Exam 11: Organizational Structure and Controls

Distributed strategic networks are the organizational structure used to manage international cooperative strategies.

The primary disadvantage of the multi-domestic strategy and worldwide geographic area structure relates to limited:

Strategic controls are largely subjective criteria intended to verify that the firm is using appropriate strategies for the conditions in the external environment and the company's competitive advantages.

Toyota heavily uses a strategic network of vertical relationships. Toyota enables engineers in supplier firms to communicate easily with companies with which Toyota has contracts for services. This results in the suppliers and Toyota (the strategic center firm) being more:

Describe the organizational structures used to implement cooperative strategies, giving attention to the role of the strategic center firm.

The CEO of Transector, Inc., set a 6.5 percent rate-of-return target for all divisions for the past year. Now, at the end of the year, three of Transector's seven divisions have not met this rate-of-return goal. The division managers of these three under-performing divisions have all secretly contacted executive-placement firms to investigate openings at other firms, because they know their future at Transector is in jeopardy as financial performance is all-important at Transector. Transector probably uses the ______ structure.

A strategic network can be characterized as a loose federation of partners revolving around a strategic center firm.

Firms implementing the multidomestic strategy often attempt to isolate themselves from global competitive forces by establishing protected market positions or by competing in industry segments that are most affected by differences among local countries.

Research has consistently shown that there is one best way to structure all organizations, regardless of competitive strategy.

Functional structures work best for firms for all of the following strategies EXCEPT:

Alfred Chandler found that firms grow in a predictable pattern and that the firm's growth patterns determine its structural form. Which form corresponds to the FINAL stage in Chandler's theory?

Structural stability affects the organization's ability to:

Describe the organizational structure associated with a firm that pursues an unrelated diversification strategy.

The marketing and R&D functions are emphasized in the differentiation strategy's functional structure.

In most cases, the focus strategy is best managed using a ______ structure.

Strategy has an important influence on structure, although once in place, structures influence strategy.

One disadvantage of the functional structure is that:

In Japan, the center firm in a strategic network of vertical relationships might be expected to undertake all of the following EXCEPT:

The ______ structure is the most appropriate structure for implementing the integrated cost leadership/differentiation strategy.

The worldwide geographic area structure differs from the worldwide product divisional structure in the level of centralization of decision making.