Business History - coursework Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Business History - coursework - Essay Example In Britain ownership is much less concentrated, with almost half of all shareholdings-generally by the financial sector-amounting to less than 5 percent of company stock. (2) In Germany-in contrast to Britain-the network of interlocking directorates is closely related to the capital network, i.e., it serves to enhance the power of the owners. (3) In Germany-in contrast to Britain-both networks are concentrated within the same industry, i.e., potential competitors are associated with one another. Germany thus illustrates 'co-operative capitalism' whereas Britain exemplifies 'competitive capitalism'. According to Porter (2006), "He found a relatively consistent pattern of basic changes in strategy being followed by major adjustments in organizational design. The changes inorganizational design roughly matched the needs for information and decisions called for in the new strategy. Chandler called the organizational design that emerged during this period the multiple division form, replacing a unitary/functional form. The three key elements of a multiple division design are, first, activities must be divisible into relatively elements of a multiple division design are, first, activities must be divisible into relatively independent bundles of activity. Second, there is a central guidance group which is supported by an analytic staff and which has the power to discipline the actions of the various divisions. And third, there are summary statistics that make possible interdivisional comparisons for purposes of evaluating the performance of divisions." Summary performance measures and their development strongly led to the success of the M-corporation. The fall of the system can be explained relatively simply, too. According to Porter (2006), "Implementation of this new strategy requires, I argue, substantial changes in institutional structures. This project traces the emergence of this new strategy and suggests institutional design changes appropriate to more effective implementation of the new strategy." The advantages of the 'networked' firm in the modern global economy. Networked firms can obtain significant competitive advantage in the modern global economy. Their products and services are hard to copy. In the beginning, networked firms rely on their partners for comparable assets. One must be careful to evaluate the cost-effectiveness of such boundary-crossing in a networked firm, however (Jones and Zeitlan, 2010). In networked firms, open innovation can occur. This means that networked firms can use open ideas to benefit one another. They should use both internal and