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1.0 Introduction In the popular film'Wall Street', the ruthless investment banker played by Michael Douglas, devotes an ode to'Greed', as part of his speech to the shareholders'meeting of a paper company he aims at acquiring:'The point is ladies and gentlemen that greed, for the like of a better word, is good. Greed is right. Greed works! Greed clarifies, cuts through and captures the essence of evolutionary spirit...'Even though the aforementioned acquisition deal did eventually fail, in today's economy M&A activity is surging to levels previously unknown. With the exception 1 of the first quarters of 2002, the last decade has been characterised by unprecedented 2 number of transactions • It appears that'greed'is gaining ground amongst top executives and shareholders. Inasmuch as greed is an integral part of human nature, so is the propensity to grow and develop a part of organisational nature. Greiner (1998:p.66) claims that organisational evolution is not merely a self-implied process, but a'contest for survival'. In other words, if organisations are to reach and potentially surpass their average life 3 expectancy range of 20 to 50 years, they need to evolve. Mergers & acquisitions seem to play a primary role in the evolution, and thus survival, of organisations.

Foreword This is the second title in a series which is aimed at giving access as widely as possible to the results of our research into construction business management. We wish to express our gratitude to Gabler to have put their faith in us. Christoph Winter, who was the first research assistant to join the newly created chair, combines knowledge and practical experience of Anglo-Saxon construction management with awareness of the German construction environment. The Anglo­ Saxon countries have not experienced a period of reconstruction, as has occurred after the reunification of Germany, and have thus experienced life-threatening competition much earlier. Contractors in offering producer-led and collaborative procurement have developed instruments to strengthen their competitive position. These are the thoughts that this work now introduces into Germany. As a true compendium this work is not only directed upstream at the client, but also downstream, adopting a resource orientated look at integrating subcontractors and other suppliers most effectively into the supply chain, in order to facilitate contractor-led procurement in the first place, despite the difficulties of seasonal one-off and prototype production at ever changing locations. Midstream relationships in form of collaborative working or partnering are being considered as well.

Higher education institutions have proven to be one of the most enduring organizations of the last centuries. In recent decades, however, significant changes in their institutional environment have forced universities to rethink their strategies. This is particularly true for management higher education institutions. How do universities, and specifically business schools, deal with these various expectations? Are there different organizational responses in the American, German, or Swedish higher education systems? These and other important questions of higher education management research are examined in this doctoral thesis. Taking neo-institutionalism theory as its basis, the thesis is convincing both conceptually as well as empirically through its multiple case study design. The insights gained are most interesting. They reveal how a form of'organizational schizophrenia'can help institutions comply with external demands without compromising the pursuit of academic reputation which is essential for the inner stability of higher education institutions and their continued existence. This book is relevant both for students and researchers in higher education management as well as management practitioners and administrators. I can say this with conviction as Heinke Robken's doctoral thesis was one of the last that I supervised as a teacher before changing to the president's office of the University of Oldenburg. As such, I read it both from a theoretical viewpoint as well as that of a practitioner.

Introduction Are services millennium-proof? Certainly not. At least not at this moment. There is no thorough research needed to derive that conclusion, simply ask around. The evi­ dence is overwhelming. True horror stories exist of all types of services in all types of sectors. It is even becoming a business in itself. Television shows that are based on customer complaints about services are becoming more and more popular. As is the case in the millennium problem, management of service companies experiences a lot of problems in the hardware and the software of services. There are still prob­ lems in defining and developing the service, and problems in creating, realizing and managing weil defined services. Is there than no progress at all? We believe there iso The enormous attention for services has its advantages as weil. In various places innovations are realized, and what is more important are linked to theory. Only in this way learning becomes pos­ sible. Eventually innovative practice will reflect in the development of theory, and in turn good practice will be based on solid theory. This series tries to support this pro­ cess by presenting a number of innovative practices, and examples of testing theory in service quality marketing and management.

Today many business environments are characterized by frequent changes that result in a higher market dynamism and complexity. Global media industries are an up-to-date example of this development: a fast growth period was followed by a rapid downturn. Media companies wrote off a colossal US$ 120 billion from their balance sheets in 2002 - mostly as a result of growth strategies'failure. It seems that despite popular belief growth or market share by itself is less than ever before a guarantor of success. Sebastian Raisch decided to analyze various strategies in order to gain a bett8r understanding of the determinants of successful firm performance. When he decided to go on a research journey into the elements and dynamics of strategic thinking and firm performance he brought along all the ingredients necessary for such a challenging project; he had experience gained through exhaustive consulting work, excellent knowledge of management theories and, as a result of his studies and activities as a research assistant, specific knowledge of strategic management. His research objectives were furthermore clearly defined and, thanks to a meticulously planned and well-organized project as well as his enthusiasm for the topic, he had ready access to an empirical field.

v Foreword Over the years strategic initiatives have received increasing importance as core vehicles for strategy-making. These coordinated undertakings enable firms to reinforce the current strategy or alter it in order to realign the organization in accordance with changed environmental conditions. Despite the growing importance of strategic initiatives the overall understanding of their professional management is still limited. While previous research has acknowledged the importance of the organizational context for the successful development of strategic initiatives, so far only little research has focused on this important link. Especially the social side of the organizational context has remained under-investigated. Karolin Marx addresses this shortcoming and analyzes the role of the social context, represented by the embeddedness of the initiative team in the intrafirm network, for strategy­ making. As initiatives are pursued by teams, it is reasonable to assume that the type and quality of the team's social relations to other organizational units impacts the thinking and behavior within the team and thus the performance of the initiative.

