| Author: | Chan, Chung-wai Andy |
| Title: | Strategy, structure, and performance : a multiple case study of retail companies in Hong Kong |
| Degree: | D.B.A. |
| Year: | 2006 |
| Subject: | Hong Kong Polytechnic University -- Dissertations. Retail trade -- China -- Hong Kong. Retail trade -- China -- Hong Kong -- Management. Strategic planning -- China -- Hong Kong. Organizational effectiveness. |
| Department: | Graduate School of Business |
| Pages: | 2 v. : ill. ; 30 cm. |
| Language: | English |
| Abstract: | This paper explores the effects of strategy and structure on retail performance and reports the findings of three in-depth case studies covering three Hong Kong based chain retailers operating in the increasingly competitive casual wear clothes market. Each of the three retail organizations was studied over three periods during the 1990s. The decade has been broken down into three periods, according to the prevailing contemporary economic conditions. Therefore, a total of nine cases was studied. This paper also provides a conceptual framework for determining the right combination of strategy and structure to fit a specific internal environment of an organization. The research studied the contingency theory, Chandler's (1962) relationship of strategy and structure, Porter's (1980) generic strategy, and Burns and Stalker's (1961) organic and mechanistic structures. Strategy and structure are interactive and interdependent in a retail business operation. When inter-matching takes place, fitting the content of each variable and blending them together perfectly allows the organization to achieve a higher level of effectiveness and efficiency. Performance is shown to be better than when strategy and structure are developed individually, without considering their compatibility through an adequate study of the content. Strategy leads people in each position of the structure to the right track for striking the performance targets, while structure enables people to develop their full potential in their work and allows the strategy to develop with both effectiveness and efficiency. Results indicate that organizations which include other lines of business, such as manufacturing, in their operations, tend to have specific strategy-structure combinations, yielding higher performance results. The other lines of business simultaneously conducted within the same organization are therefore a determinant of the content of the combination. Specifically, when strategy is complementary to the internal environment and organizational structure, it promotes success. The strategy of differentiation needs to be pursued in an organic structure, as it makes that organization's economic performance stronger. The strategy of costing is associated with a mechanistic structure when higher economic performance is required. An attempt has also been made to identify combinations that do not match, lack of fit making organizational performance decline. These combinations are a differentiation strategy with a mechanistic structure and a costing strategy with an organic structure. |
| Rights: | All rights reserved |
| Access: | restricted access |
Files in This Item:
| File | Description | Size | Format | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| b23217996.pdf | For All Users (off-campus access for PolyU Staff & Students only) | 48.16 MB | Adobe PDF | View/Open |
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