1,720,953 research outputs found
Resilience and Strategic Agility in Family-Owned Firms : The African Expansion of a Moroccan Industrial Group
No full textResearch Questions and Objectives
Family businesses from emerging markets are increasingly pursuing regional expansion and strategic internationalization to diversify their activities, increase resilience, and reduce dependency on domestic markets. This research centers on a distinguished Moroccan family-owned enterprise specializing in manufacturing and consumer goods, which has systematically developed a sophisticated internationalization strategy spanning both African regional markets and global economic landscapes. The study aims to provide a comprehensive analytical exploration of the processes, strategic considerations, and organizational dynamics that support progressive business expansion. Specifically, the research seeks to address the following critical research questions:
• What motivational factors led to pursue international growth in African markets?
• How does CEO manage its family governance model while adapting to diverse African business environments?
• What significant operational, institutional, and strategic challenges emerged during phased international expansion across different geographical and institutional landscapes?
Theoretical Background
This case study draws upon a multifaceted theoretical framework to comprehensively analyze internationalization strategy. The Uppsala model of internationalization provides a foundational perspective, explaining firms\u27 gradual market expansion through incremental learning and experiential knowledge accumulation (Johanson & Vahlne, 1977). Critically, the model introduces the concept of psychic distance (Ojala and Tyrvainen, 2009), a nuanced construct that captures the cognitive, cultural, and institutional distances between home and host markets, rather than mere geographical proximity.
Dynamic capabilities theory emerges as a crucial element for understanding the firm\u27s adaptive strategies and international operation entry modes (Teece et al., 1997). The firm\u27s ability to identify, assess, and respond to market opportunities demonstrates the dynamic capability framework\u27s core principles.
The network approach provides additional insights, emphasizing the critical role of local partnerships and informal institutional networks in emerging markets (Johanson and Mattson, 1988). The firm’s strategic collaborations with local distributors and carefully selected joint ventures underscore the importance of embedded relational networks where trust often come after formal legal mechanisms.
Socioemotional wealth (SEW) theory offers a unique perspective on family business internationalization strategies (Gomez-mejia et al., 2007; Berrone, Cruz and Gomez-Mejia, 2012). The firm’s approach demonstrates a delicate balance between financial objectives and non-economic goals, preserving family control and legacy through strategic oversight and direct involvement in decision-making. Unlike depersonalized multinational corporations, the firm maintains a distinctive approach that prioritizes identity preservation and long-term strategic orientation.
The resource-based view (RBV) further enriches our understanding by highlighting how the firm leverages its internal capabilities (Wernerfelt, 1984). The firm\u27s competitive advantage stems from its distinctive resources, including manufacturing expertise, strong brand equity, and efficient logistics systems. Rather than competing solely on price, The firm differentiates itself through product quality, innovation, and market responsiveness (Helfat et al., 2023), particularly in its core sectors of furniture, foam, and bedding.
Methodology and Research Design
This qualitative case study employs a documentary and comparative research methodology to investigate the firm’s internationalization process. The research design strategically leverages publicly available sources, including journalistic articles, corporate communications, and secondary market reports, to construct a comprehensive analytical narrative of the firm\u27s cross-border expansion.
The empirical investigation focuses on The firm’s operational experiences in three strategically selected African markets: Côte d\u27Ivoire, Cameroon, and Kenya. These contexts were purposively chosen to capture geographic, linguistic, and economic diversity, enabling a rich comparative analysis that transcends simplistic linear narratives of international business expansion. By examining these distinct national contexts, the research seeks to illuminate the complex interplay between organizational strategy, institutional environments, and family business internationalization processes.
The analytical framework is structured around critical thematic axes that provide a systematic approach to understanding the firm’s international strategy. These thematic dimensions include a detailed examination of entry modes, governance decisions, operational challenges, and strategic adaptations encountered during the firm\u27s African expansion. This approach allows for a nuanced interpretation of the firm\u27s internationalization journey, revealing the subtle mechanisms through which a family business navigates the intricate landscape of cross-border market engagement.
Through this methodological approach, the study aims to generate sophisticated insights into the strategic logic and organizational dynamics that underpin family business internationalization in emerging market contexts.
