How has Japan become a major economic power, a world leader in the automotive and electronics industries? What is the secret of their success? The consensus has been that, though the Japanese are not particularly innovative, they are exceptionally skilful at imitation, at improving products that already exist. But now two leading Japanese business experts, Ikujiro Nonaka and Hiro Takeuchi, turn this conventional wisdom on its head: Japanese firms are successful, they contend, precisely because they are innovative, because they create new knowledge and use it to produce successful products and technologies. Examining case studies drawn from such firms as Honda, Canon, Matsushita, NEC, 3M, GE, and the U.S. Marines, this book reveals how Japanese companies translate tacit to explicit knowledge and use it to produce new processes, products, and services.

The knowledge-creating company : how Japanese companies create the dynamics of innovation

Entrepreneurship is the creation of organizations. What differentiates entrepreneurs from non-entrepreneurs is that entrepreneurs create organizations, while non-entrepreneurs do not. In behavioral...

“Who Is an Entrepreneur?” Is the Wrong Question:

Strategic alliances have been recognized as arenas with potential for opportunistic behavior by partners. Hence, a firm needs to have an adequate level of confidence in its partner's cooperative behavior. In this article we examine the notion of confidence in partner cooperation in alliances and suggest that it comes from two distinct sources: trust and control. We make the argument that trust and control are parallel concepts and that their relationship is of a supplementary character in generating confidence. In addition, we suggest that control mechanisms have an impact on trust level and that the trust level moderates the effect of control mechanisms in determining the control level. Finally, we discuss various ways to build trust within strategic alliances and important alliance control mechanisms.

https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdfplus/259291.pdf

Between Trust and Control: Developing Confidence in Partner Cooperation in Alliances

We develop and test a theoretical model to investigate the assimilation of enterprise systems in the post-implementation stage within organizations. Specifically, this model explains how top management mediates the impact of external institutional pressures on the degree of usage of enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems. The hypotheses were tested using survey data from companies that have already implemented ERP systems. Results from partial least squares analyses suggest that mimetic pressures positively affect top management beliefs, which then positively affects top management participation in the ERP assimilation process. In turn, top management participation is confirmed to positively affect the degree of ERP usage. Results also suggest that coercive pressures positively affect top management participation without the mediation of top management beliefs. Surprisingly, we do not find support for our hypothesis that top management participation mediates the effect of normative pressures on ERP usage, but instead we find that normative pressures directly affect ERP usage. Our findings highlight the important role of top management in mediating the effect of institutional pressures on IT assimilation. We confirm that institutional pressures, which are known to be important for IT adoption and implementation, also contribute to post-implementation assimilation when the integration processes are prolonged and outcomes are dynamic and uncertain.

/pdf/assimilation-of-enterprise-systems-the-effect-of-4bilo1zpw7.pdf

Assimilation of enterprise systems: the effect of institutional pressures and the mediating role of top management

Corporate entrepreneurship seems to many entrepreneurship scholars a contradiction in terms. This paper represents an attempt to bridge that gap. This is done by, first, reviewing the literature on entrepreneurship, trying to summarize it in a few major themes. Second, a view of entrepreneurship is proposed that facilitates the application of the previous findings to the field of corporate entrepreneurship. Finally, a series of propositions are developed, as instances of the kind of research that can be pursued by following the proposed approach.

A Paradigm of Entrepreneurship: Entrepreneurial Management *

The literature of small business and entrepreneurship is explored. It is established that, although there is an overlap between entrepreneurial firms and small business firms, they are different entities. Using the 1934 work of Schumpeter and recognizing the additions to the field of current writers, a conceptual framework is established for the differentiation of entrepreneurs from small business owners.

Differentiating Entrepreneurs from Small Business Owners: A Conceptualization

https://isiarticles.com/bundles/Article/pre/pdf/1121.pdf

ERP implementation failures in China: Case studies with implications for ERP vendors

This study identifies governance patterns for information technology investment decision processes and explores the impact of organizations' investment characteristics, external environment, and internal context on the shaping of those patterns. By identifying the lead actors of the initiation, development, and approval stages in IT governance, the patterns of 57 IT investment decisions at 6 hospitals are analyzed. The results reveal seven IT governance archetypes: (1) top management monarchy, (2) top management-IT duopoly, (3) IT monarchy, (4) administration monarchy, (5) administration- IT duopoly, (6) professional monarchy, and (7) professional- IT duopoly. Each archetype is analyzed by taking into account four specific factors: IT investment level, external influence, organizational centralization, and IT function power. This study makes several contributions to IT governance theory and practice. First, IT governance is reframed to include pre-decision stages, highlighting the importance of participants other than the final decision maker. Second, the variation of IT governance archetypes suggests that even when top management approval is required, the IT department may not play a key role in the IT investment decision process. Third, governance of the pre-decision initiation and development stages is found to be jointly affected by several contextual factors, suggesting that the allocation of final decision rights is only a part of IT governance. While decision rights may be allocated by the organization a priori, the actual patterns of IT governance are contingent on contextual factors. It is important to understand how IT governance archetypes are shaped because they may affect desired outcomes of IT investments.

Information technology governance in information technology investment decision processes: the impact of investment characteristics, external environment, and internal context

This paper continues a line of research into the effect of environmental characteristics and uncertainty on strategic planning. Results suggest that measures of uncertainty and the environment need...

Strategic planning: determining the impact of environmental characteristics and uncertainty.

Examining cases of failed ERP system implementation in China and explaining the unique circumstances.

/pdf/why-western-vendors-don-t-dominate-china-s-erp-market-4grnuxpiva.pdf

William R. Boulton

Papers

Differentiating Entrepreneurs from Small Business Owners: A Conceptualization

ERP implementation failures in China: Case studies with implications for ERP vendors

Information technology governance in information technology investment decision processes: the impact of investment characteristics, external environment, and internal context

Strategic planning: determining the impact of environmental characteristics and uncertainty.

Why Western vendors don't dominate China's ERP market