613 [Full Dtn Draft 1] Hazza [Cultural Diversity]

7/31/2019 613 [Full Dtn Draft 1] Hazza [Cultural Diversity]

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Dissertation Title

Mergers and Acquisitions in

International businesses: An inquiry into

the organisational culture and values in

the UK Fashion Industry

By

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

A dissertation submitted in partial fulfilment of the

degree of

XXXXXXXXXXXX

At

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Date of Submission

August, 2011

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Signed Statement

I declare that this dissertation has not already been accepted in substance for any degree and is not concurrently submitted in candidature for any degree. It is the

result of my own independent research except where otherwise stated.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Date: XXXXXXXXXXXX

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Acknowledgement

Along with theoretical knowledge it is necessary for the student to possess the

skill to apply it all practical situations. A students practical application of knowledge is put to test while preparing reports, for instance while preparing marketing report. One

can tell from a marketing report, the status of a students calibre and his practical

knowledge potential. In fact, the ability to apply your knowledge practically is your true

capacity.

Through this form of gratitude, I would like to thank each and every person that

has in some way helped me during the course of my research endeavour. At the outset, Iwould like to thank my supervisor, XXXXXX, for his invaluable support and guidance

right through my study. In fact, his guidance has helped me particularly while gathering

literary evidences from various academic resources.

Next, I wish to thank all the participants who have done their best and have

been kind enough to spare some of their time for the interviews giving their valuable

responses and opinions which have realised my research aims. I thank them for their

patience and support.

Lastly, I would like extend my gratitude to my family; friends and colleagues

who have cooperated with me by allowing me to work at free will and leaving me alone

at study table which has helped my thought process construct ideas during the course of

the research. Without their support and cooperation this would not have been a reality.

I feel I have not left out anyone that has been a contribution to my work in thisnote of gratitude, if so I would like to thank all of them with due gratitude to each of

them who have been instrumental for this research project of mine.

Once again, Thank You All.

Yours,

xxxxxx

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Abstract

The main area of the dissertation was to investigate into the strategies of

mergers and acquisitions in international businesses. The research also investigated intothe role of organisation culture in global businesses. To focus on the area of the study

the researcher has taken fashion industry in UK. This dissertation not only investigated,

why and how firms attempt to expand the business internationally through mergers and

acquisitions but also evaluated the impact of organisational culture and values in global

context.

The study was conducted making a qualitative approach interpreting the data byadopting philosophy of interprevitism the samples numbering in50 were employed from

the case study sounds of fashion industry; that was also the strategy off the research.

The semi structured in depth interview was conducted adopting non- probability

judgemental sampling. The data was analysed, deriving courser and themes as

suggested by qualitative thematic analysis

The major finding of the research indicates that in UK, most of the fashionindustry, were involved in mergers and acquisitions. It was also found that, the most

important factor, while firms go international was to achieve cross culture and

management integration. Managing cultural diversity was the prime threat after the

process of merger and acquisition. In this context the study reported that the

organisational culture plays an important role whilst aligning integration values; for

which the management skills play an important role. Management integration in

addressing cultural values demands both internal and external focus such as flexibility

in advocacy as well as control over driving forces like, clan, adhocracy, hierarchy and

market. Other findings also include the concept of globalisation inviting more mergers

and acquisition recognising individual employees importance in emphasising on trust

and integrity and valuing traditional systems as well as adhering to legal and political

recognition; all these indicators were found to be playing an important role in

internationalisation of business and valuing organisational culture.

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Table of Contents

MERGERS AND ACQUISITIONS IN INTERNATIONAL

BUSINESSES: AN INQUIRY INTO THE ORGANISATIONALCULTURE AND VALUES IN THE UK FASHION INDUSTRY...........1

BY..............................................................................1

SIGNED STATEMENT....................................................2

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT...................................................3

ABSTRACT...................................................................4

TABLE OF CONTENTS...................................................5

LIST OF FIGURES.........................................................7

LIST OF TABLES...........................................................7

CHAPTER ONE.............................................................8

INTRODUCTION...........................................................8

CHAPTER TWO...........................................................16

LITERATURE REVIEW..................................................16

CHAPTER THREE........................................................41

INTRODUCTION TO RESEARCH METHODOLOGY ...........41

CHAPTER FOUR.........................................................53

DATA FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS.............................53

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CHAPTER FIVE...........................................................69

CONCLUSIONS, RECOMMENDATIONS AND LIMITATIONS

........................................................................................69

REFERENCES.............................................................75

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List of Figures

FIGURE 1: ORGANISATIONAL CULTURE AND COMPETINGVALUE FRAMEWORKS........................................................38

FIGURE 2: SAUNDERS RESEARCH ONION.....................42

List of Tables

TABLE 1: LIST OF METHODS-PARADIGMS STUDIES-

PARADIGM ADOPTED.........................................................42

TABLE 2: DIFFERENT RESEARCH APPROACHES.............44

TABLE 3: RESEARCH STRATEGIES................................46

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Chapter One

Introduction

The purpose of the dissertation is to investigate into culture and values that an

organisation possess and need to possess in the context of international business. The

focal idea behind the inquiry is the rapid growth of certain organisations after acquiring

other business firms in the on-going globalisation of businesses. Because of the

involvement of diversified cultural aspects prevalence in the context of global and

international business more emphasis is being laid by organisations to gain values

through the organisational culture. The focal idea behind emphasising on the fashion

industry is because in the recent times it was found that most of the fashion brands in

UK have been acquired by one single brand.

Many studies and researches have been categorically reporting the news of

organisational mergers and acquisitions most often in the fashion industry of UK at the

outset of the 20 th century. However, not much attention was given to organisational

culture and its role in the context of the on-going globalisation that is on increasing

trend in the present century; which generally should have been the other way especially

in the context of Globalization concept wherein a mixture of varied cultures is a

common phenomenon.

With the stated insight gained from initial literature review this chapter as an

introductory beginning initiates to initially mark out the scope of the study and states its

aim to further derive a set of objectives to work on towards conceptual underpinning to

poise a set of research questions to investigate into focal area of research and explore

mergers and acquisitions in international businesses inquiring into the organisational

culture and values in with UK Fashion Industry as a case. With these initial works the

research furthers to lead the reader to the contents of the rest of the chapters of the

dissertation after the contents of the introductory chapter are summarised.

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1.1 Background and Scope

Mergers and acquisition activity was practiced by firms during both favourable

economic conditions and adverse economic conditions. The activity was at its peak

during 1990s especially during the middle of the decade. As a result there was immense

economic growth and the M&A activity made a good contribution towards this

economic growth. Evidence can be gathered from the results which showed a

contribution of $4 trillion to world economy (2010) by mergers and acquisition activity.