Findings:
The firm’s African expansion was initially motivated by market saturation in Morocco and the ambition to secure a pan-African industrial footprint. The firm identified a strong demand in sub-Saharan Africa for high-quality, affordable manufactured goods, particularly in home furnishing and industrial components. Its choice of countries was influenced by market size, ease of doing business, trade agreements, and political stability.
In West Africa, the firm began with export-driven market testing before shifting to local distribution partnerships. This low-commitment entry mode allowed it to understand consumer preferences and regulatory conditions. Over time, the firm expanded its footprint through franchising and co-investment in logistics infrastructure. In Côte d’Ivoire, for instance, the firm leveraged a growing middle class and urban development to promote its furniture and foam products.
In East Africa, particularly in Kenya, the firm adopted a more ambitious model. It created a local subsidiary with full operational capacity, including warehousing, distribution, and localized marketing. The firm aimed to position itself as a long-term industrial partner, signaling a shift from opportunistic exports to embedded presence. This model required significant investment in talent recruitment, legal compliance, and institutional engagement.
Throughout its expansion, the firm faced multiple challenges: currency volatility, customs procedures, fragmented logistics, and varying consumer behavior. However, the company navigated these obstacles by appointing experienced regional managers, building strong relationships with local authorities, and investing in supply chain resilience. Family oversight remained central, with top management in Casablanca closely monitoring each regional development.
Originality and Scholarly Contribution
This research makes a distinctive scholarly contribution through its comprehensive analysis of a Moroccan family business\u27s strategic internationalization across African markets. While the extant internationalization literature predominantly focuses on North-South investment flows or multinational corporation strategies, this study offers a nuanced investigation of an emerging South-South strategic paradigm characterized by cultural proximity, regional strategic ambitions, and experiential learning processes. The firm’s empirical case provides valuable insights into the sophisticated mechanisms through which African enterprises can systematically develop cross-border operational capabilities while preserving the integrity of family-centered governance structures.
The study further illuminates a distinctive hybrid internationalization logic that transcends conventional theoretical categorizations. While manifesting the characteristic risk-sensitivity and control-orientation typically associated with family enterprises, the firm demonstrates remarkable strategic adaptability through its deployment of diversified market entry configurations—ranging from graduated export strategies and collaborative joint ventures to wholly-owned subsidiary establishments. This strategic flexibility enables the organization to respond effectively to heterogeneous country-specific institutional environments without compromising its foundational identity or established governance paradigm. Such findings contribute substantially to the theoretical discourse on family business internationalization by revealing the complex interplay between preservation of organizational essence and adaptive strategic evolution in cross-cultural business contexts.
Theoretical, Managerial, and Social Implications
From a theoretical standpoint, this case study offers a significant contribution to the family business internationalization literature by developing an integrated framework that synthesizes socioemotional wealth theory with institutional and resource-based perspectives. The research illuminates how family enterprises navigate the complex tension between preserving core identity and adapting to diverse institutional environments. The firm’s internationalization trajectory demonstrates that family firms often pursue non-linear expansion patterns, strategically alternating between cautious incrementalism and decisive market penetration when environmental conditions align with organizational capabilities. This nuanced approach extends current theoretical understanding by revealing the dynamic interplay between family governance mechanisms and strategic decision-making in cross-border contexts.
Managerially, the study generates valuable insights for family enterprises pursuing regional or continental expansion strategies. The firm’s experience underscores the critical importance of sophisticated market selection methodologies, adaptive entry mode configurations, and governance continuity as fundamental pillars for successfully navigating Africa\u27s heterogeneous business landscapes. The case illustrates how judicious professionalization of local operations, when balanced with centralized strategic oversight, can effectively maintain brand integrity and organizational value consistency across diverse institutional environments. These findings provide actionable strategic frameworks for family businesses seeking to expand beyond their domestic markets while preserving their distinctive organizational character.
