Strategic Flexibility

Many companies refuse to face the reality that their businesses are in trouble or that their strategic positions are wrong. Whether a product line is no longer profitable, foreign competition has slowed growth, or technological changes have left them behind, many otherwise well-managed companies hang on for too long to the status quo. In this inflexible posture, managements time and talent go to waste, assets grow sterile, and technology falls behind.

This book will help managers overcome the exit barriers that hamper strategic flexibility. Based on innovative studies of 192 firms within Sixteen industries, the ideas presented here are applicable to almost any industry and any type of firm. Harrigan discusses the major strategic decisions facing executives today, including guerrilla strategies of underdog competitors, entry and exit barriers, the use of joint ventures to cope with the uncertainties created by erratic growth, and the management of change. She focuses on the shortcomings of vertical integration, developing a framework for better make-or-buy decisions. The effects of exit barriers on firms' strategic flexibility are detailed, and managerial tools to cope with high barriers and declining businesses are introduced.

Strategic Flexibility is organized to provide easy reference for managers seeking to find out what strategies have worked and why. This book offers practical, proven ways for managers to expand the flexibility and responsiveness of their companies to new competitive conditions.

Kathryn Rudie Harrigan (D.B.A., Harvard; M.B.A., Texas; B.A., Macalester) is an associate professor of strategic management at the Columbia Business School in New York City. Her research interests include industry and competitor analysis, strategic management, turnaround management, competitive dynamics, global strategies, and business-government relationships. Her books, Strategies for Declining Businesses (1980), Strategies for Vertical Integration (1983), and Strategies for Joint Ventures (1985), are published by Lexington Books.

Professor Harrigan received the General Electric Award for Outstanding Research in Strategic Management, presented by the Business Policy and Planning Division of the National Academy of Management, for her research on declining businesses, and their Best Paper Award in 1983 for her research on vertical integration (or make-or-buy decisions). She also won an IBM Research Fellowship in Business Administration and a Division of Research Fellowship at Harvard Business School.

Professor Harrigan has started and sold four businesses. Her consulting experience includes work on competitive strategy and strategic management for both private and public organizations. She has acted as consultant to strategic consulting firms, as well. She is a founding member of the Strategic Management Society and appears each autumn on their international programs.

Professor Harrigan writes for and serves on the boards of editors of the Academy of Management Journal, the Strategic Management Journal, and the Journal of Business Strategy. She is an ad hoc reviewer for and frequent contributor to the Academy of Management Review. Her articles have also appeared in the Harvard Business Review, Long Range Planning, Boardroom Reports, Executive Woman, and the Proceedings of the National and Regional Meetings of the Academy of Management.