Re-framing globalisation

The research track Re-framing globalization mainly focuses on the cross-border nature of social phenomena, with a particular emphasis on multinational companies with operations in different countries and small-medium sized companies active on international arenas, and the challenges they meet. Globalization and increased connectivity of human activity around the world is also a defining characteristic of modern world. Today, it is becoming more obvious than ever that no country is an island and that changes in one part of the world might have (un)paralleled effects in other part(s).

Having strong expertise rooted in the markets as networks theory, research produced in the track closely follows and accurately captures contemporary trends. For instance, a modern view of multinational companies in which subsidiaries are not subjected to the headquarter, but rather can assume a central role in the company, leads to new implications for how success can be achieved. Customers who no longer are passive receivers of what is being offered –be it products, services or ideas –need to be understood by looking at what drives their attitudes, perceptions and behavior in order to succeed.

Other challenges we contribute to better understand and manage are:

• How organisations work to overcome geographical and cultural distances.
• How business manage increased diversity and complexity emerging out of cross-border nature.
• How contemporary business can deal with the glocal character of the emergence of digital technologies.

Re-framing globalization for future business, management and society

The collective work within the track Re-framing Globalization centres around three main research areas that in different ways explore increased connectivity and participation:

Coordination and Management of Multinational Corporations

Multinational Corporations are the main engine behind increased economic and social connectivity among nations and play the central role in the process and pattern(s) with which globalization unfolds. In a successfully completed project, “Coordinating the Global Firm”, the role of information technologies in global strategies of multinational corporations and ways in which they use IT to manage their global operations have been studied. Research conducted in the track also considers MNC as a coordinated network of different units located in different parts of the world. Adopting this perspective, members of the track focus on subsidiary evolution and embeddedness, knowledge governance and transfer, network theory, and strategy and management of the MNE.

International Growth and Small and Medium Enterprises (SME)

SMEs play a crucial role in terms of production, innovation, job creation, sustainable economic growth and facilitating equitable distribution of income. The advent of digital technologies present both challenges and opportunities for SMEs. To better understand this, one of our projects, "It´s a retail revolution", aims to provide insights into how a small Swedish retail companies should act to succeed in its digitalization strategy and thus increase its international growth. In another project, called "Digital transformation: a silver bullet for Swedish firms' growth and internationalization?", our researchers aims at a closely related issue and probe into the consequences of digital transformation for Swedish firms in terms of their innovativeness, operational efficiency and international growth.

Career Trajectories of Migrants

Besides firms of different sizes, research in Re-framing Globalization track also tackles phenomena at individual level. Inter alia, migration is one of the most relevant issues in our contemporary world. This constitutes the main focus of an ongoing project, "Skilled migrants and their career success", which targets at identifying the main institutional, organizational and individual determinants of career success of skilled migrants.

In these areas, we collaborate nationally and internationally with researchers at, among other, Stockholm School of Economics, Uppsala university, Trinity College Dublin, University of Lausanne, Dublin City University, Aalto University Business School. We are also leading members of journal editorial boards. Worth mentioning is that in a recently published study in the Journal of International Business Studies, Ulf Andersson, Professor of Business Studies, ranks among the most published researchers in the world when it comes to subsidiary-research.

Collaboration

Our research is conducted in collaboration with public and private sector, as well as with colleagues in Sweden and around the world. Our results are published in internationally recognized journals and widely cited. Our results are also used in practice by associations and companies, as for instance Business Sweden’s Business Climate Survey 2020.