Enterprise Business Management Research Articles

A TWO‐COUNTRY COMPARISON OF THE USE OF INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY IN COMPETITIVE STRATEGY: SWEDEN AND THE UNITED STATES

Many factors in today's competitive and global business environment contribute to an organization's financial success. A business enterprise's management must adopt a strategy that fully exploits information technology's power as a key element in order to optimize the organization's competitiveness. Recent spectacular technological advances and breakthroughs have made the effective use of modern information technology a critical, competitive business weapon.

“Business Without a Boss”: The Columbia Conserve Company and Workers' Control, 1917–1943

Throughout the twentieth century, the role of workers in the management of business enterprise has been the subject of ongoing debate. Opponents of centralized, bureaucratic management have proposed a series of participatory alternatives—workers' control, industrial democracy, employee stock ownership, and more recently, employee involvement—that have sought to democratize workplace governance. Much of the literature on such initiatives, be it historical or contemporary, has implied that workers favor exercising greater responsibility over shop-floor matters but have been deterred by employer resistance and cautious labor leadership. This literature often fails to capture the complexity of workers' attitudes towards greater participation and the tensions felt by reform-minded business leaders seeking to share power and authority with their employees. It is in this context that the story of the Columbia Conserve Company, an Indianapolis-based producer of canned soups, assumes particular relevance as a pioneering attempt to implement workplace democracy. Between 1917 and 1943, Columbia Conserve's owner, William P. Hapgood, established a system of workers' ownership and management. However, workers at Columbia Conserve, while sympathetic to Hapgood's experiment, were reluctant to accept full managerial responsibility. Instead, they embraced a more familial concept that met their psychological needs for fellowship and security. William Hapgood's faith in worker self-management subsequently waned, revealing an authoritarian streak that undercut his democratic pretensions. The experience at Columbia Conserve illustrates the enduring problems involved in sustaining workplace democracy and illuminates the status of current efforts aimed at empowering workers on the job.

Explaining amoral decision making: An external view of a human disaster

Quality of work life affects the quality of life. By applying amoral paradigms in decision making managers of business enterprises can cause a poor quality work life and reduce the quality of life. The explanation and prediction of ethical/unethical business behaviour should not always be attributed to individual managers, as it may result from strong culture and decision making systems. It is argued that the causes and the solutions to ethical dilemmas can often be found in a theory based on integration of models of moral reasoning, decision schema, value congruence and corporate decision structures. The impact of exclusion of moral principles from the decision making process is illustrated by way of a case study.

The Reform of Business Management in China

The purpose of this research is to use the Japanese model of business management to study and critique the Chinese enterprises' business management since reform and open-door policy. The study, first, explores the factors that limit the implementation of a modern management system by looking at systemic problems, structural functions, and management style of the Chinese enterprises. Secondly, this study formulates policyproposals for the future reform of Chinese enterprises' business management, which may strengthen and improve the overall situation and competitiveness of the enterprises under market conditions.The chief method and characterisitic of this research is, that it first makes a comprehensive study of the Japanese business management and uses it as standard criteria to measure and investigate the practical aspects of Chinese enterprise business management under reform. The statistical investigation is based on 13 categories with 102 items, demonstrating the broad range of the study coupled with content-precision and its qualitatative nature. The statistical investigation is based on 12, 000 data, which are analysed through factor analysis and multi-variate analysis of regression. Based on the abovementioned analytical method, the study established 5 control factors in the Chinese enterprises' business management style, it then studied their interrelationship and their influence on the growth of the enterprise. Based on the results derived from the analysis, the study carried out a diagnosis of the enterprises business management and identified 4 types of conditions, followed by a critique of their internal mechanisms.Based on the above-derived results, this study, formulated policy-proposals for the macro-cum-micro reform of the enterprises business management style. The study also prognosticated the future pattern of development of enterprises, following the implementation of the proposed policies.In conclusion, the comprehensive study of enterprises after 16 years of reform and open-door has clearly demonstrated Chinese enterprises business management problems and the challenges they face amid reform. This study emphasizes the importance of correct business management strategy to reform and develop the Chinese enterprises.

Strategy formulation for the smaller firm—A practical approach

There are many models and processes aimed at helping the managers of business enterprises in making strategic decisions. However, most of this work is oriented toward large organizations. In this paper, a model based on empirical data observations in 20 small Dutch firms is presented. This is a practical model giving the managers a guideline with checklists to follow in making strategic decisions. The significant characteristics of the model include the capabilities of the managers of small business firms. It attempts to fill the gap which exists between sophisticated theory and the decision-making tools that are used by the entrepreneur. The model was successfully used by approximately 50 firms and this paper demonstrates its applicability and discusses the problems encountered.

