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The purpose of this paper is to explore the fit between process standardization and international management strategy of multinational corporations (MNCs) by assessing the compatibility between process standardization and corporate structural characteristics in terms of asset configuration and headquarters-subsidiary relationships.

First, after a literature review on MNCs’ strategy and process standardization, the study suggests two propositions on the fit between corporate international management strategy and process standardization. Second, to empirically examine the propositions, the study investigates the outcome of process standardization in three cases with different strategic and structural contexts. Third, using the propositions and empirical findings, the study proposes a framework for aligning process standardization with MNCs’ structural characteristics.

Process standardization has a higher degree of fit in MNCs pursuing global integration where process standardization parallels the need for coordinating interdependencies in the functional structure, and is consistent with the headquarters’ operational control over the subsidiaries. Process standardization has a lower degree of fit in MNCs seeking local responsiveness as process standardization disturbs the financial control relationship between the headquarters and subsidiaries and is less crucial for coordination as the subsidiaries contain the necessary coordination mechanisms.

The study provides in-depth understanding of how the international management strategy and consequent structural characteristics of MNCs affects process standardization in the course of a global enterprise resource planning implementation. The study proposes conditions of fit for aligning process standardization with asset configuration and headquarters-subsidiary relationships of an MNC.

Today enterprise resource planning (ERP) applications are a substantial proportion of many corporations' capital expenditure and the effective management of this pliable asset has significant consequence for business performance. The purpose of this paper is to examine the corporate strategy of a global corporation that, in pursuit of competitive advantage, deployed ERP applications.

This inductive case study research examines the corporate processes utilised to strategically manage ERP in a global corporation. The approach is explorative and method qualitative. Semi‐structured interviews were conducted over a period of a year with senior executives, IT directors, IT managers, financial controllers, country managers and end‐users.

The study found that devolving responsibility of ERP applications to subsidiary organisations increased cost and hindered corporate parenting. The considerable cost of centralising IS management and standardising ERP processes was found to be greatly exceeded by the numerous benefits. The primary benefits being reduced cycle time, the ability to benchmark subsidiary performance, improved customer satisfaction and increased market share.

The research is limited by the analysis being of a single corporation. The major implication for future research is the need to understand the manner of ongoing management and control of ERP applications in different types of organisations. Particularly, their relationship with strategic management, how ERP enable and inhibit strategy, and ongoing management of operational ERP systems.

The dissemination of the management practices that have been employed to achieve a very successful ERP application‐based business strategy is helpful to the many organisations that have or intend to implement ERP applications. It is particularly noteworthy that centralised corporate objectives, when mandated and focused upon, provide benefits that could not be achieved in the ad hocracy that existed prior to the ERP implementation.

The dearth of theory about ongoing management of ERP and the plight of the many organisations that are having difficulty understanding how to strategically manage these ubiquitous systems in a rapidly changing business landscape makes the study significant to both theory and practice.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate factors that contribute to the successful implementation of enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems in manufacturing firms.

The qualitative research method was used to study six diverse manufacturing firms in Virginia. A semi-structure method of data collection was used for the analysis.

The ERP software has emerged as a key enabler of system integration in organizations to reduce redundancy, improve efficiency, productivity and performance. Firms implement ERP not only to improve operations efficiency but to be more responsive to the customer needs in the global economy. The findings provide insights on the factors that these large and global manufacturing firms consider to be important to the success of ERP implementation and utilization.

The study is limited to large manufacturing firms and does not consider service industries or small and medium enterprises.

A considerable amount of time and capital are required for the acquisition and implementation of ERP systems. The results are useful to managers of manufacturing companies who are interested in using, modifying or upgrading an integrative technology software system, such as ERP.

This empirical study provides an in-depth analysis of factors that motivate firms to consider ERP systems, factors that are important when acquiring the system, key factors to implementation and cultural adjustments following implementation. To the best of our knowledge, no single study has examined all of these issues in one report.

Material requirements planning (MRP) systems have become the most effective and widely used inventory control systems across the world. Many operation managers have found the vast knowledge that MRP systems provide is absolutely necessary to effectively and competitively succeed in the current global economy. Although MRP systems have been in existence for almost 25 years, they have had their share of problems and are both challenged and enhanced by new supply chain management techniques and enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems. As the world wide web evolves into a global market of information, the information provided by MRP systems, in particular ERP systems, will be necessary in order for businesses to compete in the global marketplace.

There is significant evidence of increasing global implementation failures in enterprise resource planning (ERP) projects; and, for this reason, critical success factors (CSF) on implementation success (IS) are of notable concern to manufacturing organizations. This paper aims to focus on these factors and the role they played toward implementation success of ERP projects in India. Furthermore, this paper will also seek to explore whether the implementation success is moderated (i.e. influenced) by the organizational culture. This will help other manufacturing organizations take appropriate decisions about the ERP implementation.

In the proposed model, the authors propose organizational culture as the moderator toward the implementation success of ERP projects in India. A survey methodology is used for the study, and a structured questionnaire was developed to get the information.

Through this study, it has been found that the organizational culture acts as a moderator and moderates the relationship between CSF and implementation success of the ERP projects in India.

This study offers both academicians and practitioners a model to research, assess, and identify the appropriate CSF such as Setting up ERP business goals and objectives (SEB), Cross-Functional Teams (CFT), Business Process Reengineering (BPR), Projects Tracking (PTG), and Data Analysis and Conversion (DAG) on IS of ERP projects in India and moderated by the organizational culture. The research is targeted on manufacturing organizations in India, and hence it has limitations in terms of scope. However, the results are quite encouraging with very good response (n=223) from the manufacturing organizations. Other manufacturing organizations planning to implement ERP soon will be highly benefited from the results of this study.

