The Evolution of Business: Interpretative Theory, History and Firm Growth

Description

Firm growth. This concept has interested researchers for generations. Economists have sought to predict and measure firm growth using a host of different variables, while strategic management scholars depict growth as the result of clever analyses and rational resource exploitation. Entrepreneurship scholars - ever engrossed by successful start-ups - have pondered why growth sometimes comes fast and sometimes never at all, while the field of business history has given countless examples of growing firms in a range of different settings. Yet despite research across fields, our knowledge of how growth in a firm actually comes about is limited and we still know little about the process. This book offers a new reading of economist Edith Penrose’s The Theory of the Growth of the Firm. The bold statement is that although Penrose’s work - across fields and generations - is amongst the most quoted on firm growth, the basic points of her work have yet to be realized and explored empirically. Essentially, growth is created by a dynamic interrelation between the firm’s self-conception and its image of context. Based on these two subjective categories, the firm makes decisions and its actions lead it to develop along a particular path. To Penrose this is the basic engine that drives the growth and development of firms. This book discusses how the engine of firm growth can be captured in empirical analysis using interpretative theory and narrative methods inspired by recent streams of research in business history. Cover Half Title Title Page Copyright Page Dedication Contents Acknowledgements 1 Introduction Penrose and the Historical Study of Firm Growth Subjectivity, Entrepreneurial Attitude, and Image of Context The Creation of Meaning The Social Nature of Meaning Change and Geertz’s Concept of Culture Thick Description and Narratives The Case of Fiberline and the Use of Empirical Material 2 Founding a Company and Formulating a Basic Narrative The Circumstances of the Start-Up Pultrusion The Basic Narrative of Fiberline Establishing a Proper Motive and a Founder Naming the Product and the Market Specifying the Production Process and Constructing the Birth of a Company 3 The Prior Experience of Henrik Thorning and the Context of the Start-Up The Plastic Industry in Denmark in the 1970s and Start 1980s The Development of the Composite Industry in Denmark Environmental Concerns and Organizing the Industry Dukadan and Henrik Thorning’s Two Years Working There Jotun Innovation in the Danish Plastic Industry 4 Putting Resources to Service and Strengthening the Basic Narrative in the Start-Up Process Getting Started The First Sales The Everydayness of Acute Problems 5 How Should the Profiles of Fiberline Be Sold? Pressure Building Strong Export Growth of the Danish Plastic Industry A Gradual Focus on Sales Standard Profiles and Distributors The Origins of the International Focus The Narrative of How Profiles Should Be Sold and   to Whom 6 The Efforts of Financing and Opportunities for Growth Continued Pressure after 1983 Financing Behavior over Time Bootstrapping and Effectuation in Financing Behavior 7 Productive Opportunities and Technological Base The Growth of Fiberline and of the Danish Plastic Industry from the Mid-1980s until the Late 1990s External Inducements to Diversification – Processed Profiles and Systems Internal Inducements to Diversification – Phenol Based Profiles and Construction Profiles 8 Market Focus and Developing the Sales Organization The Composites Industry around the Turn of the Millennium Seven Good Years of Development and Organization Building Establishing the Sales Organization Diversification and Uncertainty Sales and Strategic Plans in the Early 1990s Operational Systems and the Strategic Plans in the Late-1990s 9 Discussion The Case of Fiberline and the Theoretical Choices I Have Made The Study of Firm Growth and Path Dependency The Study of Business History The Study of Entrepreneurship The Study of Internationalization 10 Conclusion Appendix 1: Financial Development of Fiberline Appendix 2: Composites and Profiles Appendix 3: The Pultrusion Process Appendix 4: Methods for Producing Reinforced Plastic Archival Material and Interviews Other Materials and Sources Bibliography Index