Organizational analysis within developing and emerging countries

International Journal of Organizational Analysis

ISSN: 1934-8835

Article publication date: 24 July 2009

762

Citation

Sarkis, J. (2009), "Organizational analysis within developing and emerging countries", International Journal of Organizational Analysis, Vol. 17 No. 3. https://doi.org/10.1108/ijoa.2009.34517cac.001

Publisher

:

Emerald Group Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2009, Emerald Group Publishing Limited


Organizational analysis within developing and emerging countries

Article Type: Guest editorial From: International Journal of Organizational Analysis, Volume 17, Issue 3

About the Guest Editor

Joe SarkisProfessor of Management within Clark University’s Graduate School of Management. He earned his PhD from the University of Buffalo. He researches issues in operations management, information management, and business and the natural environment. He has over 200 publications in a wide array of outlets. He is the Editor of Management Research News and Departmental Editor of IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management.

The body of and contribution to knowledge in management and organizational analysis is not limited to the study of practices in developed countries only. There are substantial insights that can be delivered from organizational analysis in developing and emerging nations as well. In addition, understanding organizational practices in these nations provides organizations who seek to operate in these countries, or have integral contact through their supply chains, insights into their organizational strategies and operations. The historical under representation of published studies of these practices in these countries does not bode well for progress within and between nations.

The titles of developing and emerging countries are derived from economic terms. The term emerging is derived from “emerging market” which was originally coined by the International Finance Corporation of the World Bank to describe middle-to-higher income economies amongst developing countries, with stock markets in which foreigners could buy securities. Recently, emerging markets and developing markets have been used synonymously. Amongst some of the emergent markets would be the BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India, and China) countries. Substantial research especially in India and China has been carried out, so we delve even deeper in this special issue to consider non-BRIC countries primarily. We consider even more under represented countries that are barely on the map of organizational analysis and management research. For even the smallest and least studied nations will provide academics, practitioners, and policy makers with additional insights with respect to analysis of organizations in these countries and beyond.

Much of this research will seek to determine whether cross-cultural characteristics do exist. Similarities and differences in various fundamental and ethical practices such as gender equity and sustainability are jumping of points for social and cultural issues that will play a role in organizational analysis and management. After going through rigorous review, we have arrived at a number of quality papers on under represented countries in business and management research. The countries are diverse and include two Middle Eastern nations, Lebanon and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), one African nation, Nigeria, and two additional Asian nations (Bangladesh and Thailand) with relatively differing cultural backgrounds. What is presented here is a snapshot of various organizational practices and analyses in these countries. The common thread is the important social and economic mechanisms that have caused managers and policymakers within these countries to help their fledgling and emergent economies. The businesses represented in these studies range from large financial organizations, to moderate-sized family-owned businesses, to smaller micro-enterprises. In a way, a broad brush picture can be painted to help define the roles of larger and smaller enterprises. There are some organizations that have been greatly influenced by global events such as the recent financial crisis and environmental degradation. But, there are clear local organizational issues faced by the organizations in these studies that also need to be managed. Ethical concerns arise in almost every situation, whether it is based on development of local industry from globalization, gender rights, environmental concerns, or living in times of turbulence, war, poverty, and famine. These dimensions are faced by the countries where human rights are concerns along with environmental and economic rights. Thus, the triple bottom line of sustainability is not far from the discussion when the whole picture is to be considered the organizational analysis of emergent country organizations. We now introduce each of the papers and some of the interesting insights provided by each.

Some of the more basic issues facing most emergent nations relate to the need to grow economically so that their populations can live sustainable lives and thrive. Yet, with these economic growth objectives comes environmental degradation. How organizations in one emergent country are dealing with these issues is evaluated by Watchaneeporn Setthasakko in her paper titled, “Barriers to implementing corporate environmental responsibility in Thailand: a qualitative approach”. The barriers found in these organizations are probably similar to those that may be found throughout the world. Understanding the barriers is critical to overcoming them. At the broadest levels, organizations cannot function for long in a world where the natural environment is deteriorating. Using information from the seafood industry, the study finds top management commitment a major issue in the barriers to overcome. Without this commitment, organization will not be successful in environmental programs. There are also cultural issues, due to diversity of opinions and cultures, that must also be managed. Systemic issues related to the organization and the culture are needed to help overcome barriers to improving the environmental performance of these organizations. These findings, even though focused on the seafood industry in Thailand, have been evident in the literature on greening organizations for many years (see Zhu et al., 2008; González et al., 2008, for similar issues discussed in China and Spain, respectively).

Our next paper focuses on an economic and managerial phenomenon, globalization, and its influence on developing country organizational management. The paper “Managerial perspective on the impact of globalization in an African commercial bank: implications for strategy implementation” by Aminu Mamman and Nabil Baydoun seeks to investigate the implications of strategic organizational analysis and planning for banking.

In their article, they begin with a mention of the recent global financial crisis. This crisis has greatly impacted the developed world, but developing and emergent country organizations are not immune to these events. At the center of this crisis are banks. African banks, because of globalization, are influenced greatly and how managers in these banks develop strategies are critical to their long-term well-being and the economic development of their countries. Nigeria, one of the largest economies in Africa, but still relatively small when compared to developed and BRIC countries, serves as the national and cultural background to this study. Using managerial and organizational cognition literature and theory, this study evaluates the impact of globalization on managers and professionals in Nigeria’s banking industry. The respondents showed that they felt that there is injustice that must be overcome from globalization. But, they are not allowed to ignore it since organizational learning and more importantly, funds flows, are critical to their well-being. There is significant trepidation to globalization, much of which centers around the barriers that globalization causes to domestic enterprises. Yet, the inflow of knowledge and rules may help to provide a stronger ethical and political foundation for growth. Managers need to be able to precariously balance the tradeoffs associated with globalization. The pressures are even greater in the financial markets globalization that banks are facing in this economic climate. Insights into how organizations in developing countries can develop and maintain strategic vision and plans amongst these globalization issues is a major outcome of this study. Clearly, a multilevel (micro) and (macro) perspective and linking these two levels is critical for a thorough analysis of these phenomena. The usage of qualitative and quantitative methodologies also provides complementary insights into this study. Replication of these types of studies across developing countries can definitely be useful in further interpretation of globalization and cross-cultural issues.