Management of Business Enterprise under the Japanese Military Administration in Southeast Asia

The Koizumi Seima Co. Ltd. was founded in 1889. It had its main factory in Kobe and manufactured gunny bags from jute fiber imported from East Bengal. In 1930's the Company ranked first in its production of gunny bags in Japaan. Due to the increase of military demand during the Sino-Japnese War, the Company was placed under the special controls of the Army and the Navy. After the outbreak of the Pacific War, it was authorized in August 1942 to expand its activities into Southeast Asia, first in Burma, then in Java.a) In Burma, the Company was nominated as the agent for growing jute fibers. Owing to the lack of experience in the jute growing business, the Company employed two technicians to meet the demand. Upon their arrival at Rangoon, they were assigned to undertake the work of jute growing in the lower Irrawady delta as allocated by the Hesdquarters of the Military Administration. They distributed to the peasants the seeds which they brought from Japan. In 1944, the jute was harvested. It was spun and woven by peasants using primitive tools which they designed. The finished gunny bags were delivered to the Army suply base. From the latter half of that year, owing to the counter-attack of the Allied Forces they were forced to halt their business and to retire to Rangoon. In May 1945 they retreated to the border of Thailand where they heared of the Japanese surrender. Of eight members of the Company's team, two were lost in the course of retreat.b) In Java, the Company was commissioned in July 1943 by the Headquarters of the Military Administration to run a jute mill and eight neighbouring jute estates which were located at Delanggu in Surakarta and had been run by a Dutch Company. The Company was under the supervision of the Sugar Industry Public Corporation since the produced gunny sacks were exclusively delivered to the Corporation for packing of sugar. The Coporation controlled the business of the Company and supplied the funds. In the meantime, the Company was, in addition, ordered to take care of two nearby tobacco estates From early 1944 the Company ran the business free from the control of the Sugar Industry Corporation. In the latter half of that year the Company was commissioned to produce cloth from jute fiber as a result of the acute shortage of cotton cloth. They managed to produce such cloth and fabricate men's short trousers using captured sewing machines which were in the hands of Military supply office and leased temporarly to the Company. These trouseres were delivered to the Substantial Material Supply Corporation.After the Japanese surrender, they closed the offices and the mill. The Japanese employees went to the Japanese detainee's camp. However, in October 1945 a group of Indonesians headed by Soemarsono former clerk of the Company, appeared at the Jakarta Office and summoned the Company's representaive. Posing as representatives of the Ministy for Economic Development they demanded the surrender of all assets and properties of the Company to the newly born Republic of Indonesia. They also asked the representative of the Company to sign a paper prepared to that effect.The members of the Company in Java, thirteen in all, returned to Japan early in the following year.

Professionalism in Management and The History of Administrative Thought: Comment

The article reports the author's opinions regarding the social status of the managers of business enterprises. He focuses on the occupational tasks associated with the position of manager and wheth...

NOUVEAUX ASPECTS DE LA THÉORIE DES PRIX ET DE LA PRODUCTION*

SUMMARY New Aspects of Price and Production Theory. Despite recent progress, price and production theory is still inadequate, because it is not applicable to the management of business enterprises and it cannot be used in macro‐economic models. What is needed is not the refinement of a few special points in the theory, which suffers from the defect of narrowness, but rather an effort to extend its scope, particularly in the following respects:(a) Investigation of such relations as may exist between markets or between industries;(b) Specification of the production functions;(c) The working‐out of a theory of organisations, which would make it possible to grasp and express, in simple terms, the differences that are to be expected in the behaviour of a co‐operative society and a share company, a trust and a cartel a free and a dependent enterprise, etc.;(d) Investigation of cases falling somewhere between a duopoly and a polypoly— the only forms which really exist—detailed treatment being given to the possible reactions of enterprisers (price changes, advertisements, participations etc.), and the result being systematised on the basis of a new logical principle, which, to all appearance, can only be the one underlying the theory of games.It looks as if we are now upon the brink of such an extension of the theory. This would constitute the second “revolution” of the price and production theory. The book Business Concentration and Price Policy reviews the stage now reached by research with regard to a large number of important points, such as:‐ the concept of industry,‐ investigation of yields,‐ the extent of concentration and degree of integration of business firms,‐ the incidence of taxes,‐ the tactics of imperfect competition,‐ the relations between markets.Although it suffers from want of systematic arrangement, the book nevertheless supplies a great many data necessary for the elaboration of a general theory.

Modern Management in Western Europe

American management of business enterprise is compared with that in France, Belgium, and Italy. By comparison business management in Europe is undermanned, and decision-making highly centralized. Access to the managerial class is rigorously restricted by family or by education. European businessmen strive to control rather than to build organization. Their class-consiousness largely explains the class-consciousness of workers. Management's concern for security forces other classes to safeguard their own, making business enterprise static. But certain busineses are now becoming more dynamic.