MIT Sloan Management Review

Organizations have often turned to well-established and very competitive global cities when looking to expand their markets. However, new research suggests that many corporations have been going to these cities for the wrong reasons and consequently have missed opportunities to build strategic advantages and organizational capability.

How can executives prioritize their time to ensure that they are focusing on the countries and subsidiaries that need the most attention?

A comparison of two Mexican factories suggests that global companies should go beyond monitoring codes of conduct and attack the problem of poor working conditions at its source by collaborating with their suppliers to implement new management systems.

Many manufacturers have established product development activities in different countries around the world. Yet their senior managers often struggle to tie those decentralized organizations into a cohesive, unified operation that can efficiently drive growth and innovation. New empirical frameworks may help unlock practices with which managers can deploy well-coordinated global product development strategies.

Before investing in China, venture capitalists and private equity investors need to take the time to understand the differences between Eastern and Western business practices.

Global sourcing is an increasingly popular business strategy, but it’s not easy to execute. There are seven typical characteristics of organizations with outstanding global sourcing.

As entrepreneurs are considering international expansion earlier and earlier, it is crucial that they structure their ventures to anticipate and mitigate the tensions that can arise from the ongoing need to match perceived opportunities to available resources.

By sourcing and integrating knowledge from dispersed geographic locations, companies can generate more innovations of higher value and lower cost.

Has strategy changed in the wake of the recent economic frenzy and subsequent downturn? Is the New Economy finished? Has the Old Economy returned? At this point, most managers understand what the advent of the Internet implies — operating efficiency for most companies, a terrific channel for some and a

As service and product outsourcing become more commonplace, new organizational forms are emerging to facilitate these relationships. Chase Bank has created “shared services” units that compete with outside vendors to furnish services to the bank’s own operating units.

Effective supply-chain management requires choosing a type of relationship appropriate to product and market conditions and adapting management practices to that relationship.

Emerging markets (EMs) constitute the major growth opportunity in the evolving world economic order. Their potential has already effected a shift in multinational corporations (MNCs), which now customarily highlight EM investments when communicating with shareholders.

Almost all companies polled by the authors in a three-year study that spanned firms in Europe, North America and Asia claim they lack an adequate number of globally competent leaders. The authors outline four strategies that are particularly effective in developing global leaders, who, their work reveals, cannot succeed without several core characteristics.

Local initiatives provide winning opportunities and new vitality for MNCs. But managers need tactical savvy, persistence, and luck to break through corporate barriers.

Are Japanese companies changing their practices of lifetime employment and seniority-based pay? Will a new system based on individual performance affect their competitors?

The experiences of an Italian copper-products company yield lessons for firms engaged in global mergers and acquisitions.

Increased global competition means that industry and government must work together to ensure that manufacturers have support networks of transportation, telecommunications, services, and knowledge centers.

Will the Japanese business system, based on favorable industrial policies, the keiretsu, and lifetime employment, survive the current recession? While simultaneous competition and cooperation among companies have fostered growth and a system without “losers,” fundamental changes may require an upsurge in risk-taking Japanese entrepreneurs.

As the corporate sponsorship of sports events has grown, so too has the practice of ambush marketing. Is the practice legal and ethical? How can a legitimate sponsor counteract the effects of an ambusher?

The Internet promises to revolutionize the dynamics of international commerce and, like the telephone and fax machine, may be a major force in the democratization of capitalism.