A influência do ambiente operacional na relação entre diversificação e desempenho: um estudo aplicado ao mercado de manufatura norte-americano

AUTOR(ES)
FONTE

IBICT - Instituto Brasileiro de Informação em Ciência e Tecnologia

DATA DE PUBLICAÇÃO

03/03/2011

RESUMO

The task environment, defined as the most immediate and relevant environment for companies, has been an issue of extended research on the management theory, especially by strategy disciplines, owing to its determining influence on the companies strategic option and performance. Previous research have concluded that the option for diversification depends on environmental conditions. Simultaneously, the increasing diversity and interaction among different markets stimulates firms towards diversification owing to get advantage from different and more valuable products for diverse niches. That context suggests the existence of a relationship between environment and diversification strategy, and companies‟ financial performance as well. Though, the vast literature on the impacts of diversification and the performance determining factors remains inconclusive. The project owed to add new knowledge to the issue by assessing the relationship between the constructs diversification, financial performance and task environment, taking part of the international discussion on the environment and its influence over organizations. It analyzed the hypothesis that the environmental dimensions munificence, complexity and dynamism have a moderating influence on the relationship between diversification and the performance dimensions growth and profitability. Factorial analysis and multiple regressions statistics were applied on the North-American manufacturing industry. Using data from U.S. Bureau of Census regarding the 2002-2007 period, the factorial model was elaborated at the sector activity level to generate the factors related to the task environmental sub-dimensions, according to the measuring model elaborated by Dess and Beard (1984). It related to the amount of 169 valid sectors with available data from the total 272 sectors with 5 digit NAICS code. Those factors were entered in a multiple regression model that matched the environmental dimensions of those 169 manufacturing sectors to the diversification level and financial performance of 994 companies belonging to them. The companies‟ data were acquired from Compustat data base. The results confirmed the existence of a linear relationship between growth, diversification and the environmental dimensions complexity and munificence. Even though, despite the regression model statistical significance, those variables can explain very little, that highlights the opportunity for new research in finding additional knowledge to comprehend the diversification effects over firms. The hypothesis of the moderating influence by the operational environment on the performance-diversification relationship was not confirmed. The project has contributed to the strategic management by highlighting to the managers the importance of assessing the environmental conditions as part of the strategy making process, regarding its influence over performance. It also made a methodological contribution by confirming the operational environment dimensions proposed by Dess and Beard (1985) for the construct.

ASSUNTO(S)

administracao de empresas ambiente operacional desempenho diversificação manufatura moderação operational environment performance diversification manufacturing moderation

ACESSO AO ARTIGO

Documentos Relacionados