This research project was driven by curiosity about the actual impact of Corporate Venture Capital activities on the investing company. At the end of 1998 when I developed the idea of analyzing CVC further, corporate venturing activities began to increase again after they had gone through two earlier boom and bust cycles. At that time, I did not envision how large the dimensions of CVC investments would become and how sharp the decrease afterwards would be. This latest cycle confirmed my desire to determine the impact of CVC and contribute to the understanding of CVC,in theory and management practice. This research project was accepted as a dissertation by the'PromotionsauBschuss der Wissenschaftlichen Hochschule fUr Unternehmensfiihrung (WHU), -Otto-Beisheim­ Hochschule-', in Vallendar entitled'Impact of Corporate Venture Capital on Sustainable Competitive Advantage of the Investing Firm - A Resource Based Approach'in June 2002. I want to thank several people who contributed to this research project. I am grateful to Prof. Dr. Klaus Brockhoff and Prof. Dr. Markus Rudolf for their guidance and support. I want to thank several interview partners from industry for their time and insights. Thanks also to NVCA, EVCA and Asset Alternatives Inc. for the permission to cite Corporate Venture Capital figures.

Engineering organizations developing large complex systems are usually not capable of determining an'overall optimal'system design. Rather, the system is divided in'com­ ponents'or subsystems (such as an axle in a car or a module in a software product), for each of which a performance can be measured, an optimal design can be found or at least approximated, and for which a designer (or engineer or team of engineers) is responsible. Each engineer then makes, at first, decisions to optimize'his'component. In real orga­ nizations, designers often develop considerable pride in the solutions they have found for their components. However, it is the very nature of complex systems that the components cannot be optimized in isolation, but that they interact in determining the quality of the overall system (via space constraints, or via the exchange of fluids, air, force, electricity, or information). To some degree, these interactions are known from experience and can be anticipated, or are embedded in accepted design principles. However, in any complex design project that is not entirely routine and marginal, many such interactions are not known at the outset.

1. 1 Research Problem and Relevance........................................................ 1 l. 2 Key Concepts and Significant Prior Research.................................... 6 1. 2. 1 Definitions and Basic Concepts in Knowledge Management............. 6 1. 2. 2 Refining the Research Question......................................................... 9 l. 3 Research Objectives and Expected Contributions.............................. l3 1. 4 General Research Approach................................................................ 18 1. 4. 1 Research Design.................................................................................. 18 1. 4. 2 Site Selection....................................................................................... 21 1. 4. 3 Unit of Analysis................................................................................... 23 l. 4. 4 Data Collection, Analysis, and Exposition.......................................... 25 2. Conceptual Foundations.................................................................. 29 2. 1 Change Paradigms Guiding KMS Implementations............................ 29 2. 2 Linear,Staged Change......................................................................... 30 2. 2. 1 Lewin-Schein's Conceptualization of Change..................................... 30 2. 2. 2 Unfreezing........................................................................................... 32 2. 2. 3 Cognitive Restructuring....................................................................... 38 2. 2. 4 Refreezing........................................................................................... 40 2. 3 Circular, Continuous Change............................................................... 42 2. 3. 1 Sathe's Conceptualization of Change.................................................. 42 2. 3. 2 Behavior.............................................................................................. 44 2. 3. 3 Justifications of Behavior.................................................................... 47 2. 3. 4 Cultural Communications.................................................................... 48 2. 3. 5 Hiring, Socializing, and Replacing Employees................................... 51 3. Case Study: Siemens ShareNet......................................................... 53 3. 1 Project Prologue.................................................................................. 53 3

From the very beginning in the field of organization development and action research there has been a central role afforded to the role conversation plays in enabling change to take place in social systems. Kurt Lewin himself actively pursued and developed settings in which conversation was the foundation for attitudinal and behavioral change. After his death, his colleagues and subsequently the scholars and practitioners who took his seminal research and insights into the world of organizations continued to explore ways in which conversation in groups could facilitate individual, group and organizational change. From T-group to team development, from the confrontation meeting to large group interventions, from intergroup conflict management to dialogue conferences, the heritage of Kurt Lewin has stamped itself on the applied behavioural science approach to change management that we know as organization development. In more recent years the work of Bohm, Isaacs, Schein and others has contributed significantly to the development of how conversation can be structured. The flourishing of large group interventions - open space technology, search conferences, future search, whole scale change - have created structures whereby whole systems can engage in simultaneous conversation about the future of their organizations and communities. Another distinctive characteristic of organization development is the role played by the external consultant. In organization development, consultants work in a facilitative, process consultation mode whereby they work at enabling members of the client system to perceive their own issues, understand them and develop and take their own actions in their regard.

