are missing in the so-called configurational literature are configurations themselves: complex systems of interdependency brought about by central orchestrating themes. The Approach of Typology Typologies at their best are memorable, neat and evocative. Among the more prominent of these are those of Burns and Stalker (1961), Miles and Snow (1978, 1994), and Mintzberg (1979). These scholars differentiated among types of strategies, organizations, or decision making styles. …

Fashion and ontology in Trinidad

Abstract: A title of this nature invites the accusation of pretentiousness. This would follow the juxtaposition of two terms, fashion and ontology, which ordinary discourse would construct as opposing ends of a spectrum of social phenomena. Fashion is often taken as the most superficial content of social activities, ontology the deepest and the least susceptible to an analysis as mere content. Fashion is therefore one of the least promising candidates as a vehicle for ontology or even as having ontological consequences. The juxtaposition of the two stakes the claims of this paper, that is to equate modes of consumption with an understanding of the fundamental nature of being.

« Je m’y connais peut-être en art mais je ne sais pas ce que j’aime »

Abstract: Cette observation ethnographique, realisee dans les quartiers nord de Londres, sur la maniere dont on choisit les objets de la vie quotidienne vient completer l’etude de Bourdieu sur le contexte social du jugement esthetique. Ces donnees suggerent que de tels jugements esthetiques sont rarement une simple rencontre « kantienne » entre des personnes et des objets isoles. Les individus s’appuient plutot sur des processus sociaux pour decouvrir ce qu’ils aiment. Les exemples presentes concernent l’ajout de nouveaux elements decoratifs dans la maison, les problemes lies au choix et a l’achat d’une robe a fleurs et de sous-vetements, le recours aux services de la societe Colour me Beautiful pour choisir ses habits. Ces etudes de cas illustrent la signification des relations sociales et celle des rapports entre les objets dans la definition du gout.

Caos criador ou evoluir dentro da continuidade transformara organização por que, como e em que direção as organizações se transformam

Abstract: No campo da mudanca organizacional, existem contradicoes fundamentais entre os trabalhos destinados aos praticos e os estudos teoricos e empiricos feitos por pesquisadores academicos. Nosso estudo visa a determinar as divergencias fundamentais eritre esses dois approaches, examinar as fontes e avaliar como podemos utilizar os tra­balhos de natureza empirica para tirar deles recomendacoes mais sensatas e mais realis­tas sobre a maneira como as organizacoes poderiam negociar a mudanca.