In fact, 40 per cent of the US economy ($ 10 trillion) came from mergers and

acquisitions. The activity is still underway in the current ups and downs in the global

economy. The organisations start acquiring other smaller firms or those having troubled

growth, in a view to dominate the market as against their rivals. In the context of the

fashion industry, the same trend is observed where dominant players continue to

acquire weak players having troubled financial status. Be it the studies of Cox, (2001)

or the more latest one of Pless and Maak, (2004) the concept of diversity management

was indicated to have been of less use and in most of the cases tend to fail unless the

organization is integration oriented with strong cultural background and respectable

values towards their employees. However, a good cultural and diversity management

strategy should necessarily incorporate the following elements together. The essentialelements are integration values, organisational culture, and management competencies

which together play a vital role in the context of international business. Cameron and

Quinn (2006) furthers to state that there are seven integration values they being 1)

Emotional Recognition; 2) Legal and Political Recognition; 3) Solidarity; 4) Reciprocal

Understanding; 5) Standpoint Plurality; 6) Trust; and 7) Integrity. Each of the indicated

integration values are evaluated with the four types of organizational culture, they being

1) Clan; 2) Adhocracy; 3) Market; and 4) Hierarchy.

The above discussion gives the reader an insight into the M&A activity as well

as the nature of organisational culture and its value. Now, the research furthers to state

its aims and objectives to further the study with conceptual underpinning to poise

research questions.

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1.2 Aim Objectives and Research Questions

1.2.1 Aim

The focal aim of the proposed research is to investigate into growth of an

organisation internationally through mergers and acquisition and investigate into the

impact of culture and values of the organisation in internationalisation of business; with

a special focus on UK Fashion Industry

1.2.2 Objectives

1. To investigate into the organisations attempt of internationalisation of businessthrough mergers and acquisitions;

2. To investigate how most of the present day branded firms of the UK fashion industry

merger and/or involved in acquisition in the process of international growth;

3. To evaluate the general impact of organisational cultural and values in international

business and the fashion industry in particular.

1.2.3 Research Question

1. What is the general ideology and motive of organisations expanding their

businesses through mergers and acquisition?

2. What role does the organisations culture and values play in its strategic growth

process and how is it influenced in international business?

With the stated aims and objectives the research furthers to state and report the

case study i.e. fashion industry in UK. The primary reason for investigation into fashion

industry is because of the fact that the UK apparel industry has recorded a compound

annual growth rate of 9.9% for the years 2010-2015 (Allison, 2011); as such an insight

of UK fashion industry is gained here.

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1.3 UK Fashion Industry

The survey and study report of Allison, (2011) indicate that on the total,

customers in UK expensed approximately $7.01bn, translating to 4.3bn pounds, in the

year 2010, buying clothing goods online. The reports suggested that the trend has

shifted from bricks and mortar shops to virtual online buying portals that traded

clothing goods. Similarly a market survey report conducted by Mintel (2011) also

replicated similar findings. The survey notified that approximately 34 per cent of

customers bought online clothing goods, whose earlier percentage was 25 way back in

2009. The survey attributed the main reason for its findings being the increased number

internet users and the improvement and increment of online buying portals by retailing

firms. The stated report also predicted increase in sales to $7.83bn translating to 4.8bn

pounds by 2011. The prediction claimed that the online sales would increase by

approximately 11.6 per cent by 2011. Further, the survey went on to claim that the sales

would reach $7.83bn translating to 4.8bn UK pounds by the end of 2015 accounting for

an increment rate of 60.5 per cent with respect to 2010 and an overall growth rate of 9.9

per cent on annual basis during the period from 2010 to 2015.

Knight (2010) identified four prominent fashion brands in UK that dominated

its fashion market. Over the past and extending in the current scenario these brands

have been maintaining great brand loyalty among their customers. They were able to

persuade even people who have been against buying their goods and have created a

market of their own by trading latest trends in apparels. These prestigious brands are: 1)

Burberry; 2) Ben Sherman; 3) FCUK; 4) London Fog; and 5) Dr. Martens. These sell

fashion goods ranging from bags to footwear. These five brands have been so popular

that they every British national, prefers them while purchasing some or the other

fashion good. They have been promoting stylish attitude among Brits for generations,

both among the old and the younger generations. An investigation into the stated brands

has indicated that these top brands have expressed confidence in beating any newcomer

or even foreign brands for that matter. Their strengths include customer loyalty via

better customer care and the flexibility of their production of fashion goods in tune withthe latest trends in fashion.

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Their popularity does not confine to Britain alone; their brands are widely used

in countries such as Scotland, Ireland and other parts of Europe and the world; as such

these fashion brands have been considered as case study firms for the present research.

1.4 Introduction to case study firms

1.4.1 Burberry

It is yet unknown as to what makes those checks

so attractive! One cannot resist from buying at least one

wear containing these checks. Burberrys checks redefine

style and have won hearts and patrons the world over.

Burberry has brand loyalty all over the world and sells

goods ranging from perfumes and bags to various types

of clothing including its famous overcoats. It is one of the must appear clothing goods

in ones wardrobe.

1.4.2 Ben Sherman

Ben Sherman is an exclusive brand for every

Beatles fan. It is a special brand for the Brits, especially

for those who love anything exclusively British. The

Union Jack and fab four are the favourites for Ben Shermans customers. Ben Sherman

fashion-ware is both stylish and comfortable. The fashion goods representing this brand

are designed to serve various purposes and occasions, for movies and party outfits and

the like. The fashion-ware is designed based upon contemporary style and has acolourful outlook.

1.4.3 French Connection United Kingdom (FCUK)

This brand has become very popular amongst the youth and even the older

generation. Its logo presenting the acronym stands mischievous and catchy and is prone

for misinterpretation which is but the most likely tendency.

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Its clothing goods are both elegant and contemporary giving

an energetic outlook and excitement to their bearers.

1.4.4 London Fog

It is one of the famous London brands selling professional

clothes apart from other fashion-ware. Its clothing goods have a

prestigious outlook, for example, its T-shirts and shirts that have

sharp collars and comfortable and fitting sizes.

1.4.5 Dr. Martens

It is one of the most popular London brands selling

footwear for all age groups and footwear of all kinds and

fashion. The designs at Dr. Martens are both sturdy and

stylish and stand apart with outstanding comfort and

elegance.

1.5 Summary

Initiated with the focal aim to investigate in to the idea of Mergers and

acquisitions in international businesses the introductory chapter has found that it was a

common phenomenon in the UK fashion industry right from the beginning of 20 th

century. This trend further aggravated giving the first decade of the new millennium.

The introductory chapter also discussed how Mergers and acquisitions would impact

the organizational culture and values. There were many researches in the field of organizational cultures and values; mergers and acquisitions; and fashion industry, but

never there was an attempt made to add up all the stated areas. With these rational the

research identified that there was a good scope. Thus, this chapter duly recognizing the

concepts of the stated areas of study built a rational to further add up to the core aims of

the research along with its objectives and questions that are to be resolved, as an

attempt to build a base for the research.

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1.6 Dissertation Structure

Chapter-two : The core aim of this chapter is to gather literary evidences within

the chosen field of the research interest thereby establishing the need and basis for the

aims of the study. Throughout the chapter academic support for the current study is

obtained via referring academic resources in the related area. It is proven in this chapter

whether the research claims are feasible or not, if the research claims have a basis and

are required to be studied, then the reason in support of this is presented. In case, the

research aims are baseless, the reasons for the same would also be presented in this

chapter. Therefore, it will be clearly presented whether focal aims of the research are

realised or not, the reasons for either of the consequences are thereby presented here.