Foreword The positive impact of technology transfer on universities and companies in my opinion is undisputed. Driving factors for technology transfer are the complementary nature of research, the increasing specialization and the available vast resources outside companies'settings. In that sense I welcome the work done by Franz Hofer which provides recommen- tions to further facilitate technology transfer. He has done a remarkable work in examining technology transfer between Graz University of Technology and Styrian companies. As the author shows, the results presented in this book are not only valid for the specific setting in Styria, one of nine states of Austria, but also for other regions dealing with this specific topic. He based his results on detailed empirical examinations which allowed the introduction of target groups of university researchers and companies defined by a set of characteristics. Thus the work enables parties involved in technology transfer to act according to the specific needs of the participants. Formerly, this knowledge was available at best implicitly, i.e. experienced university researchers or managers used to deal with each other thus knowing well the others'expectations. Inexperienced fellows had to build up this knowledge gradually. Due to his research Franz Hofer set a landmark for university researchers and managers, representatives of governmental agencies as well as for companies dealing with technology transfer.

Foreword With early warning of CEOs in small and medium-sized companies, Andreas Kirschkamp has found a highly relevant and, up to this point, mainly unexplored research area as a field for his dissertation thesis. In a first step, he confirms the results of traditional contingency theory which show a strong link between environmental uncertainty and strategic sensemaking. In a second step and as the actual core of this study, he elaborates on the link between personality traits of CEOs and their strategic sensemaking. Thus, he sees his study in the tradition of an “extended contingency theory”. The underlying framework originates from Lewin/Stephens 1994 who distinguish eight attitudes as determinants of organizational design. Kirschkamp empirically shows that six of these attitudes have significant explanatory influence on the design variables. However, egalitarianism and degree of moral reasoning do not have any explanatory power within this context. Regarding the relationship between early warning behavior and success, Kirschkamp finds that successful CEOs differ in their use of sources from their less successful peers. They use internal, impersonal and external, personal sources more than managers of organizations with low success in early warning do. The managers with effective early warning behavior scan with a broader scope, delegate less, interpret with more and different partners, and more intensively. However, no difference can be observed as for the frequency of scanning, tool support and fixity of time for interpretation.

Venture capital has become an important driver of economic growth in Europe during the last decades. Corporate governance is a key success factor for the development of private growth companies and thereby for the achievement of the venture capitalists'financial objectives. Despite the high relevance of corporate governance for venture capital-financed companies the topic has so far not been extensively researched. Tra- tional research on corporate governance focussed almost entirely on public companies. Maik Kleinschmidt aims in his dissertation at narrowing the knowledge gap by ana- sing the relationship between venture capital, corporate governance and firm value for the first time in a systematic way. He researches how venture capitalists influence the corporate governance of their portfolio companies. Factors that determine the inf- ence and the impact are analysed in detail. In a second step, the impact of good corporate governance on the firm value of the portfolio companies is researched. The underlying research design is developed to ensure that the particularities of cor- rate governance of growth companies are captured. It incorporates both, a theoretical and an empirical analysis. The comprehensive research concept and the corresponding hypotheses are derived from an economic and a managerial theory. Thereby, the control as well as the value-adding role of corporate governance is taken into account. Empirical testing of the theoretical findings is done with qualtiative and quantitative analyses. State-of-the-art methods are used to allow for the characteristic development of growth companies.

Foreword This book contains three essays which emanated from the desire to understand more thoroughly the strategies employed by producers of experience and credence goods in order to avoid market failure due to asymmetric information. The first essay focuses on the employment relationship between a football club and its player and treats the productivity of the latter as an experience good. The second essay looks at the market for religious services, which can be considered as credence goods per se. The analysis highlights how the church can employ specific institutional devices, like e. g. celibacy, in order to signal certain properties of its religious services to potential customers and, at the same time, gain a superior strategic position in the market for these services. The last essay is entirely devoted to the analysis of competition among suppliers of experience goods. The author employs a rather sophisticated Coumot model with endogenous, vertically differentiated products. Without going into the details here, the book is recommendable because of its creativity and originality. Scholars interested in the application areas covered by the essays as well as researchers studying markets for experience and credence goods will find rich food for thought. Prof Dr. Egon Franck Preface VII Preface Uncertainty about the quality and the attributes of a product influences the behaviour of the transaction partners and may lead to reduced market efficiency.

Most network industries throughout Europe are subject to sector-specific regulation with large impact on market structures and results. Consequently, questions related to regulatory designs and their effects on market outcomes become more and more important in business and politics as well as in scholarly research. Concentrating on Germany and the UK, Christian Wernick provides the reader with insights on the effects of different regulatory strategies, which take place under a common European regulatory framework. Combining theoretical analyses and empirical material a sophisticated and balanced picture on the coherences between regulation and investment behaviour in Germany's and the UK's broadband markets is presented.

The role of trust in governing institutions has been disputed for years. Increasing uncertainty and people's personal concerns about future perspectives seem to have created an increasing need for what we call trust. Simultaneously, the same uncertainty that induces this increased demand for trust seems to be undermining it. Marco Tulio Zanini examines the effects of different industry-specific institutional framework constraints on the level of trust within business organizations, particularly the possible differences in old and new economy. Based on the results of a survey carried out in seven major companies from different sectors of the Brazilian economy, the author shows that trust is more likely to be found in relatively stable, hierarchical and bureaucratic organizations whereas there is comparatively little trust in new economy firms.

