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Product innovation is central to the success of most companies. The rewards of a successful innovation programme are highly visible in terms of sales, profits and growth. But not so apparent are the strategies that underlie these product innovation efforts. This monograph is about the ingredients of a winning new product strategy — about strategic decisions on markets, technologies, products — that result in a successful innovation programme.

The paper reports an investigation into the marketing and performance consequences of organisations operating in regulated, deregulated and open market environments in Zimbabwe’s developing economy. The findings suggest that organisations do not respond to environmental changes by adapting their marketing effort, hence the environment is a poor predictor of marketing effort. Organisational strategy has a far greater impact on marketing effort than the environment. However, the environment is an important predictor of organisational performance and has significant interaction with business strategy in influencing organisational performance hence it is a quasi‐moderator. Our result suggests that in regulated environments there may be “ideal‐type” strategies for effectiveness and across all environments the concept of equifinality is not supported. There is evidence to suggest that more adaptable strategy types outperform their less adaptive competitors. These results extend a popular typology to developing economies and allow some findings to be generalisable across countries at different stages of economic development.

Proposes primarily to test empirically Smith′s entrepreneurial typology and Miles and Snow′s typology of strategy in the restaurant sector, and then to establish whether or not there is a relationship between type of entrepreneur and type of strategy. Evidence suggests that Smith′s two entrepreneurial types may not be mutually exclusive and that a third group of entrepreneurs exists combining characteristics from both Smith′s craftsmen and opportunistic types. Finds support for Miles and Snow′s four generic strategies of defender, prospector, analyser and reactor. Through the use of discriminant analysis, it was possible to demonstrate a relationship between type of entrepreneur and type of strategy.

The Nature of Business Policy Business policy — or general management — is concerned with the following six major functions:

This paper aims to investigate the effect of parent–adolescent conflict in step versus biological families on family communication patterns (FCPs) and the conflict resolution strategy adopted by adolescents during family destinations or holiday planning (where to visit?).

The literature on family conflict (i.e. parent–adolescent conflict) and the different types of families (step vs nuclear) supported the proposed framework. The survey was conducted in the Indian subcontinent with a sample size of 437 adolescents. SPSS 22.0 was used for factor analysis (exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis) and structural equation modelling was used through AMOS 26.0 for data analysis.

Significant relationship was observed between the types of families (step and biological), FCP and the resolution strategy chosen by Indian adolescents. Adopting a resolution strategy by adolescents in both families depends on the type of FCP in the family. Adolescents in stepfamilies have socio-oriented FCP and use “positive problem-solving” and “conflict withdrawal” as a resolution strategy. In contrast, adolescents in biological families have concept-oriented families and use “conflict enhancement” as a resolution strategy. It has also been found that adolescents who fall into high-stress categories used conflict enhancement strategies. In contrast, those who fall under low-stress categories used positive problem-solving and withdrawal strategies.

This study will add a new chapter to adolescents’ decision-making literature in line with the previous research. It has practical implications for tourism marketers, academicians/researchers and policymakers. Marketers can segment adolescents into step versus biological families, and the choice of resolution strategies may introduce efficient and competent marketing strategies and promotional campaigns.

This study favours that family type is a robust construct to predict adolescents’ choice of resolution strategy. So, it is one of the most influential variables in adolescents’ resolution strategy adoption.

This study adopts the Miles and Snow typology as a framework for analyzing export performance of manufacturing firms. The study investigates the role of distinctive competence and various strategic responses of firms belonging to each strategic type on their foreign market performance. The results of this study show that a firm’s strengths and strategic responses are related and that the impact of strategic responses on export performance differs according to the firm’s strategic type. Based on these results, the strengths that defenders, prospectors and analyzers should build and maintain as well as the strategic responses that each should pursue are identified.

The purpose of this study is to examine the impact of family communication patterns (FCP) on adolescents’ choice of influence strategies and parents’ choice of response strategies in situations of parent–child purchase decision disagreement.