The importance of this chapter lies in its role in establishing the foundation for the

study.

Chapter-three : Saunders et al., (2009) laid emphasis on the importance of

choosing a suitable methodology to conduct the study; the scholar opined that the

methodology chosen should be in line with requirements and the nature of the study.

The gathering of literary devices is extended into this chapter further exploring into the

study. Literary support is gathered to justify the chosen research strategy, the analytical

tool utilised and the chosen approach to conduct the study. The logic behind the

selection of each and every method for the conduct of the study is also presented

alongside the choices. The methods so chosen are deemed fit by the researcher who

bases his decision keeping in mind their suitability in the context of the study. Overall

this chapter aims at building a conceptual framework for conducting the research.

Chapter-four : The researcher presents the data findings within the primary and

secondary data, here in this chapter. Further, qualitative analysis is conducted and the

analysis findings are also presented here. Using the Qualitative thematic analysis, the

researcher derives themes and concepts within the data comparing the data findings

with those within the previous academic resources. The current findings and the past

findings are tabulated for relative comparison.

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The research questions are dealt with at this point and it is proven whether they

are resolved or not, if they are resolved, logic for the same is presented and vice-versa.

At the end of this chapter the reader has a clear opinion as to whether the research goals

are reached at.

Chapter-five : The results are finalised after the analyses and are presented in

this chapter. Various conclusions are made based on the findings using objective

interpretations. The researcher makes final inferences and reflects upon the study via

his personal experiences. Further, he goes on to make recommendations wherever he

feels improvement can be made and presents the future scope for research in the current

field.

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Chapter Two

Literature ReviewInitiated with a purpose to investigate into culture and values that an

organisation possess and need to possess in an internationalised business environment,

the researcher in the previous chapter presented the focal idea behind the investigation

stating the rapid growth of certain businesses through mergers and acquisitions;

especially in the current scenario of internationalisation of business firms, where

involving diversified cultural aspects was apparent and there was a need to inquire why

organisations need to gain values through the organisational culture. The focal idea behind emphasising on the fashion industry was because in the recent times it was

found that most of the fashion brands in UK were been under the umbrella of

acquisition and mergers.

As already seen, the researcher had stated that the focal aim of the current study,

i.e. to throw light on how an organisation is benefitted by the merger and acquisition

activity and to examine the effects of organisational culture in the scenario of globalisation with specific concentration on the M&A activities within the fashion

industry of UK. With this as the backdrop, the research went on to stat its objectives

which were to explore in-depth into the merger and acquisition activity that is

prompting an organisation to go global in its business operations. The study would

revolve around the investigation into the M&A activity underway in most of the fashion

firms in UK leading to globalisation of their businesses. How are the M&A activities

helping these firms to grow? The question that comes into our mind is the stance of organisational culture in internationalisation of businesses; what are the issues propping

out on the international stage? And what are effects of organisational culture on the

multicultural personnel. The above situations will be evaluated in the context of the

fashion industry in UK.

As indicated and discussed in the previous chapter, academic resources within

the field of management and cultural diversity management have already made notablecontribution on the M&A activity on the international scene and the aspects of

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organisational culture coming into light in the internationalisation of business and the

role of managements in organisations that have to deal with these aspects conditionally.

Therefore, keeping in mind the above discussion, the research has identifiedcertain viewpoints, discussions and statements of various authors and academicians

within the stated context. This will be the primary focus for the present chapter (table-

1).

Focus Author Dominant Contribution

Mergers and acquisitionsFocarelli and

Pozzolo, 2008Mergers and Acquisitions

Internationalisation of

business through mergers

and acquisitions

Sharona Peng

(2010)

Achieving Successful Cross-

Cultural and Management

Integration: The Experience of

Lenovo and IBM.

Impact of organisational

culture in international

business

Erika and Alberto

(2009)

Berry, 1983; Pan,

2006

Managing Cultural Diversity:

Integration Values and Management

Skills

Major acquisition in UK

fashion industry

Sharona Peng

(2010); Anon

(2011)

UK Office of the Statistics; case

study company website

Conceptual ModelCameron and

Quinn, 2006

In the studies of Erika and Alberto

(2009)

Competitive advantage as perceived earlier is more about making use of market

deficiencies and dominating weak economies. However, with the advent of

internationalisation of businesses, these traditional ways of market dominance no longer

played the trick. Globalisation had led to unification of markets and economies.

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Therefore, as pointed out by Zhu and Huang (2007), the present day organisations are

prompted to make use of the M&A activities to gain competitive advantage in markets.

With the stated insight the research furthers to initially investigate into theconcept behind the M&A activity and as to why the majority of acquisitions in UK are

taking place amongst its fashion firms, and to evaluate how organisations move ahead

with internationalisation of business through the M&A activities and to examine the

effect of an organisations culture in international business.

1.7 Mergers and acquisitions

Interestingly, the mergers and acquisitions occur both in good and bad

economic conditions. When favourable economic conditions were prevalent during the

mid 1990s and till late 1990s, considerable economic boost was supplied by mergers

and acquisitions. Now, in the recent years of economic crises, there are mergers and

acquisitions underway in many of the industrial business area. Basically, in view of

gaining economic advantage, an organisation tries to benefit from consolidating one or

more of its competitors over a period of time. For example, in the health sector, bigger

hospitals are on continuous acquisition of smaller hospitals with the motive to prompt

insurance companies to increment coverage payments to them.

Mergers and acquisitions are not limited to MNCs and organisations with huge

capital values, even the SMEs can make use of mergers and acquisitions to attain

superior status in the market. However, to acquire intellectual properties of other

companies the financial resources are also the required credentials. As such the small

and medium size firms can be benefitted on the other side of the M&A activity; i.e. they

can claim huge capital benefits if they sell their intellectual properties. Moreover, the

laws related to intellectual properties have also evolved. Capital benefits from mergers

and acquisitions can be used to expand business operations, thus contributing to the

growth of the SMEs. In fact, the Microsoft and Sun Microsystems have been acquiring

many small companies of potential intellectual assets and are today some of the leading

MNCs of the world. Of course, the Sun Microsystems has been acquired by Oracle

recently.

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Globalisation, as opined by scholars Mitchell (2000); Focarelli and Pozzolo

(2008), has become a worldwide phenomenon and has opened the flood gates for

international business. Organisations in every part of the world are thinking beyond

national boundaries and it has become imperative for them to expand business

internationally given the impact of globalisation. As a result of this internationalisation

of business, the world is moving closer to becoming one single integrated economy.