Internationalization and globalization are major forces for companies to change their organizational structures and processes fundamentally. To master the associated problems, profound and well planned procedures are indispensable, a task which is referred to as change management, and which has to take into account both structural and dynamic aspects. Especially interventions in the area of human resource management lead to manifold repercussions—intended and unintended, enhancing or interfering with the original intentions. Birgitte Snabe investigates in her dissertation if and to what extent System Dynamics can be helpful to design organizational interventions and to examine and evaluate in a next step which particular actions offer adequate problem solutions. In a distinction from the permanent organizational adaptation to a changing environment, the author understands organizational interventions as discrete and fundamental changes to the company's structures and processes. The management of organizational interventions consists of two interdependent cycles: Problem formulation, analysis and solution (what to do) on the one hand, and the resulting actions to make the change happen (how to do it) on the other. It is a central hypothesis of the investigation that the implementation of solutions to strategic problems often presents larger challenges than the development of the solution itself. The methodological support for effective implementation processes is the core topic of the dissertation. Following an ‘action research'approach, a delicate and far reaching personnel decision in a large corporation was investigated and is discussed.

Foreword Starting point for Sebastian-Dominik Jais'dissertation is the insight that – despite the relevance of national culture on the one hand and the use of information on the other – there is only little research on the relationship between the two variables. Thus, the author aimed at a better understanding of the influence of national culture on the use of information. To that end, Jais has carried out a survey with asset managers of a renowned global company in Germany, South Korea and the United States of America. Since there is only little relevant knowledge available, the author has chosen an explorative setup. In his research, Sebastian-Dominik Jais finds that differences between the samples are only observable where the adequate type of information use is determined neither by technical necessity nor the task to be fulfilled. Accordingly, national culture can only exert its influence when the information user has some degree of freedom when fulfilling his task. In addition, the findings of Jais'research provide first evidence for the existence of cross-national effects on the managerial use of information in general. In particular, the results show that power distance and uncertainty avoidance affect the managerial use of information most strongly. This confirms Hofstede's prediction and underscores the frequently made statement that not all cultural dimensions are similarly important as determinants of managerial behaviour.

The latest increase in numbers of mergers and acquisitions (M&As) and the latest increase in size of M&As raise the question, whether M&As can meet the expectations. This question is relevant in two ways, from an economic as well as from a social perspective. Despite its central economic importance, many mergers and acquisitions fall short of their objectives. In his work, Florian Frensch sees cooperation relationships between employees and management of previously separate firms as the key success factor for the realization of synergies and thereby for the M&A success. Cooperation depends on different factors on the environmental, the firm, team and the individual level. Grounded on extensive literature search, Florian Frensch investigates which individual factors of employees and which dyadic factors of relationship partners affect the cooperation between employees of previously separated firms. With the help of social network analyses, Florian Frensch investigates cooperation relationships after M&A-transactions in two case studies. Unlike previous studies, he asks employees on the lower operative levels of the firm instead of using key informants in the management ranks. In order to use social network analysis in larger groups, Florian Frensch develops an innovative approach for gathering network data with the help of a dynamic computer based questionnaire, which allows him to conduct a full network analysis in a group with ~ 400 employees.

Virtual Organizations (VOs) and other forms of cooperation among firms are gaining popularity in particular among SMEs as a way to strengthen their position in an era of global competition. Consequently, public institutions at the regional, national and supranational level like the European Union are actively promoting and supporting the formation of networks and virtual organizations. But despite all the efforts spent on promoting cooperation and the numerous projects aimed at supporting the development of virtual organizations, our understanding of the success factors for the development of VOs is still rather limited. While the ultimate goal of virtual organizations is to improve economic performance, economic factors alone are not sufficient to explain success or failure in establishing a VO. In her thesis, Marita Haas has introduced a new perspective on the formation process of virtual organizations by interpreting the formation of a virtual organization as a group development process between the key actors in each participating company. This person-centered approach is particularly valid when considering SMEs, which in many cases are strongly influenced by the personality of the founder. Applying phase models from small group research enables Marita Haas to identify critical phases and transitions in the formation process and develop adequate intervention strategies to support the VO members in their efforts.

Foreword Starting point of Tanja Prinzessin zu Waldeck's dissertation thesis is the insight in the relevance of strategic sensemaking in top management teams. Consequently, Prinz- sin zu Waldeck investigates how the composition of the team may influence the cor- sponding activities. Different from previous research, her study takes a broader - proach in two respects. First, it describes top management teams more compreh- sively. Instead of focusing only on demographics such as age, tenure, or functional backgrounds, it also explores the personalities of the team members, the leadership style and team culture. In this context, it transfers knowledge from other research fields such as psychology to sensemaking research. Second, the study does not only concentrate on specific sensemaking activities, for instance scanning or information sharing, but tries to draw a more holistic picture of the sensemaking process. Finally, the study controls for the effects of the organizational context. It explores how varying the organizational size, involvement of owners in the management of an organization and ownership status changes the findings about the team composition and its effect on sensemaking. As a result, the work of Prinzessin zu Waldeck offers several interesting new insights and at least three substantial contributions to the relevant literature: It offers new ideas about how the composition of top management teams affects the strategic sensemaking of teams differently. It furthermore provides evidence that organizational factors might influence the composition of teams and consequently also their sensemaking.

