Organizational learning failures may be caused, not by resistance to change, human nature or poor leadership, but by lack of communication among three distinct “cultures” that exist in most firms. When organizations attempt to redesign or reinvent themselves, these cultures collide. To overcome this tendency, says the author, each culture must learn how to learn and must be able to analyze its own characteristics.

The history of U.S. business during the past 100 years has been a story of mass production and mass distribution of standardized goods. Scholars and practitioners who examined the economic landscape have generally been drawn to large corporations that built their fortunes by transforming fragmented and heterogeneous markets into unified industries.1 At the heart of [...]

After studying IT management practices in various companies, the authors identify three assets important for using IT as a competitive tool. The human asset is an IT staff that consistently addresses business opportunities; the technology asset is sharable technical platforms and databases; the relationship asset implies the risk and responsibility sharing between the IT and business staffs. The authors discuss the interdependencies among the three assets, using many examples from their study, and offer ways to formulate an action plan based on a company’s position relative to its competition.

In an overview of the future role of the IT organization, the authors examine the business and technological changes that are effecting change in many IT units. They cite eight imperatives in which IT organizations must excel in order to succeed. Additionally, they examine the evolving key of IT managers: ensuring that all line managers understand the potential of IT and how it can be used to implement business strategies effectively.

More than a decade after the deregulation of the leading service industries, consumers are accustomed to service providers competing on price. Now consumers demand increasingly higher levels of service quality. For service companies, staying competitive in the new market environment means not only offering products at reasonable prices but also tailoring these products to meet [...]

How many times in the past few years have you heard, “This is not just an improvement program. It’s a revolution in management thinking”? Then, after thinking about this specific revolution, you find that, in many ways, it is similar to other revolutions you’ve recently heard about, such as reengineering, total quality management, activity-based costing [...]

Ten years ago, Peter Drucker offered three reasons why the foundation and structure of the world economy had changed:

The uncoupling of the primary products and the industrial economies resulting in a decline in the comparative advantages of natural resources.
The uncoupling of employment and production within the industrial economy due largely to productivity gains associated with [...]

Corporations concerned about the efficiency of traditional methods of marketing communications have adopted a range of alternative media to target audiences. One such medium is commercial sponsorship, which has grown significantly in recent years. By sponsoring an event or providing a budget for an event’s broadcast, a sponsor can generate audience awareness while simultaneously creating [...]