The above situations posed fresh challenges for all kinds of organisations both smaller

and bigger ones; you either choose international business or perish. Therefore, the

organisations those are unable to look beyond national boundaries with the philosophy

of "domestic-business-only" are giving way to their rivals and are falling much behind

them. In this business context, the mergers and acquisition activity comes into lime

light. By definition, the merger activity implies consolidating two firms forming one

integrated firm. Explaining the difference between the mergers and acquisitions, Zhu

and Huang (2007) observed that acquisition is different from mergers in the sense that

an organisation buys off another organisation in acquiring it for a certain monetary

value whereas in mergers the combining organisations merge themselves forming one

single entity. Porter (1985) underlined that the motive behind the mergers and

acquisitions is to attain competitive dominance in market. Authors, Lodorfos and

Boateng (2006) opined that mergers and acquisitions are resorted to by the

organisations mainly to improve their economies apart from other motives such as to

better their technological backdrop, to mitigate risks, and to obtain expertise for

producing quality goods. In furtherance, Zhu and Huang (2007) observed that alongside

improving economies of organizations, mergers and acquisitions help organizations

grow and expand their business operations. In another observation, authors Cartwright

and Cooper, 1993), underlined that the organisations resort to the M&A activity mainly

to attain market dominance.

However, authors Magnet (1984) and Gilkey (1991) put forward their

contention that most of the transactions, nearly 60 per cent and often two-thirds of the

M&A transactions actually ended up in failure. It is an intriguing contention as to what

is the main reason for such a failure. Various academicians over the past have been

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going through literary resources to find the actual reason for such overwhelming rate of

failure in mergers and acquisitions.

In this regard Peng (2010) argue that fruitful results depend upon the choice of good and appropriate answers. The author is of the opinion that the human relationships

within the organisations are critical for the success of the M&A activity. Further

another scholar Gilkey (1991) stated:

"The high percentage of failure is mainly due to the fact

that mergers and acquisitions are still designed with business and

financial fit as primary conditions, leaving psychological and cultural issues as secondary concerns. A close examination of

these issues could have brought about a learning process,

directed at successfully managing such ventures."

The author further argues that the employees of an organisation are often

worried about their future if their organisation is going to acquired by another

organisation there is sense of fear in their minds which develops an unwelcoming

attitude in them towards the imminent acquisition.

The employees are further pulled into confusion because of the lack of

information and the ill attitude of the management in not providing clear news about the

acquisition activity. Therefore, the employees are driven into a state of confusion and

anxiety and are puzzled if the news of acquisition is dramatic in few cases.

In furtherance, the studies of Mirvis and Marks (1985) indicate that due to lack

of information various speculations are created and the employees tend to believe them

because they have not been informed of anything. This further leads to a lot of

confusion and the rumours that are spread around take care to increase the turmoil by

spicing up the situation. Therefore, it always better to inform the employees of the

imminent acquisition beforehand to avoid all these unfortunate happenings. The

acquiring company is ill benefitted because of the confusions in employees who are

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anxious about their future and employment. The acquiring company is at loss if the

employees coming from the acquired company are disturbed.

In this context it is quite useful to revise the viewpoint of Zhu and Huang (2007)who in their studies observed that if the organisation does not provide information

regarding acquisition to its employees, a feeling of uncertainty and insecurity is created

in their minds which leads to several problems after the acquisition. The problems are

more in case of acquisitions taking place between organisations of differing cultures. Of

course, the corporate culture within an organisation may not be a hurdle but the

national, cultural and linguistic diversity are likely to create new problems for the

managements of organisations.

On similar lines, scholar Peng (2010) also opined that these fresh problems

following acquisitions will have to be dealt with greater precision and skill; often a

foreign language skill will help in communicating better.

First of all it is necessary to understand the constituents of an acquisition

statement. An acquisition statement is basically an agreement made between theacquirer and the institution or entity that is being acquired. The statement consists of the

terms and conditions mutually agreed upon by both the parties and the purchase of the

stock or the sale of properties will be made based on this agreement. The details of the

agreement clearly mention various specifications of the transaction being made such as

the stock costs; payment options, closing date, and all the legal proceedings that have to

be finished before the closing date. Further it will mandatory for the selling entity to

give written form of guarantee for the intellectual assets that are being sold. When

compared to purchasing a share, purchasing of an asset requires legal supervision and

authenticity even greater than the former case the reason being that the buyers of an

asset will own it for life whereas that is not the case with a share purchase.

Whatever the kind of transaction, when it comes under the domain of

intellectual property rights, asset schedules are imperative as they determine

representations and sureties to be mentioned in the agreement (5).

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The mergers and acquisitions' agreements between the US organisations stress

upon identification and scheduling of intellectual properties. On the other hand, we find

emphasis on the representations and sureties in European agreements.

Another clarification that has to be made within the agreement as t avoid

confusion is that the seller has to clearly state what are the boundaries of intellectual

properties he is selling and what business he is willing to retain. All these have to be

clearly mentioned in the contents of the agreement. For instance, the selling entity wish

not to sell its title, the "house" trademark, however, if he has given consent to inclusion

of such a trademark in some of the products, then terms and conditions have to be stated

clearly.

Further there should be clear cut legal formalities and licensing of trademarks

and the seller is obliged to prove the license of trademarks to the buyer using solid

documents before the closing date (7).

Within the agreement for purchasing intellectual properties, the 6 th clause brings

in heavy negotiations as it incorporates representations and Warranties. Informationcontained regarding the representations and warranties outlines the scheduling

information related to the intellectual properties transfer. The transfer information has

to be precise stating clearly as to whom the intellectual property is being transferred and

that there are no legal implications such as liens, etc. It is the responsibility of the seller

to make everything clear to the buyer because intellectual properties transfer is a

complex legal procedure. Assistance should be given to the buyer while processing

legal documents. The seller will have to transfer all necessary documents such as the

existing licenses, settlement agreements, consent agreements, ongoing litigations, etc.

Only transparency can ensure the completeness of this complex agreement. There

should be any hurdle to the use of intellectual property by the buyer, if any the seller

should mention as per the 8 th clause.

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1.8 Organisational culture

According to Cameron and Quinn (2006), the realisation upon the importance of

organisational culture and its strategic value came into light only in the 1980. Before

1980s the existing organisational culture and values were casual and were not of much

importance for organisations. In fact, organisations were ignorant of values and on

implementing specific organisational culture in the workspace. Ever since 1980s

organisational culture and its impact on the performance of employees was studied

immensely by various academicians with special mention to likes of De Long and

Fahey (2000); McDermott and ODell (2001); and Schein (2004). In such an attempt to

study organisational culture, Jarnagin and Slocum (2007) arrived at the conclusion that

the way the employees behave and perform depends more on the organisational culture

and values they are subjected to rather than the guidance and instructions provided by

senior managerial staff.

Organisational culture has been the popular subject of debate to the recent

researchers. The researchers emphasised on the perceiving organisational culture being

the focal point of performance. In this context, the studies of Cameron and Quinns

(2006) stand out to be epitomic. In their studies, the above scholars have designed the

model Competing Values framework (CVF) which has been very much appreciated by

Chin-Loy and Mujtaba (2007) in their works. The CVF has classified organisational

culture possessed by organisations into four classes of culture; 1) Clan; 2) Adhocracy;

3) Market; and 4) Hierarchy.

