نوع شناسی استراتژیک تجارت الکترونیک :دیدگاه هایی از مطالعات موردی

Growth in electronic commerce (EC) continues to exceed growth rates in traditional markets and continues to offer new and different opportunities than traditional businesses. Its failures, however, suggest that many firms are not following successful strategies and have failed to align their EC strategies with business strategies. Observing practices at 12 companies provided insight into the impact of EC alignment on organizational profitability. A framework for its strategy types, derived from the Miles and Snow typology, was found to be useful in examining the strategic practices of the companies and results were generally consistent with the ideal profiles. Data suggested that companies with medium to high alignment exhibited higher planning formality and were more profitable. Analyzers displayed the highest alignment and online commitment. Both analyzers and prospectors had high profitability but prospectors displayed low alignment. Reactors exhibited the lowest alignment and were the least profitable.

Following the economic downturn from 2000 resulting in loss of venture capital and increased investor apprehension, management adopted a more rational and cautious perspective towards e-business investment. Despite tremendous losses, both business-to-consumer (B2C) and business-to-business (B2B) electronic commerce (EC) continue to expand at rates in excess of their traditional counterparts. The primary question facing managers today is not whether EC investments are worthwhile, but how to best manage the investments to increase returns. In a recent analysis of CEO letters to shareholders, it was concluded that EC performance can be improved by emphasizing it in business strategies and that failure to integrate EC and business strategies decreased the likelihood of success [3]. In a survey conducted by the London Business School [4], two-thirds of responding CEOs stated that their companies had separate EC strategies. Aligning EC strategies with business strategies—that is, applying proven business approaches and achieving consistency in terms of future direction—has the potential to increase returns on EC investments. At the same time, the online business can reflect the unique opportunities offered by the electronic marketplace and create organizational synergies. There is general agreement that proper alignment is critical to strategic IT success, yet little is known about the implications of EC alignment. A recent review of the literature showed that less than 10% of 275 articles on EC-related topics took strategy into consideration and that none addressed alignment issues [22]. Three streams of research are available for deriving prescriptive approaches to strategic alignment: surveys of alignment practices; case studies; and conceptual studies [17]. Using a combination of the case and survey approaches, this study examined EC strategic behaviors adopted by various organizations. The theoretical background provided is that proposed by Miles and Snow [18]. The study attempted to answer two research questions: 1. How does EC alignment affect organizational profitability? 2. Are formal planning mechanisms more likely to support EC alignment? Another purpose was to develop a framework of EC typologies that could be used to evaluate EC strategic behavior.

Miles and Snow posited that the prospector, analyzer, and defender were all valid strategies for aligning with the external environment but that the reactor type was not. To determine if these were valid for EC and whether the proposed framework in Table 1 was consistent with the predicted behavior, three sets of relationships were analyzed. 5.1. Business/EC strategic alignment and profitability The relationship between business and EC strategic alignment and profitability is shown by strategy type for all 12 companies in Fig. 2. Profitability was measured by the average return-on-assets (ROA) over a 3-year period with the exception of Company 10 for which the calculation was an estimated return-on-investment. The three analyzers and one defender exhibited high alignment paired with a high ROA but two prospectors had low alignment paired with a high ROA. However, six of the companies with medium to high alignment also had medium to high profitability, indicating the existence of a positive association between alignment and profitability. The analysis also showed that reactors fared least well in terms of profitability: of the three reactors with low alignment, two had low ROAs and one had medium while the reactor with medium alignment had a medium ROA. One defender with medium alignment had low profitability while another with high alignment had high profitability. Figure options 5.2. Alignment and the planning approach The relationship between EC alignment and the planning approach was analyzed by strategy type for all 12 companies as shown in Fig. 3. The planning approach was characterized as either informal, a mix of informal and formal, or formal. A formal approach was adopted by two analyzers and a defender exhibiting high alignment, and by two reactors exhibiting low alignment. Mixed and formal plannings were associated with medium to high alignment, while informal planning was mainly associated with low alignment. 5.3. Online commitment and the planning approach Online commitment, as measured by the four online perspectives, was compared to the extent of formal planning to determine if a single planning approach was better for firms wishing to develop a strong online presence. As shown in Fig. 4, overall results were inconclusive. Three companies with formal planning mechanisms had high or medium/high online commitment and two with mixed planning had either high or medium online commitment. However, two companies with formal planning mechanisms displayed low online commitment and two companies with informal planning displayed medium/high online commitment. Thus, there was not a clear relationship between a company's planning approach and its online commitment. 5.4. Limitations Despite its contributions, the study has several limitations. First, many companies, as in this study, will not exhibit all of the characteristics for a particular strategy type. The analyst must decide which characteristics are most pronounced and assign weights according to the intended purpose to derive a specific strategy type. This does not make the framework less useful but simply reflects the failure of any typology to capture the uniqueness and richness of individual organizations. Second, this study is based on observations of only 12 companies and subjective interpretation of the author. Different observers may arrive at different conclusions. Finally, the companies varied in size. It is possible that this influences the strategy type of online companies: larger companies might benefit from greater planning capacity, which might improve the quality of environmental scanning and alignment.