| Summary: | This thesis reports an exploratory, quantitative study into the
implementation of strategic. decisions. Implementation was viewed as a
discontinuous organisational activity involving strategic change. The
organisational vehicle of change is seen as "the project" and the
specific unit of analysis adopted is the capital investment project.
Manufacturing organisations were studied because these were shown to
most frequently undertake such projects. '
Adopting a theoretical perspective derived from systems theory
and cybernetics a model of implementation was developed which recognises
two dimensions of implementation success (modes of organisational
change) to be contingent upon a dimension of project uncertainty
and two dimensions of information. From this model ten hypotheses were
developed.
Data on 45 projects was collected from a diversity of manufacturing
companies. This was obtained using a structured questionnaire
instrument administered to a single informant during a retrospective
personal interview. Initially the data was analysed using principal
components factor analysis to determine the factorial compositions and
reliabilities of scales measuring theoretical constructs. Subsequently,
causal modelling and stepwise regression techniques were employed
to test the hypotheses.
Analysis demonstrated that the essentially structural approach
to implementation taken in the study adequately explained many of the
observed associations between constructs. Hypothesised associations
between organisational structure and implementation success could not,
generally, be supported. Finally, the theoretical model adopted was
not able to account for a number of empirically observed associations.
These associations were explicable in terms of a behavioural or social
dimension. The wider implications of the study are also discussed. === Economic and Social Research Council
|
|---|