Titilayo Seriki has developed a new theoretical approach to explain the success of teams operating within the complex societal context of sub-Saharan Africa. While prior literature often suggests that organisational and national contexts are highly significant to team process and outcomes, these factors are seldom specified and their possible influence seldom studied. The cross-level character of this research framework (analysis of interrelationships between societal, organisational, and team levels) is a novel and necessary contribution to the research on teamwork and project management. The author focuses on sub-Saharan Africa as a region of increasing economic importance. International organisations consider Africa as a market for expansion due especially to its wealth of natural resources as well as its immense growth opp- tunities. A deeper knowledge of the cultural and institutional environments is needed to design appropriate business strategies and internal processes within the organi- tion. Based on existing literature, Dr. Seriki logically hypothesises chains of influence from the societal context to the innovation team, via the organisation as a mediator. The identification of common societal forces across sub-Saharan Africa and the analysis of consequences for organisations and teams provide a valuable contri- tion to the management literature, especially given the recent interest in the region by countries such as China.

University spin-offs contribute effectively to economic prosperity and job creation. These independent entities are formed to commercialize technologies originating from publicly funded research institutions and fulfill several functions. University spin-offs increase the technological effectiveness of an economy and contribute to the competitiveness of a nation. They foster regional development by establishing themselves in close proximity to their incubator organizations thereby attracting other high-technology companies to the region. They achieve abo- average growth rates and promote higher innovation efficiency. In a discussion on the function of publicly financed research and regional economic development, sp- offs are regarded as instruments to support their incubators and therefore legitimize further support for academic institutions. However, only limited research providing further insight on the phenomena of university spin-offs is available. Empirical evidence on the factors influencing the success of spin-offs is scarce. The Institute for Innovation Research of the Kiel University has been working towards improving the current fragmented findings through its own research efforts. Manoj Gupte contributes to the research field with an in-depth study providing empirical results on the influence of internal management activities on the growth of university spin-offs. He explicitly incorporates contextual factors into his framework.

To ensure their long-term survival and prosperity, many industries have to deal with increasingly dynamic and complex environments. Due to this situation, they are confronted with major challenges. Manuela Stoll investigates why some firms cope with change successfully, while others do not. She focuses on two strategies to address change: adapting to change and creating change. Using a large-scale survey among top executives of manufacturing firms in Germany, she evaluates the importance of a range of resources, competences, and “isolating mechanisms” (shields against imitation) for the success of these strategies. The results show that adapting to change has an important effect on firm performance and is mainly influenced by a firm's industry foresight abilities. A separate analysis illustrates how these abilities can be strengthened.

Der immer schnellere Wandel der Unternehmensumwelt führt zur drastischen Verkürzung der Marktzyklen; die Entwicklungszyklen hingegen werden länger und die Entwicklungskosten nehmen zu. Daher gewinnt das strategische Technologiemanagement für den Erfolg von Unternehmen zunehmend an Bedeutung. Die Entscheidungsprozesse hierbei sind äußerst komplex, denn naturwissenschaftlich-technische, markt- und wettbewerbsbezogene, wirtschaftliche und rechtliche Faktoren müssen berücksichtigt werden. Christoph Feldmann entwickelt ein Modell, das alle Entscheidungsebenen und Optionen eines Unternehmens im Rahmen technologiestrategischer Entscheidungsprozesse systematisch abbildet und eine klar strukturierte unternehmerische Entscheidungsfindung erlaubt. Seine Praxistauglichkeit wird anhand von 250 fragebogengestützten Experteninterviews in 80 Pharma- und Biotechnologieunternehmen untersucht, und die gewonnenen Erkenntnisse werden zur Charakterisierung der technologiestrategischen Ausrichtung der Gesamtbranche und der sie konstituierenden Technologiestrategietypen herangezogen. Die Simulation einer zeitlichen Längsschnittanalyse sowie die Analyse der wichtigsten Faktoren des technologiestrategischen Umfeldes ermöglichen den fundierten und differenzierten Zugang zur technologiestrategischen Ausrichtung und Neupositionierung der hochinnovativen Pharma-Branche.

The telecommunication markets in Europe, North America and Australia are currently changing from growth to saturation or even to decline. The results are fierce competition and strongly reduced profit rates. The situation in developing countries is totally different. Large unsatisfied needs are leading to increased demand and to important growth rates. China and India are especially attractive to operators and equipment manufacturers in the telecom sector, because of their important size. Ms. Kiruba J. B. Levi's research investigates India as one of these two markets. Ms. Levi's objective is to support, with her research, the successful entry of foreign companies in the Indian telecom market. To reach this objective, she proceeds in four steps. First, she summarizes the literature on market entry strategies. Afterwards, Ms. Levi describes the Indian Telecom Market. A lot of actual facts and figures are given. The clear structure helps the reader to find the needed information. The third step consists of four cases of foreign companies entering the Indian telecommunications sector. After the description of the companies and their entry activities, the cases are analyzed with the help of the case research method. Based on the analyses of the Indian telecommunications market and especially on the lessons learnt from the four cases, Ms. Levi finally provides recommendations for companies, which are planning to start activities in the Indian communications industry.