The next three papers narrow the level of analysis down to entrepreneurial firms. The first two of these three papers address gender issues facing women entrepreneurs in two different developing countries. The third paper focuses on how family businesses function within a very turbulent environment. Amzad Hossain, Kamal Naser, Asif Zaman, and Rana Nuseibeh’s paper titled “Factors influencing women business development in developing countries: evidence from Bangladesh” takes us to where the world become aware of micro-credit. They investigate various factors that influence women entrepreneurship development in Bangladesh. They start their study by presenting a generalization on how the economies of these developing countries are heavily dependent on international partners for their growth. Bangladesh, like other developing countries, has sought to implement the reforms needed for achieving its development goals. As part of such reforms, women’s small-scale economic activities have been under consideration at all stages of the country’s development plans. The success of micro-credit of the Grameen Bank in Bangladesh has attracted policy makers’ attention in considering women enterprise development. Also, the target of much micro-credit throughout the developing world has been women entrepreneurs. Thus, a study on these factors in this paper, and the next paper in our special issue, is even more pertinent. In their paper, similar to our second paper, the use of both quantitative and qualitative analyses provides a robust picture of many issues facing the development of women entrepreneurs. There are numerous steps in the entrepreneurial process and barriers have been found to exist in almost every stage. Women typically take care of family chores first and managing the family situation is usually a priority. But, there are factors that are deemed as enablers and encourage and development of these factors are economically advisable since women are a large untapped economic engine in developing countries. The study focused on urban women and replication is needed for the broader rural environments that exist in most developing countries.

In the next paper on gender issues in entrepreneurship in a developing country, Kamal Naser, Wojoud Rashid Mohammad, and Rana Nuseibeh whose paper “Factors that affect women entrepreneurs: evidence from an emerging economy” studies the socio-economic and cultural issues facing women entrepreneurs in the UAE. This particular paper looks at one of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries. The GCC countries in recent years have experienced exceptional rates of growth due to petroleum products. These countries have also sought to diversify their economies from a number of perspectives. For example, the economies of these countries are mainly built on the expatriate male labor force. It has been observed that women participation in the GCC countries labor force is limited. This limitation may be a motivational characteristic for women entrepreneurs to run their own business. Expanding the workforce is necessary and entrepreneurship will provide better opportunity for women to take active part in shaping the national economies of these countries. Similar to the Bangladesh paper, this one also seeks to identify factors that motivate women in the UAE to become self-employed. The clear policy implication from this study is that financial support from the government especially in the start-up capital is an important factor that motivates women to establish their own businesses. Knowledge, skills and experience are all important factors in the development of women entrepreneurs. Interestingly, an important factor that appeared to influence women’s decision on whether or not to become self-employed is the father and the spouse occupation. Another interesting set of findings are that factors significant in developing countries did not seem to be factors of importance in the UAE.

The issue of familial linkages and business in a developing country is a concern of the final paper in this special issue. Many of these smaller developing countries have gone and continue to go through significant internal turmoil. The turmoil may be extreme economic growth (a positive turmoil) or negative turmoil such as famine and war. Just functioning in these environments as a business requires significant resilience and careful management of organizations. For example, in war torn transition economies, such as those in Lebanon that are struggling to rebound following civil war, it was found that the family unit is often the only intact socioeconomic institution capable of supporting organizational activities. The importance of family businesses in this environment is critical to the long-term well-being of these economies and may be true for even more stable emergent economies. These findings are from the final paper in the special issue titled “Entrepreneurship in Lebanon: the impact of family and cultural factors” by Josiane Fahed-Srieh, David Pistrui, Wilfred Huang and Harold Welsch. Demographic, social, and personal characteristics are all investigated for entrepreneurial firms. The entrepreneurial profile questionnaire was utilized to survey the effect of individual, societal, and environmental factors on entrepreneurship and family business development. In this country, entrepreneurs were motivated by the need for independence and flexibility. The family was a major resource for operating their organizations.

These studies provide a broad brush overview of various operational and strategic practices of organizations in a variety of developing countries. The sustainability issues whether they represent social, environmental or economic issues are central to the major themes of these papers. I believe the readers of this journal will find these articles interesting and insightful.

Putting together any special issue is not the work of a single editor. I had the luxury of having help from a number of reviewers who provided excellent guidance to these authors in making revisions to their already high-quality work. I wish to thank the reviewers and authors for their important contributions. Also, I wish to thank Kim Foster our publisher at Emerald Publishing for her motivation and direction in completing this special issue. Hopefully, this special issue becomes a valuable resource for additional research on emerging and developing economies and organizational analysis.

Joe Sarkis

References

González, P., Sarkis, J. and Adenso Diaz, B. (2008), “Environmental management system certification and its influence on corporate practices: evidence from the automotive industry”, International Journal of Operations & Production Management, Vol. 28 No. 11, pp. 1021–41

Zhu, Q., Sarkis, J., Cordeiro, J. and Lai, K.-H. (2008), “Firm level correlates of emergent green supply chain management practices in the Chinese context”, OMEGA, Vol. 36 No. 4, pp. 577–91

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