1. Clan culture This type of cultural environment is characterised by friendliness

among the employees. People openly share their thoughts and life. Such a

friendly atmosphere can generate teamwork spirit and commitment. Further, the

employees maintain healthy relationship with their colleagues as well as the

management. From the management side, there are employee involvement

assignments and a good appraisal system and corporate training, guidance and

learning programmes.

2. Adhocracy culture This kind of organisational culture is found within firms thatare generally not mechanical in their culture practices and are work focussed. In

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addition, the organisation practising this kind of culture has a dynamic and

creativity generating working environment. The employee team of the

organisation is empowered and risks are taken. Leadership is recognised and

motivated and employees are motivated to handle risk taking.

3. Market culture The organisation cultivating this kind of culture focuses on

attaining market dominance and competitiveness by increasing the interests of the

stakeholders in the organisations, in fact, it channelizes stakeholders towards

investing more. The organisation of this kind will focus on two principles, they

are competitiveness and productivity. Therefore, the burden of competition also

falls upon the individual employee. Sharing of knowledge is absent and is

substituted with competition, "if you compete, you survive".

4. Hierarchy culture In this kind of organisational culture, certain rigid formalities

and hierarchical principles persist. There is a standard for everything in this kind

of an organisation and rules apply for everything even at the individual level of

actions. Employees have lesser freedom to make decisions and are seldom

empowered. The organisation of this kind strives on reinforcement of rules and

focuses on consistency in production and depends on predictable results.

Knowledge sharing is blocked by hierarchy and vertical and horizontal working

units. Knowledge is blocked mainly because of power and hierarchical blockade.

Basing on the CVF, Cameron and Quinn developed another model which

integrates the CVF elements, it is known as the OCAI (Organisational Culture

Assessment Instrument). It can be viewed as an extension to the CVF; however the

authors argued that it is simpler and economical than the CVF. Cameron and Quinn

further stated that both the above models have been successful in predictingorganisational performance by assessing the culture within a particular organisation. In

fact, both these models have been employed by organisations to critically evaluate their

cultures and find out the impact of the same on the performance of their employees.

It is noteworthy to revise the comments of authors De Long and Fahey (2000)

who observed that quality leadership lies in recognising culture within an organisation

as the critical instrument that can either hone the skills of its employees or can act as a barrier and produce negative results. One important observation made by academicians

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is that employees do not tend share their knowledge because they fear to be dominated

in competition. Therefore, the organisation should see to it that sharing of knowledge is

practised by its employees by encouraging leadership qualities by some means of

recognition and appraisal and by their cultural practices which should ensure

relationship among employees and a sense of friendship. Authors, Al-Alawi et al

(2007); McDermott and ODell (2001); Milne (2007); Smith (2001), are in support of

the above suggestion that there should be incentives for knowledge sharing practices

and leadership qualities, it can be recognised by strategic promotion of those employees

possessing leadership qualities such as knowledge sharing, teamwork and coordination.

In their framework model for organisational culture, Cameron and Quinn (2006)

marked two main parameters that determine the performance boosting quality of

organisational culture, they are: 1) Discretion and Flexibility together with Stability and

Control; and 2) Internal focus and Integration together with external focus and

differentiation. Further based on these two identified parameters, the authors derived

four cultural quadrants, which are clan, adhocracy, hierarchy, and market. The authors

remarked that each of the above four act as indicators of organisational performance.

Ultimately the knowledge sharing factor depends upon the behavioural

characteristics of the workforce of an organisation which comprises employees at

different levels, namely the managers, general officials and employees, as well as the

decision making team comprising of leaders. There are innumerable references and

academic contributions towards organisational culture; some of the eminent authors

who researched on the aspects of organisational culture are Chin-Loy and Mujtaba

(2007) and Roma n-Vela zquez (2005). The above authors focussed on the effects of

different kinds of organisational cultures such as clan, adhocracy, the market as well as

the hierarchy culture on the performance of organisation. The kind of organisational

culture from the above followed in an organisation determines the extent of knowledge

sharing in that organisation.

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1.9 Impact of organisational culture in internationalbusiness

Author Hofstede (1980, p. 21) defined organisational culture as "the collective

programming of the mind which distinguishes the members of one human group from

another". In other words, culture can also be visualised as a system though imperfect in

nature that is shared and shaped by the members of the system with their experience.

We are not especially aware of our own culture, however, our culture determines our

actions, behaviour, the way we dress and or be it the way we interact, and culture

influences almost all of our social characteristics. The fundamental default with most of

the management concepts and theories is that they are all developed by westerners and

were assumed to be applicable globally. Therefore, people and institutions of one

locality or a nation find difficult to cope and implement these theories as they are

incompatible to their cultural environment and values. Moreover, people of one nation

have shared values which are distinct to those of others and this difference is unnoticed

by them, however, when people of other countries encounter these situations they will

be able to easily distinguish.

Author, Hofstede (2005) also remarked that some of the academicians are

under the opinion that the distinguishing features of national institutions within a

country lead to different thinking, feelings and different cultural practices in that

country. The institutions that influence culture include national governments, law

institutions, associations, educational institutions and family structures. However,

according to Hofstede (2005), some other academicians emphasised on culture of a

nation as being the most important element that influences the nature of cultural

practices within an organisation located in that nation. Therefore, it is not possible toapply western management theories globally because nobody can change the

characteristic behaviour or culture of the people of one nation. For instance, the

westernised philosophies and culture dating back to Socrates cannot be applied to an

Asian country like China which derives its cultural values from Confucius and the

philosophy of Taoism, so opine authors Fang (2001); Zhuang & Zhou (2004) in their

studies.

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In this context, various scholars such as the likes of Lubatkin alor Veiga (1997)

and Pioch (2007) have opined that it is most important for MNCs to closely examine

the cultural values characteristic of a nation where they intend to establish subsidiary

business units and therefore, modify the parent cultural practices of their organisations

in accordance with the local culture. The scholars emphasised that the above stated

concept will boost healthy headquarter-subsidiary relationships. Similarly the same

principles are valid and apply appropriately in the context of mergers and acquisitions.

Therefore, the acquirer should closely examine and first of all understand the cultural

scenario of the nation where his acquired organisation is operating from. It is

imperative and of immense utility in the period after the acquisition when the acquirer

integrates the organisational culture of the company that is acquired as well as its

management system.

1.9.1 Diversity management in international businesses

According to Ayoko and Hartel (2006) the current happenings and

circumstances in the international scenario taking place in political, social and

economical spheres have brought upon the realisation among the managers and

entrepreneurs to put cultural diversity management in the drivers seat. Extending the

above contention further, Seymen (2006) underlined that cultural diversity management

is imperative because of the changing social circumstances such as increased events and

gatherings, migratory phenomena, and increased encounters of multiethnic,

multicultural and multi-linguistic people and cultures, and because of increased

globalisation leading to integration of markets and economies.

Offering a new dimension to the above argument, authors Milliken and Martins

(1996) observed that due to the presence of multiethnic environment the needs and

necessities of the society also change, in fact, it leads to the creation of a multiethnic

market. In this context the employee team of an organisation consisting of people from

different cultures and ethnicities, is advantageous as it can provide the necessary

backup for the organisation to diversify marketing campaigns and advertising strategies.