Human capital is one of the main sources of sustainable competitive advantage of firms. However, employees can move to another firm taking with them part of the knowledge stock of the former employer. Hence, the mobility of key Research & Development (R&D) personnel jeopardizes the innovative ability of a firm and consequently its competitiveness. This poses major challenges to the management of firms, but also to policy makers since innovation has a large share in economic growth and technological leadership of countries. Karin Hoisl is concerned with innovation processes and the involved inventors. Her focus is on the determinants of inventor productivity, the relationship between inventor mobility and inventor productivity, and the establishment of efficient incentive systems to commit key inventors to the firm. A novel and unique dataset is employed, including information on more than 3 000 German inventors from a recent survey as well as information on almost 40 000 European patents.

In gravierender Weise hat sich die Rolle von Patenten in den vergangenen Jahren gewandelt. Führten sie noch vor wenigen Jahren ein Schattendasein in der Rech- abteilung eines Unternehmens, dem das Management keine große Beachtung zollte, erwies sich seit Mitte der neunziger Jahre mehr und mehr das Patent als eine Waffe im Kampf um die Wettbewerbsposition eines Unternehmens. Mit Hilfe von Patenten lässt sich nicht nur die eigene Wettbewerbsposition stärken, sondern sie eignen sich auch, um den Handlungsspielraum der Mitbewerber systematisch einzuengen. Patente bilden eine Art Währung im Rahmen von Cross-Licensing-Abkommen, die das eigene Unternehmen als Kooperationspartner erst interessant macht und den Zugang zur Nutzung von Patenten der Wettbewerber öffnet. Und Patente bilden einen am Kapitalmarkt zunehmend beachteten Indikator für die Erfolgsaussichten von te- nologiebasierten Unternehmen. Spätestens seit dem Buch „Rembrandts in the Attic“ von Rivette/Kline ist auch die separate Verwertung von Patenten zum Zwecke der Hebung ungeahnter Einnahmequellen ein in Theorie und Praxis viel beachtetes Thema. Aus theoretischer Sicht zeichnet sich hier nicht weniger ab, als eine Weit- entwicklung der Arbeitsteilung in den Bereich der Wissenserstellung und der Wissensverwertung. Vor dem Hintergrund dieser Tendenzen hat die Professur für Industriebetriebslehre und Technologiemanagement an der Helmut-Schmidt-Universität in Kooperation mit der IPB – IP Bewertungs AG ein Forschungsprojekt zur näheren Untersuchung der aktuellen Patentstrategien und insbesondere der Verwertungsabsichten initiiert.

The importance of managerial support has been established for modern busine- related sciences at least as early as 1922. It was then in the?rst issue of Harvard Business Review, that Wallace B. Donham called for a proper theory of business to avoid business to continue to be “unsystematic, haphazard, and for many men a pathetic gamble.” The past century witnessed signi?cant development in terms of theory. Common examples attracting considerable attention for scienti?c enquiry are decision theory, knowledge management and transfer,or organizational learning. Each set of theories focuses aspects of managerial work. Methods and tools based upon decision theory are concerned with?nding one appropriate course of actions amongst a myriad of possibilities. Knowledge management methods and tools - sentially seek to conserve and transfer expert knowledge so that repetitive errors can more easily be prevented and repeating success more easily be achieved. - nally, methods and tools building upon the notion of organizational learning aim at signi?cantly lowering the resources involved in creating experts. I focus organizational learning for two main reasons: Firstly, learning is an “- avoidable” phenomenon. Learning does not have to be pursued as an additional activity to daily responsibilities. It is thus not the question if managers learn but what they learn and how this learning process can be directed. Secondly, a new dimension of criticism emerged from postmodern discussions of knowledge m- agement or decision making, which at least hints at the need to investigate other mechanisms for supporting management.

The discussion about increased product complexity in Western European companies has been omnipresent for decades. This is due to ever new demands (real or c- ceived) from the market and new possibilities (technical and others) open to the p- viders of products and services to come up fast with very specific solutions. The m- agement of this complexity inside the company so as to achieve a balance between the market benefits of more customer specific solutions and the internal costs induced by this is still a big challenge. After years of research in this area there is still a lack of tools to help practitioners to take decisions about the right degree of complexity for a product or the right design of a product architecture. Mr. Marti brings together three perspectives on this topic in an easily understa- able and communicable way: The strategy of the company (combined with the mat- ity of the product), the functionality, and the physical complexity on a component level. The visualization in a complexity matrix is an important new tool especially for fostering the understanding for complexity issues in a company! With this book Mr. Marti has come up with an outstanding contribution to product complexity management, which is crucial for the future competitiveness of companies in Western Europe. I hope that this book will find a broad distribution as well in pr- tice as in theory for the sake of our countries! Prof. Dr.

Foreword Research on the creation and development of new firms has gained substantial prominence over the past ten years - especially in the German-speaking countries, where many new entrepreneurship chairs have been created in universities. Despite the surge in interest, short-comings in the research domain remain. These shortcomings primarily concern the lack of solid empirical research that reflects the state of the art of management science. Based on psychological theories, expla- tions of the founding of a firm and its subsequent success have been made frequently in terms of character traits and attitudes. Yet these studies explain little about a new firm's success. Their usefulness was especially limited concerning team-based ventures, which represent the majority of technology-based ventures. Other more recent approaches focus on entrepreneurial activities and how they impact new venture development. In this stream of research, the competence perspective has special importance as competencies of founders determine which activities they undertake, and how they perform these activities. A key question has been raised often by entrepreneurs, researchers and educators with respect to competencies of the founders: What are the critical competencies needed to create and grow a new firm? Although this is a fundamental question of entrepreneurship research, this question has hardly been investigated empirically. The dissertation of Dr. Jan Brinckmann analyzes how competencies of founding teams of new technology based firms affect the development of the new firms. In order to identify the critical competencies needed to create and grow a firm, Dr.

