Alliance management capability: the roles of alliance control and strength of ties

Abstract

Purpose -Strategic alliances have a low success rate despite the profusion of literature on this topic in the last 20 years. To understand the factors that determine performance of partnership relations, the purpose of this paper is to study the roles of control and the strength of interorganizational ties in businesses ability to manage strategic alliances. Design/methodology/approach -The authors have examined 10,377 partnership relations formed as part of strategic alliances to analyze the capacity of a business to manage its alliances. The authors built a structural equations model (PLS) based on observation of 4,242 alliances. Findings -This research identifies two determinants of the success of alliance management. First, the impact of weak ties and strong ties is identical when the business does not control the alliance. Second, weak ties are a more effective means than strong ties when a business controls the alliance. Originality/value -The main contribution of this study thus lies in our analysis of interorganizational relations and of their tangible impact on strategic trade-offs. The field of public procurement is particularly well-suited to evaluating this phenomenon, given the subtlety of alliances at play.

Financial Comparisons Before and After Joining a Strategic Alliance in the Airline Industry

“…The low success rate of the strategic alliance in airlines industry is not surprising. In fact, the low performance of alliances is common across other economic sectors [13] despite the wealth of literature in the topic in the last decades. Around 50 percent of alliances does not meet expectations [14].…”

“…Thus, researchers are interested in factors affecting alliance performance [15]. The search of key drivers has not converged in many literature, but most focuses on alliance management capability, such as alliance control and strength of ties [13], interorganizational coordination, alliance portfolio coordination, interorganizational learning, alliance proactiveness, and alliance transformation [15]. Low degree of management capability may lead to high failure rate of the alliance, hypothetically including airline alliance.…”

Role of management capability and web-enabled direct procurement in creating competitive direct procurement advantage

“…Manufacturing firms must recognise the management capabilities in direct procurement that should be developed. Failure to develop management capabilities results in a lack of appropriate capabilities to implement business solutions (Rivard et al, 2006;Chiadamrong and Sophonsaritsook, 2015;Mamavi et al, 2015). Hence, this study suggests that clarifying management capabilities in direct procurement is crucial for assisting manufacturing firms in more efficiently allocating their resources to create a competitive advantage.…”

“…Enhancing the capability of governing relationships with direct material suppliers allows firms to improve direct procurement performance (Tai, 2013;Mamavi et al, 2015). Establishing close relationships with suppliers requires a firm to develop trust-building capability.…”

Alliance strategy: context, process, and requirements

“…Little research has been devoted so far to exploring from an organizational change perspective organizations' way of working and necessary reorganization for successful alliance performance. In addition, since in general there is within organizations insufficient alliance management capacity available (Mamavi et al, 2015), we believe too little is known about necessary modifications to organizational design and capabilities for organizational change in order to become effective in meeting the alliance objectives. Therefore, we explore the organizational practice of implementing an alliance strategy as a strategic reorientation.…”