Strategic Animation and Emergent Processes: Managing for Efficiency and Innovation in Globally Networked Organizations

Abstract

The Globally Networked Organization (GNO) is an archetype of the geographically distributed, globally integrated, and organizationally networked information-age multinational enterprise. While its organizational form has been widely discussed, methods for providing strategic direction to all or part of a GNO have been largely overlooked. We propose the concept of strategic animation as an innovative leadership approach to strategic management in the GNO and offer a set of guiding principles for installing such a system in organizations. Strategic animation employs sophisticated incentives to motivate voluntary buy-in, utilizing principles of self-organization to replace the command and control of the unitary firm and the uncertainty and transactional costs of real markets. This makes possible virtual integration of the multiple highly separable businesses that comprise the value-added proposition of the firm and encourages the development of emergent processes for both exploitation and renewal of assets. From a scholarly perspective, this model suggests a new framework for studying the strategic direction of GNOs. For practice, it offers an organizational solution to conditions where process control is preferred, but command of resources is limited. Strategic animation, set in motion through multiple managerial actions, facilitates the timely and flexible responses to chaotic environments that are the sine qua non of today’s global businesses.

Citation

Tallman, S. and Koza, M.P. (2016), "Strategic Animation and Emergent Processes: Managing for Efficiency and Innovation in Globally Networked Organizations", Perspectives on Headquarters-subsidiary Relationships in the Contemporary MNC (Research in Global Strategic Management, Vol. 17), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 59-85. https://doi.org/10.1108/S1064-485720160000017003