Unfortunately, few research studies define the issues related to the moderator namely the organizational culture. This paper demonstrates how this moderator played an important role in ERP implementation. The findings will encourage Indian manufacturing organizations to implement ERP when facing challenges of the competitive market for their competitive advantage. For India, this research could be among the first to its nature.

The International Valuations Standards Committee adopts the Capital Asset Pricing Model as a method for estimation of the cost of equity. It has several drawbacks and appraisers in emerging markets need more useful model for cost of equity estimation. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

The proposed model is a modification of the Salomon Smith Barney model for cost of capital determination. The econometric part of the model incorporates the non-synchronous effect, the thin trading effect, the time varying risk nature, and the systematic country risk.

The model estimates the cost of equity of Bulgarian REITs more accurate than the one, who uses the traditional β estimation.

The study provides appraisers, business consultants, and investment bankers with a consistent model for cost of equity estimation. The model incorporates most of the features of emerging markets REITs return series and avoids the weaknesses of the single-factor model for cost of equity estimation in emerging markets.

The proposed model reflects the following characteristics: the degree of diversification of the particular investor (imperfectly diversified); country risk; and time-varying risk nature. The political risk is incorporated by more objective measure of the systematic country risk.

In spite of the large body of literature on success factors of enterprise resource planning (ERP) implementation, there is a need to explore its multinational dimension. The purpose of this paper is to explore the impact of the conflict between parent and subsidiary on the process of ERP implementation in a multinational enterprise (MNE).

Using an interpretive case study methodology, this paper analyses the theoretical frameworks of parent-subsidiary conflict and applies them to interpret an in-depth case study and generate a set of managerial prescriptions.

Theoretical analysis and case evidence suggest that managing parent-subsidiary conflict is a critical success factor of ERP implementation in MNEs.

This case relates to a diversified multinational group producing a variety of materials through subsidiaries. The data collection includes multiple sources in the company, and strong theoretical development provides a high level of generalizability. The paper shows that managers should consider the impact of conflict from the planning stages of any multinational ERP implementation.

A detailed set of practical managerial prescriptions is derived from case and theoretical analysis. These prescriptions provide guidance to multinational managers planning a successful global ERP rollout.

Although parent-subsidiary conflict is clearly a major factor in multinational ERP implementations, this topic has never been analysed in detail in the literature. This paper breaks new ground applying grounded theoretical frameworks of parent-subsidiary conflict to an implementation case, and providing managerial guidance for implementation decisions.

This research aims to explore factors influencing accountants' usage of enterprise resource planning (ERP) at a global development agency. The paper tests a model, which hypothesised that attitudes, performance expectancy, effort expectancy, social influence and self-efficacy would have significant and positive effects on behavioural intention to use, and facilitating conditions and behavioural intention would have significant and positive effects on frequency of use (actual usage).

The study utilised a quantitative approach through an online survey of 104 respondents from the different countries that the organisation operates within.

Using multiple regression analysis, the findings showed that attitudes towards use, performance expectancy, self-efficacy and effort expectancy were significant predictors of behavioural intention to use the ERP system. Behavioural intentions and facilitating conditions significantly and positively influenced actual ERP usage. Social influence was found to be non-significant.

The study used a small sample drawn from a single organization.

The paper tests a model of usage of ERP and identifies those factors that are likely to influence ERP usage in a global development agency.

The paper supplements the existing literature on ERP usage in global organizations.

The success rate of enterprise resource planning (ERP) implementations is not high in view of the sums invested by organisations in these applications. It has often been indicated that a combination of inadequate preparedness and inappropriate project management have been responsible for the low‐success rate of ERP implementations. The purpose of this paper is to present a case study of a successful ERP implementation.

In this paper, the authors use a case study of a very successful roll out of an ERP application in the Irish subsidiary of a UK multinational to investigate the validity of one of the most commonly cited project management frameworks, the project management body of knowledge (PMBOK), to ERP projects. Discussing each category of the framework in turn, the case data to illustrate where the PMBOK framework is a good fit or needs refining for ERP projects is used.

It is found that, by and large, PMBOK, because it is a very broad framework, can shed light on most of the key aspects of an ERP project. However, the specificities of this type of project require a different emphasis on some of the factors, as discussed in the authors conclusions. The case analysis also raised some interesting insights into how companies evaluate the success of such highly complex change management initiatives.

This research work will need to be extended to cover other case studies of ERP implementation across other industries and organisational contexts; for example in less tightly regulated industries and smaller organisations.

This discussion will be of great value to ERP project managers who are in the early stages of a project and need to understand and anticipate the areas which will require specific attention on their part, based on their knowledge of the specific circumstances within their organisational context.

This paper presents an investigation into the project management strategy adopted in the Pharma Inc. case and illustrates the mechanics of a successful ERP project implementation, categorised using the PMBOK framework.

To explore the organisational issues involved in implementing an enterprise resource Planning (ERP) system as the main approach to change management within a large global organisation, from a management perspective.

A case based research approach is used which includes participant observation and semi structured interviews with all of the case management team.

The findings indicate that ERP should be incorporated within a wider change programme, with changes to people management and cultural practices, in addition to process change. Much more consideration should be given to organisational change issues prior to design and implementation of ERP.

The study is limited to that of a management perspective.

The findings can be used to guide management teams in designing and implementing ERP as part of a wider approach to organisational change.

The paper contributes to the need for ERP studies that go beyond technical implementation issues and which address associated complex change management.