The multicultural teamwork generated would guide the advertising and marketing

departments of an organisation and therefore the organisation for obvious reasons can

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easily dominate the market thus gaining a competitive advantage, so opined Griggs

(1995). Also, according to Milliken and Martins (1996), such multicultural team can

give creative options for the management in guiding it on producing particular products

and services matching the tastes and preferences of audience of their respective

cultures.

In their attempt to investigate on diversity management, Tung (1993) and Iles

(1995) ended up classifying it into categories, the first one being the cross-national

diversity management and the second one being intra-national diversity management.

The scholars implied that diversity management does not confine to managing the

human resources of diversified cultures within the parent organisation, rather it implies

managing human resources of its international subsidiaries too.

The first category of diversity management is about managing relationships

between the personnel coming various parts of world culture and the personnel of the

parent organisation itself to manage and cultivate team-spirit and commitment.

However, the other category, i.e. the intra-national diversity management develops

healthy relationships and manages integration of diversified workforce within the same

nation, for example women, multiethnic minorities, managing newly recruited

workforce, and physically challenged people and cultivating the spirit of oneness in

them.

1.9.2 Cultural Integration

The overview of concerned literature indicates that cultural integration in an

organisation post acquisition takes place through four different phases. The four phases

of cultural integration are contact, conflict, adaptation and integration. These phases

have been identified by Berry (1983) and also in the works of Pan (2006). In all the

above phases the management is exposed to different experiences and will face

different kinds of challenges in each of them. Therefore, the management has a

herculean task of carefully managing these phases with an appropriate approach

towards each of them.

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The initial phase as already mentioned is the phase in which the employees of

both the organisations get into contact and introduce themselves. This phase occurs

immediately after the acquisition process has just occurred. The employees who get into

interaction with each begin to share the organisational values, procedures, etc of both

their respective organisations and try to sort out differences in official procedures,

operations and the system of their respective organisations. This is the phase when

employees of both the organisations are very much curious to know about each others

corporate cultures, production and management methods and their reputations. The

employees are generally excited about knowing many a things. Scholars do not rule out

conflicts happening in this phase but are of the opinion they will be mild and

insignificant. As it is just the beginning and there wont be in-depth perceptions among

the employees about changed organisational culture, therefore, conflicts if any will be

mild and can be neglected.

Raynaud (1991) and Pan (2006) suggest that in this particular phase the

management should deploy a special team of managers to sort out the potential

differences and issues that may come out soon and prevent them with necessary

managerial and preventive measures. The appointed team should be able to study the

situation and identify key differences between both the institutions and should be able

to resolve the issues those differences are likely to create. Author Raynaud

recommended that the appointed team should employ questionnaires, interviews and

focus groups in order to investigate on the probable cultural and organisational

differences. Therefore, based on the information and facts submitted by the team, the

management should take certain decisions and necessary remedies beforehand as

prevention is better than cure. Apart from the above, the team should able to identify

potential conflict creating areas and cultural gaps that can cause damage as well as the

strong and weak areas in the systems of both the organisations. Using such information

it is the immediate task of the management professionals to sketch out a plan for

achieving cultural integration within the consolidated organisation.

The next phase, i.e. the second one, is characterised by conflicts. The conflicts

so encountered will pull back the integration activity. Issues like social comparison,

disagreements, arguments, and stereotyping will come into light in this phase. The

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cultural conflicts that come into light are often dangerous to the management as they

destabilise the system. Viewing from the national setting, conflicts or differences may

arise mainly due to linguistic and cultural background of people. Viewing from the

setting of corporate culture, the possible conflicts will be with regards to difference in

nature of management operations and organisational values. Author, Pan (2006)

observed the cultural conflicts that occur will in turn have three phases of development;

they are magnification of differences, classification of those differences, and putting

down.

After the acquisition had taken place, in the course of time conflicts will slowly

develop. As they pick the momentum at point of time they burst out and the situation

where the employees of both the organisations will clash for more power and influence

each claiming superior talent and capacity. In the second phase of conflict development,

there will be a kind of biasing that will take place between both the firms employees

and they start behaving stereotypically with each other. One imminent situation that

cannot be avoided is that the stronger team will come down heavily upon the

organisational culture of the weaker one. It is in this phase that the weaker section is

forced to give way to the organisational practices of the stronger one. As a result, the

weaker team is distressed and disappointed and a kind of resentment and detachment

with the organisation is formed in their minds.

There are also chances for the feeling of being lonely and left out especially in

people working away from their home in a foreign organisation. Therefore, the concept

of cultural integration is setback and the people those are left start feeling nostalgic and

helpless leading to depression.

Literature makes two recommendations to avoid conflicts; they are creating

cultural awareness among employees by through training and orientation programme

for the same and the other recommendation is that immediate resolving action in the

wake of issues. In the first one, it is important to inculcate flow of communication and

educate the employees about their colleagues cultural background and to create an

environment that promotes friendliness amongst them. The above as a part of cultural

integration is the prevention operation. Further, the spirit of teamwork can be inculcated

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via proper training for the same. Put together, the above activities would generate

friendly atmosphere and throw out disagreement, stereotyping, etc form the minds of

the employees. The next recommendation is the plan of action in the wake unrest

almost immediately after its occurrence. The management should try both formal and

informal ways of resolving issues by setting up talks with the parties under conflict and

convincing them with proper judgement and rationale; it all depends on the negotiating

skills of the managers.

The next phase as mentioned in earlier discussion on the phases of cultural

integration is the adopting phase. This particular phase is the longest phase of cultural

integration. Changes take place and there may be strong appeals and demands for

preferential cultural practices, nevertheless this phase takes usually more time than any

other phase. Pan (2006) made an observation that the international merger and

acquisition activity that took place in China faced pretty lot of problems while

integrating with the culture of the country. The M&A activity in the rest of the world

was so much better than in China. Therefore, in such countries where there are a lot of

issues troubling, it is better take longer time to achieve cultural integrity. Moreover

there should not be any gap of communication between the parties, the acquirer

organisation and the selling organisation. Therefore, the adoption period is critical as it

allows the organisation to focus on developing high breed culture taking care of the

cultural needs of all the ethnic and cultural groups involved.

In this context as suggested by literature, two elements come into lime light; one

is that it is vital and necessary to understand your culture before you move on to

judging understand that of others. It is important because in the process of assessing our

own culture we come across several weaknesses in our own culture, of course the

process also allows us to appreciate our culture. The causes of the drawbacks of the

culture can also be discovered through the above mentioned investigative study on

ones own culture. The management would be able to evaluate its own culture and is

able to critically compare its culture with that of the acquired institution. The second

important element to be kept in mind is to develop the spirit of empathy, i.e. to be able

to put yourself in others shoes, this is vital importance in the context of cultural

integration. Certain theories on social categorisation and identification underline that

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"membership in any social group provides occurring lines along which conflict can be

drawn", in view of the above, authors Turner (1982) and Kramer (1991) remarked that

such a situation will arise when members of a community have discriminatory attitude

towards other social communities. In furtherance, Turner (1982) indicated that there is

a chance for social comparison and prestige being inculcated in such individuals.

