Governing headquarters-subsidiaries relationship: An agency perspective

Journal of Governance and Regulation

article

Dimitris Manolopoulos¹  Anastasios Magoutas²  Yiannis Kapnias¹ 

[1] Department of Business Administration, School of Business Administration, Athens University of Economics and Business;General Department, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens

关键词: Governance of the MNE Network;    Agency Theory;    Subsidiary Performance;    Dimensions of Alignment;    Configuration of Operations;   

DOI  :  10.22495/jgrv10i3art10

学科分类：社会科学、人文和艺术（综合）

来源: Virtus Interpress

【 摘 要 】

How multinational enterprises (MNEs) coordinate and control their geographically dispersed subunits is central to international management research (Kostova, Nell, & Hoenen, 2018). Our study adopts agency rationales to evaluate the effects of headquarters (HQs)–subsidiary convergence on the performance levels of the latter. Convergence within organizations relies to a large amount on controls that predicate a specific extent of alignment. In theory, the concept of alignment is seen as a valid proxy of agency intensity (Eisenhardt, 1989). Drawing on the supposition that MNEs are differentiated networks, where some subsidiaries continue to function the traditional competence-exploiting role while others are competence-creating and augment the advantages of their home-base (Björkman, Barner-Rasmussen, & Li, 2004), alignment challenges can be manifested in six dimensions that define their strategic posture, span the organizational context and underly competitive imperatives: 1) subsidiary strategy, 2) culture, 3) governance practices, 4) financial decisions, 5) human resources, and 6) environmental activity. Drawing on a sample of 72 MNE foreign operations and gathering 254 responses from top management team (TMT) members, our results indicate that strategic, cultural, governance, and HR alignment are important determinants of subsidiary performance. However, whereas strategic, cultural, and governance convergence between HQs and subsidiaries are positively related to increased performance levels, an ethnocentric approach towards HR practices seems to trigger welfare losses.

【 授权许可】

CC BY-NC