John Child

"This book is concerned with the management of organisational change. It focuses on and provides an in-depth study of change within this famous British company. Cadbury Ltd is famous for its pioneering personnel management. One of the purposes of this study is to assess how this established company ethos facilitated change by examining the development and implementation of a capital investment programme that radically changed working practices at the company's Bournville plant in Birmingham. At a more general level the authors develop a theory of organisational change that emphasises the interaction between external market forces and internal management action. This approach unites an emphasis on the structural parameters that limit a firm's capacity for independent change, with a recognition of the vital role performed by influential members of an organisation in initiating and managing change. This book will be of interest to teachers and students of business history, organisational behaviour, industrial relations and industrial sociology."

"The ’strategic choice’ perspective was originally advanced as a corrective to the view that the way in which organizations are designed and structured is determined by their operational contingencies (Child 1972). This view overlooked the ways in which the leaders of organizations, whether private or public, were able in practice to influence organizational forms to suit their own preferences. Strategic choice drew attention to the active role of leading groups who had the power to influence the structures of their organizations through an essentially political process. It led to a substantial re-orientation of organizational analysis and stimulated debate on three key issues:"

"Strategic alliances are increasingly common, as many organizations look towards various partnering arrangements. This second edition of Strategies of Cooperation extends the first edition's clear and comprehensive survey of strategic alliances. Presenting different disciplinary perspectives (economics, strategy, organization theory) and numerous examples from the corporate world. The text has been thoroughly revised and updated, taking account of new theoretical models, and its coverage of case studies has been extended. It will be ideal for business students and managers alike wishing to understand the challenges of managing alliances."

"[It was assumed that effective strategic choice required the exercise of power and was therefore an essentially political phenomenon] incorporation of the process whereby strategic decisions are made directs attention onto the degree of choice which can be exercised ... , whereas many available models direct attention exclusively onto the constraints involved. They imply in this way that organizational behaviour can only be understood by reference to functional imperatives rather than to political action."

"Environmental variability...refers to the degree of change which characterizes environmental activities relevant to an organization's operations...it is a function of three components:"

"[The model towards which strategic choice analysis led would therefore] direct our attention towards those who possess the power to decide upon an organization’s structural rationale, towards the limits upon that power imposed by the operational context, and towards the process of assessing constraints and opportunities against values in deciding organizational strategies."

"Some scholars have argued strenuously against the idea that the organization is determined by its situation and have instead asserted that managers have free choice and are thereby to be held morally accountable (Bourgeois 1984; Whittington 1989). Contingency theory appears to some critics to be a managerially convenient ideology that justifies as inevitable organizational characteristics that are not really inevitable, because they are not really required for organizational effectiveness, and that injure the interests of employees (Schreyogg, 1980). Thus contingency theory is opposed by free choice."