Communities of Practice (CoPs) are being increasingly employed in organizations and are probably the knowledge management tool today. They are a truly useful knowledge-sharing, transferring and retaining tool, surpassing other int- organizational networks such as project teams, operational teams, and purely informal networks. They also enjoy far greater success than pure IT tools employed to similar ends. The advantage is that they are based on like-minded people's fa- to-face meetings, exchange of experience, discussion and development of best practices etc. on an intra-organizational level, although these activities are often informal and not supported or recognized. As ever, practice has shown that many intra-organizational CoPs simply do not work while others are truly successful. The thesis provides the readers with some surprising insights into the nature of CoPs and the specific contributing factors. Stefano Borzillo's meticulous research started off by examining a large variety of CoPs by means of six identified success factors. The results of Stefano's investigation revealed three types of CoPs, which he calls “innovating strategic”, “operational excellence”, and “social and productive space” CoPs and which may all three be present within a single organization. Another insight in this regard was that each of them is suited to fulfill different objectives and that there is no one type of CoP that is best for managing the development and transfer of practices. The latter is determined by the CoPs'objectives, which are again determined by the organizational context. Stefano Borzillo also describes each of these CoP configurations'success factors.

This is an important book. The topic is important, and Dr. Straub approaches it with a new approach. In fact, one could say that the book's importance stems from its lack of disciplinary focus, relying instead on a holistic understanding of the phenomenon. Too often, academic research is pursued within a narrowly defined academic “field”, necessarily blinding researchers to realities whose essence is inter-disciplinary. This is typically the case with research on Mergers & Acquisitions, making most of the “findings” relatively unimportant for practice. Yet M&A are a crucial part of business development. It is evident that companies'long-term success is at least partially dependent on their strategic actions. And these are often shaped in practice by merger and acquisition activity. Thus phenomena as varied as globalization, value-chain optimization, or product diversification are often implemented as M&A operations. In no few cases, M&A activity constitutes the company's strategy. If, as noted above, strategic moves do have an impact on lo- term success, it follows that M&A activities are at the core of many business successes… and failures. As such, they play an important role in the development of the whole society: wealth is created (or destroyed) mostly by companies. Perhaps the most remarkable aspect of the phenomenon is its very high failure rate.

Low-cost country sourcing has for long been one of the hottest buzz words in the purchasing and supply management community, especially among practitioners. The lack of coverage in the academic field can potentially be explained by the complexity and the breadth of the topic. Although companies in most industries have sourced on a global level for decades or even centuries in order to reduce cost, the subject have received increasing attention over the last few years in a sense that the concept has become more and more institutionalized as part of the overall sourcing strategy. The developments are welcome – especially since the field of purchasing and supply management traditionally has been lagging behind other, more “acknowledged” disciplines such as finance, accounting, and marketing, among others. This lag is glaring if one considers the absence of faculties involved in the discipline among many universities. Therefore, the initiative of Supply Management Institute to build a worldwide research and training network has proven to be highly attractive for both scholars and practitioners. Furthermore, the discipline has also become increasingly complex due to globalization effects, where business networks become increasingly intertwined and the flow of goods, services, money and human capital grow exponentially over time. To handle the situation, companies are in desperate need for knowledge and information that can help them to crafting effective strategies that can secure supply, reduce risk and ultimately translate into competitive advantage.

Research on the patent system and the analysis of patenting activities have become an important field in economics and l)usin(\ss administration. The global demand for patcuit protection has been increasing strongly over the last decades. Institutional changes as well as the broadening of patentable subject matter pose new challenges to patentees and patent offices alike. Especially in Europe, the debate on the patentabihty of biotechnology and softwa- related inventions led to broad public attention to the design of the patent system. Given these developments, it is no wonder that practitioners as well as policy makers are turning to researchers for answers on how to cope with new challenges threatening the patent system. In his dissertation, Stefan Wagner attempts to answer some of these questions. Wagner apphes advanced econometric methods to large-scale data sets which were assembled specifically for the purpose of this thesis. His analysis focuses on various aspects of patent filings, examination and opposition at the European Patent Office. Each of the four self-contained chapters of this book addresses different issues which are important to all stake-holders of the patent system. Wagner closely analyzes institutional features of the European Patent Office, such as the duration of the examination of patent applications, the determinants of the occurrence of patent oppositions and the patentability of business methods under the European Patent Convention. In his concluding chapter he examines the managerial decision between outsourcing patent-related services to patent attorneys or generating them in-house.

Foreword The management consulting industry has grown into a sizeable eco­ nomic sector and employment market in the outgoing 20• century. Globally operating management consulting firms, with thousands of consultants, have emerged. They coexist alongside many small consultancies and single practi­ tioners. As a result, a remarkable diversity in the organizational structure of management consulting firms has developed. Organizational structure is of utmost importance for consultancies as it directly impacts their business and employment models. Yet, little scientific explanation has been offered so far on the factors accounting for the diversity of organizational structure in manage­ ment consulting. Michael Graubner explores this contemporary topic. His research is guided by the contingency theory of organizations, one of the classical organi­ zation theory schools of thought that has been traditionally applied to investi­ gate organizational structure in manufacturing, banking, and the public sector. The author thoroughly reviews the different aspects of contingency theor- contingency factors, constructs of organizational structure, the concept of fit between contingencies and structure, organic vs. bureaucratic theory - and reflects on them in the light of other organization theory schools of thought.