Moreover, individuals with discriminatory attitudes tend to favour the members of their

own group and tend to show some sort of discomfort while working with outside

people. It is natural given the circumstances in which these people are brought up but

there is always education that can make them realise the value of cultural integrity and

indiscrimination. Hence, the communication flow is broken down and biasing takes

place. Milliken and Martins (1996) reasoned that such situation arises because the

people of certain social community tend mix up more with the members of their own

group and that in turn is because their habits and cultures tend to match readily.

Therefore these key issues have to be resolved by the management so that empathy is

cultivated amongst individuals of diversified cultural backgrounds.

Now coming to the final phase of cultural integration, namely the integration

phase; as it was evident in the above discussions, realising cultural integration is not as

easy as implementation of any other measures, rather it requires careful supervision and

planning. It is not simply overlapping one layer of culture over the other, its complex

and needs great managerial and leadership qualities. On careful observation the acquirer

organisation should notice and examine the culture that is prevalent in the acquired

organisation and from there it should make note of key issues that would likely to come

out and proceed to take necessary preventive measures and then begin the cultural

integration programme. There are so many things involved in the process and some

things need to be revised in context of the acquired organisation, such as the marketing

operations, operations, and some other organisational ingredients. All the necessary

steps will determine the success of the acquisition and cultural integration programme

as such. The fruits of such success are quite useful, for example the organisation would

able to compete with more than its previous status as it has multicultural multiethnic

personnel who know the backgrounds and needs of the people of their societies. There

is opportunity and immense scope for exploring new dimensions, etc. However, the first

step in the whole process is to complete and realise cultural integration. Several authors

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felt that the main hurdle for the M&A activity is the diversity and incompatibility of

national and corporate cultural attributes which often leads to failure of mergers and

acquisitions. As already mentioned culture has the potential to become the topmost

strength of an organisation, it will increment the organisations adaptability and its

capacity to resolve diverse issues as well as flexibility. In fact, cultural integration when

implemented successfully would result in gifting an organisation with a unique set of

organisational culture and values.

The fundamental principle behind the concept of cultural integration therefore is

to be empathetic and to respect and appreciate others cultural attributes and to adapt to

them in order to establish a hybrid kind of cultural practice respecting values of all

cultures. In word call it Unity in Diversity. The company that is acquiring another

company should not blindly transfer its cultural practices to the company that is being

acquired, in fact that is the reason for the high failure rate in the M&A scenario.

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1.10Acquisitions in UK fashion industry

According to the statistical bulletin released by the Office of the National

Statistics, UK the value and number of mergers, acquisitions and disposals involving

UK companies was worth over 1.0 million. Key findings of the quarterly report (Q-1,

2011) include the following:

By the end of the first quarter of 2011 the asset value of UKs acquired

companies in other countries was estimated to be around 18.3bn as againstits previous value of 3.8bn at the end of 2010. In fact, this is the highest

mark achieved by UK firms in terms of outward investment since the end of

2007.

However, the expenditure value incurred on acquisitions came down a little

low in beginning quarter of 2011 from 7.0 billion the previous quarter.

Expenditure on acquisitions in the UK by UK companies fell to 1.2bn in the

first quarter of 2011 from 6.3 billion in quarter four of 2010.

Melin (2009) reported that the then worth of UK Fashion industry was 44.5b.

The 1960s scenario was that on an average every house in Britain spent 10 per cent of

their total spend on fashion-ware such as shoes, sandals and clothes. However, in

current scenario where there are lots of promotional offers in fashion-ware, the

household expenditure on fashion goods is only six per cent. Encouragingly for the

consumer, between 2001 and 2005, the average clothing and footwear prices fell 14.4%

whilst the cost of living has risen by 12.6%.

UK Fashion brands are kind to their customers by offering them a wide range of

discounts and sales offers all through the year and more in festive seasons. Within the

scenario of discounting prices, there exists tough competition within the UK fashion

industry. For example a top brand like Marks & Spencer faces very high competition

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from the discounting practices of its juniors like Primark and TK Maxx. Regarding the

fashion trend and preferences of young fashion lovers, few of the fashion magazines

observed that young fashion lovers are going for posh overseas brands like Prada

(Italian brand), Hugo boss (German), Chloe (French), Donna Karan (US) and Burberry

(UK). Moreover, the increasing population of cheaper imported fashion brands has had

a considerable damage on UK fashion industry.

Therefore, UKs fashion giants have shifted to manufacture special fashion wear

with exquisite look and costly clothing products aimed at alluring wealthy consumers

abroad. Moreover, the trend of integrating retailers with the manufacturers is also

underway in UK fashion world.

In the reports of Topshop, Dorothy Perkins and BHS, the topmost fashion

retailer in UK is Next followed by Marks & Spencer and Arcadia in the third position.

The above fashion giants are also manufacturers who do not have separate retailers for

their goods. However, brands such as Nike, Adidas and Reebok are not the retailers of

their own products, they have external retailers.

From the literature, it can be inferred that retailing units continue to dominate

UK fashion industry with their discounting and sales promotional practices, however,

there are retailers who sell their brands with minimal discounting there is a continuous

tug of war between these and the discounters. The fashion mantra of the full price

retailers is that they sell updated fashion trends and tend to attract youth even though

they are costly; youth group of consumers are attracted to couture-house model designs

and the kind of fast fashion goods which keep changing trends every season. Various

market experts reported that in 2010 there was 23 per cent and 15.6 per cent increase in

fashion designs of mens and boys respectively. Various other sources reported that

there was increase in womens, girls as well as infants clothing goods.

The above comprehensive discussions have given us an in-depth understanding

of the positives and negatives within the mergers and acquisitions activities that have

taken place in the past and are still underway in the international scenario. We have also

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happening that is underway in most of todays economies. A firm that is internationalising its business operations is most likely to obtain immense experience in business.

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1.11Conceptual Model

Within the literature of organizational culture the researcher has identified that

there exist innumerable conceptual frameworks that have been proposed to underpin

organisational culture, for example the works and models of various authors such as

Trompenaars and Hapden-Turner s model (1997), Hofstede s model (1991), Goffee and

Jones model (1998), Deal and Kennedy s model (1982) stand out. The researcher after

examining the above models, tick marked Quinn and Rohrbaughes model (1983) on

organisational culture as the suitable one which is close to the current study which

investigates on why organisations need to gain values through the organisationalculture.

Erica and Alberto (2006) argue that the model suggested by Quinn and

Rohrbaughe has got immense practical utility as it interprets various organisational

cultures and their impact on the performance of personnel. The above scholars

considered studying on the practical application of Organizational Culture Assessment

Instrument proposed by Cameron and Quinn more because it acts as an assessinginstrument that is founded on Competing Value Framework. The above stated model is

quite useful also because it directly evaluates the case study institution and case study

being the chosen research strategy it becomes imperative (figure-00).