This study uses family triadic (mother–father–child) survey data collected from 294 Korean families. The study develops classifications of adolescent influence strategies and parental response strategies in the initial stage and subsequently investigates the impact of FCP on the adolescent child’s use of influence strategies and each parent’s use of response strategies. The final stage of the study involved an exploratory investigation aimed at discovering the adolescent influence strategies and parental response strategies that are likely used in conjunction.

Results show an overall significant impact of FCP on both adolescents’ use of influence strategies and parents’ use of response strategies. They further reveal that Korean mothers tended to encounter their children’s persistent influence attempts with unyielding, strict response strategies. The types of response strategies used by Korean fathers were not linked to particular types of influence strategies used by their children but linked to their level of education attained and household income.

Findings of this study may help marketers formulate an appropriate marketing communication strategy that can be effective in resolving parent–child purchase disagreement.

With its focus on the adolescent influence strategies, parental response strategies, and FCP as a factor influencing the strategy choice by adolescents and parents, this study provides new insights into the parent–child interaction taking place in situations of parent–child disagreement about a purchase decision.

The purpose of this paper is to form propositions about the relationship between the cognitive composition of the top management team and its view of the viable strategy for a firm.

The cognitive style of 58 members of ten top management teams were analyzed using the Myers Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) and the strategy types based on Miles and Snow typology were defined using the paragraph approach. Descriptive statistics were used in the analysis.

Based on data from the ten top management teams in the spa industry, this study proposes that the cognitive composition of the top management team affects the strategies they prefer. Further, it is proposed that intuitive‐thinking top management teams prefer either a prospector or an analyzer strategy. A defender or an analyzer strategy is preferred by sensing‐thinking top management teams. Defining the composition of the top management team using the cognitive style is proposed to be a more promising way to explain the homogeneity or heterogeneity of the team than traditional measures such as age or education in this context.

For the top management teams, the results of this study emphasize the importance of knowing the cognitive composition of the top management team and especially taking it into consideration during strategic decision‐making.

This study extends existing research by illuminating the relationships between the cognitive composition of the top management team and the strategy type and also confirms several results drawn from previous studies concerning manager‐strategy relationships. This paper also attempts to inspire researchers to take cognitive composition into consideration when studying the influences the top management team has on a firm's strategy.

This paper proposes a new hierarchical approach toward MIS evaluation, which emphasizes the evaluation of the strategic aspects of MIS, as well as the evaluations of the activities of MIS functions and the quality of application systems. Based on the previous studies and the preliminary field survey, concepts and contents of three hierarchical evaluation types such as system‐oriented, function‐oriented and strategy‐oriented evaluations were presented, and four propositions were drawn. The surveys of 130 Korean firms, conducted in 1991 and 1997 successively, show that majority of firms use system‐oriented or function‐oriented evaluation type, although the usage rate of strategy‐oriented type is slightly higher in 1997 than in 1991 and most MIS managers consider the strategy‐oriented evaluation as the ideal one. It is also found that the firms of higher MIS maturity use the strategy‐oriented evaluation type, and the firms with strategy‐oriented evaluation type show a higher MIS performance. Results of this study imply that strategic roles of MIS should be more emphasized and different evaluation types should be used along with MIS maturity. In addition, the design of MIS evaluation framework should be done carefully in the strategic and managerial contexts, because MIS performance can vary with evaluation type. Finally, some limitations of the study and directions for further research were suggested.

The purpose of this paper is to review the strategic fit of competitive strategies, market orientation types and innovation strategies.

The paper is prepared by reviewing the relevant literatures on competitive strategies, market orientation types and innovation strategies as well as comparing and contrasting the common characteristics to attain fit.

The paper presents the criteria for distinguishing the different types of competitive strategies, market orientations and innovation strategies, along with a framework that fits a particular type of competitive strategy, market orientation and innovation strategy.

The paper provides an action framework based on characteristics of the competitive strategies (business strategy) along with the benefits of adopting a particular market orientation type and innovation strategy (functional strategies). This will facilitate the managers to execute appropriate competitive strategy that could well align with appropriate market orientation and innovation strategy.

This brief paper presents an original framework, with significant practical applications in a concise manner. The framework will provide a guide to the hotel top management in shaping and fitting an appropriate competitive strategies, market orientation types and innovation strategies.