From a social impact perspective, The firm’s expansion strategy manifests substantial developmental implications through employment generation, technological diffusion, and enhanced regional economic integration. The firm\u27s demonstrated commitment to establishing sustainable long-term operations across African markets aligns with Morocco\u27s broader geopolitical vision of South-South cooperation and inclusive economic development. By successfully transplanting a sophisticated model of family entrepreneurship that harmoniously integrates traditional values with innovative business practices, the firm contributes to a transformative reconfiguration of perceptions regarding African business capabilities and competitiveness in the global marketplace
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
No full textThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Variations on the Author
No full text“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
No full textWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts
No full textWe conducted a full-scale evaluative citation analysis study of scholars in the XML research field to explore just how different from each other author rankings resulting from different citation counting methods actually are, and to demonstrate the capability of emerging data and tools on the Web in supporting more realistic citation counting methods. Our results contest some common arguments for the continued
use of first-author citation counts in the evaluation of scholars, such as high correlations between author rankings by first-author citation counts and other citation
counting methods, and high costs of using more realistic citation counting methods that are not well-supported by the ISI databases. It is argued that increasingly available digital full text research papers make it possible for citation analysis studies to go beyond what the ISI databases have directly supported and to employ more
sophisticated methods
koamabayili/VECTRON-author-checklist: VECTRON author checklist
No full textWe have done our best to complete the author checklist relating to the use of animals in the hut study. Note that the objective for the hut study was to evaluate the IRS treatment applications for residual efficacy against Anopheles mosquitoes, including the local An. coluzzii mosquito population. Cows were only used to attract mosquitoes into the huts and no tests were carried out directly on the cows. The author checklist is intended for use with studies where experiments are carried out on animals, which is why we have had such difficulty in completing this for the hut study, as many of the questions do not relate to how the cows were used
Author-wise bibliometric analysis based on entropy.
No full textAuthor-wise bibliometric analysis based on entropy.</p
Author Under Sail The Imagination of Jack London, 1893-1902
No full textIn Author Under Sail, Jay Williams offers the first complete literary biography of Jack London as a professional writer engaged in the labor of writing. It examines the authorial imagination in London's work, the use of imagination in both his fiction and nonfiction, and the ways he defined imagination in the creative process in his business dealings with his publishers, editors, and agents. In this first volume of a two-volume biography, Williams traverses the years 1893 to 1902, from London's "Story of a Typhoon" to The People of the Abyss. The Jack London who emerges in the pages of Author Under Sail is a writer whose partnership with publishers, most notably his productive alliance with George Brett of Macmillan, was one of the most formative in American literary history. London pioneered many author models during the heyday of realism and naturalism, blurring the boundaries of these popular genres by focusing on absorption and theatricality and the representation of the seen and unseen. London created an impassioned, sincere, and extremely personal realism unlike that of other American writers of the time. Author Under Sail is a literary tour de force that reveals the full range of London as writer, creative citizen, and entrepreneur at the same time it sheds light on the maverick side of machine-age literature.Intro -- Title Page -- Copyright Page -- Dedication -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- Introduction -- 1. Spirit Truth -- 2. From Absorption to Theatricality and Back Again -- 3. "I Will Build a New Present" -- 4. Sons as Authors -- 5. Fathers as Publishers -- 6. The Daughter as Author -- 7. Lovers as Authors -- 8. At Sea with the Family -- 9. Yellow News, Yellow Stories -- 10. The Return Home -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Index -- About Jay WilliamsIn Author Under Sail, Jay Williams offers the first complete literary biography of Jack London as a professional writer engaged in the labor of writing. It examines the authorial imagination in London's work, the use of imagination in both his fiction and nonfiction, and the ways he defined imagination in the creative process in his business dealings with his publishers, editors, and agents. In this first volume of a two-volume biography, Williams traverses the years 1893 to 1902, from London's "Story of a Typhoon" to The People of the Abyss. The Jack London who emerges in the pages of Author Under Sail is a writer whose partnership with publishers, most notably his productive alliance with George Brett of Macmillan, was one of the most formative in American literary history. London pioneered many author models during the heyday of realism and naturalism, blurring the boundaries of these popular genres by focusing on absorption and theatricality and the representation of the seen and unseen. London created an impassioned, sincere, and extremely personal realism unlike that of other American writers of the time. Author Under Sail is a literary tour de force that reveals the full range of London as writer, creative citizen, and entrepreneur at the same time it sheds light on the maverick side of machine-age literature.Description based on publisher supplied metadata and other sources.Electronic reproduction. Ann Arbor, Michigan : ProQuest Ebook Central, YYYY. Available via World Wide Web. Access may be limited to ProQuest Ebook Central affiliated libraries
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