The idea of studying executive pay was born in a lecture on option valuation in spring 2002 at the Norwegian School of Economics and Business Administration NHH. At that time, I started wondering how companies that had granted large amounts of stock options to their executives would react to the sharp decreases in share prices that could be observed since 2000. Based on this interest, I wrote my NHH master thesis about'Employee stock options and falling share prices'investigating a sample of Norwegian IT companies. These companies were especially likely to both have granted substantial amounts of options and suffered from severe declines in share prices. The topic of executive pay continued to attract my interest, mainly because I felt that it offered opportunities to make a real contribution to academic researchers and policy makers alike. In summer 2002, I wrote my master thesis at the University of St. Gallen HSG. I investigated the determinants of executive stock option plan adoptions of Swiss sto- listed companies. Major results were that both large outside shareholders and CEO duality influenced whether companies would adopt stock option plans. At that time, very little information about executive pay was disclosed in Switzerland. However, the Swiss Stock Exchange SWX issued new listing guidelines that required companies to disclose detailed information on Corporate Governance starting from the annual report 2002 to be published in 2003.

There are many reasons why firms decide to extend their business operations by entering foreign markets. Whether it is a defensive step aimed at avoiding the consequences of saturating domestic markets or an offensive strategy based on the expectations of unusual profits, the most common market entry drivers are widely discussed and understood. What remains open is the most intriguing question of the selection of a particular market entry mode and the factors determining the right choice. On a theoretical ground the problem may be reduced to the issue of how many links of the Value Chain should be moved abroad in the process of international expansion. In practical terms the choice of a market-entry mode means a set of decisions taken in each particular case of a firm going international. The complexity of the task involves many different areas like the amount of risk, the scope of control, the level of capital involvement and financial efficiency. This is one of the reasons why there is no universal theory explaining the optimal way of making a successful market entry. The multitude of views on this subject does not make the question easier.

Foreword In recent years regulation and deregulation issues grew into a major concern of corpo­ rate management. Asked about their biggest pain points, managers from different businesses, not only network-based industries like telecommunications, transportation, and energy, but also chemicals or food and beverages, mentioned uncertainty resulting from regulation. Despite this fact, strategic management has so far widely neglected the interactions and inter-dependencies between corporate and regulatory actors. With this dissertation, the author aims at closing this gap through a better integration of external, regulatory actors into the strategy formation process. More specifically, he asks how regulatory actors impact corporate strategy and structure and how corporate management can proactively manage this type of external involvement. Based on an extensive literature review, the author shows that extant models of the strategy formation process focus almost exclusively on actors internal to the firm; ex­ ternal actors are widely neglected. In general, they have been condensed under rather abstract conditions of the environment (such as uncertainty or complexity). If explic­ itly considered, only selected elements (e.g., innovativeness, diversification, or organ­ izational design) have been analyzed in primarily content-based, quantitative, cro- secfional studies. A broader understanding of the complex inter-dependencies and mu­ tual influences between corporate and external actors remains lacking.

Why do projects succeed or fail? Can managers influence the outcome of a project? Are there core indicators that are extremely important in reaching targeted goals, values and - pectations? Nearly every manager responsible for a project has to deal with such questions sooner or later. This is especially the case for projects that are innovative to an organization. With the emergence of global communication technologies and driven by the desire of corporations to take advantage of the lower costs of production and skilled labor in devel- ing countries, the movement in German-speaking countries to export work offshore has - perienced a notable rise in popularity. The offshoring of information technology and software development has spawned an entire industry. Still, many offshore projects do not live up to their expectations. This book offers an enlightening and detailed analysis of the phenomenon of offshoring software development and its critical success factors. The critical success factor approach - lows management to harness the organization's resources on those issues that will make a d- ference. It will help to focus attention on major concerns and guide businesses in creating and measuring success.

Motivation and Research Questions This work seeks to further our understanding on the management of innovations in network industries. Although the economics of network markets like telecommuni- tions, Internet, email, media, computer, and service operations in banking, legal and airline industries have become a major field of economic research; knowledge about how to manage innovation within these markets is less advanced et al. 2000: 793; 2003: 198). The goods and services of these industries regularly manifest themselves as complex system products, which are composed of multiple mutually dependent components and often supplied by different industries 1998: 691; TIDD 1995: 308). Innovation processes associated with complex systems products, therefore, display a systemic character and the issue of how to coordinate the diverse but nevertheless complementary inputs poses a major challenge for innovation management. The issue of how to organise complex innovation projects, however, is still open for debate: A broad range of organisational forms--e. g, vertical integration and TEECE (1996: 68), TEECE (1996: 205), and (2001: 227); decentralised networks--BRESNAHAN and (1999: 13-14); (1999: 162) and (1992: 310); proje- organisationsmHOBDAV (2000: 892) has not only been theoretically derived, but is reported as well in practical use.