Figure 1: Organisational culture and Competing value frameworks

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Source: (Cameron and Quinn, 2006)

In furtherance, authors Erica and Alberto (2006) have underlined the four kindsof organisational cultures, i.e. clan, adhocracy, market and hierarchy within the model

proposed by Quinn and Rohrbaughe. The authors have stated that the classification in

the above stated model was based on two critical areas, they being control/flexibility

and internal/external focus. The stated areas have their own characteristic details, styles

of leadership, personnel management and type of HR practices. The above mentioned

critical areas were pinned down after exploring into various organisational frameworks.

It is interesting to look into how the above mentioned scholars were able to

devise their widely accepted and practised models. The story goes as this; it was

Campbell along with his team of colleagues who identified 39 indicators from within

those that are treated as possible drivers of organisational performance. Further work

was carried out by Quinn and Rohrbaughe who have examined the exclusive list of 39

performance indicators proposed by Campbell and team. The authors have carefully

conducted as statistical analysis on the indicators which led to discovery of two major dimensions; it was indeed a much awaited breakthrough. As explained in the results put

forward by Quinn and Rohrbaughe, the first dimension clearly distinguished various

performance indicators such as flexibility, discretion and dynamism from stability,

order and control. If one can observe here, the difference between flexibility, discretion

and dynamism, and stability, order and control is so clear, these sets of variables stand

on either sides of a coin in the current business scenario. While the first three variables

represent a fast changing environment characterised by adaptability and growth within

an organisation, the other three go with the more mechanistic and conservative kind of

organisational culture.

Now, as illustrated by Quinn and Rohrbaughe in their conceptual model, the

second dimension differentiates performance indicators of internal orientation and

integration form those of external orientation, competitive and rivalry attitudes. An

observation to be underlined here is that the concept of internal orientation and

harmony goes well with some of the organisations while others prefer to grow via the

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channels of competition and external orientation. The authors illuminated their readers

by their conceptual models consisting of the two dimensions within it which in turn

gave rise to four quadrants of performance criteria. The four quadrants can be briefed,

within the two classified dimensions, as flexibility Vs control and internal orientation

Vs External orientation.

Lastly the four identified kinds of cultural practices emerged out on close

examination of the two dimensions and their four sub-dimensions. Cameron and Quinn,

(2006) explained that the four kinds of cultural practices have different features such as

leadership values, strategic relationships and the like. In the context of the clan culture,

people are more collaborative and there is the spirit of teamwork, leaders build teams

and there are mentors to train and motivate employees, there is greater emphasis on

human resources development. In case of the market culture, the atmosphere is

different; there is the spirit of competition everywhere, both in the internal and external

environments of the organisation, brow rising aspect is that even the leaders are

competitors, the organisation of this kind emphasises more on results than the personal

growth aspects of its employees. On the other hand, the adhocracy culture is

characterised by energetic environment where the leaders are innovators, they have a

vision for the organisation, and they encourage creativity and innovation. However, the

hierarchy atmosphere is a kind of serious one where emphasis is on control,

coordination, organised rules and on systematic and consistent developments .

As discussed above the research furthers to investigate how the stated quadrants

fit into the case study organisation and test the discussed value framework within the

context of the research.

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Chapter Three

Introduction to Research MethodologyManagement studies and related research, as observed by Easterby Smith et al

(2002), are in many ways unique in their approach. The authors observed that these

studies in fact have diversified dimensions to be explored via research. As such, most of

academicians agree that these study dimensions cannot be channelized easily. In the

present chapter, the researcher tried put forward and explain each of the research

approaches chosen by him as well as the justifications for choosing them. As such the

chosen methodology and its components are detailed and explained in this chapter andin the justification part the relevance and utility of chosen methods, approaches and

tools are presented keeping in mind the core aims of the study. Further the researcher

presented justifications as to why he did not consider applying certain methods and

approaches. Author White (2005) observed that a research study institutes various

updated methods and tools proposed by academicians over time. Therefore, keeping all

those developments in mind, the researcher also mentioned various literary evidences

on the chosen research methods and approaches.

1.12Research Design

After going through various research methodologies detailed in past literature,

the researcher felt that Saunderss (2007) research onion research design was more

convenient to conduct the current study and it was more self-administrative in nature.

The above stated model detailed all the available methods and approaches by presenting

them in its various layers analogous with an onion. The above mentioned model is

diagrammatically presented in the below figure, (figure-2).

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Figure 2: Saunders Research Onion

Source: Saunders et al., (2007)

Stated below (table-1) are the methods identified and chosen by the researcher

with the ideas gained from the research onion design.

Table 1: List of methods-Paradigms studies-Paradigm adopted

Research Method Paradigms Studied Paradigm Adopted

Philosophy Positivism & Interprevitism Interprevitism

Approach

Qualitative-Quantitative; Qualitative

Deductive-Inductive; Deductive

Explanatory-Exploratory-Descriptive Explanatory

Strategy Survey-Action Research-Case Study Case Study

Data Primary & Secondary Primary & Secondary

Sampling Methods Probability & Non-probability Non-probability

Sampling Paradigms Judgmental & Non-Judgmental Non-Judgmental

Sampling Tool Quota-Snowball-Judgmental Judgmental

1.13Research Philosophy

Hughes (1994) emphasised that understanding research philosophies and relatedissues is a fundamental necessity for every researcher. Research philosophy chosen by

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the researcher is the foundation on which the whole of the research and its various

dimensions are built. Easterby- Smith et al (2002), briefed the utility of research

philosophy in the form of three advantages, they are: it guides the researcher while

choosing suitable approaches and methods as well as tools for the conduct of the study;

it hints the researcher as to rule out inappropriate and inadequate methods and tools and

points to various limitations of chosen approaches; and lastly it gives scope for creative

thinking and brings out the innovative potential of the researcher while deploying

various research methods. Broadly, there are two major research philosophies identified

by academicians, while the first one is Positivism, the second one is Interprevitism,

both these are explained in the following discussion.

1.13.1 Positivism & Interprevitism

Author Levin (1988) posited that in positivist research approach it is assumed

that reality is unchangeable and that it can be observed from objective reference point.

The author explained that a positivist studies reality without interfering in it. Further,

other academicians supported the observation that replication of results over a time

period should be possible in positivism. On the other hand, in Interprevitism, the

researcher believes the realistic scenario of the observed phenomenon is obtained only

by intervening in reality and making interpretations in a subjective manner.

Interprevitists study the chosen phenomena in their natural backdrop.

1.13.2 Justification for Interprevitism

The fundamental principle of Interprevitism philosophy requires studying and

interpreting on the phenomenon that is being investigated into, i.e. growth of the

organisation internationally through acquisitions and mergers and also to investigate the

impact of organisational values and culture in business internationalisation. Carrying

forward in the present dissertation by focusing on fashion industry in UK , the

researcher has chosen adopt the Interprevitism research philosophy, as it is not an

inferior approach to positivism, and also that it makes use of subjectivity while

interpreting observed phenomenon.

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1.14Research Approach

The details of various research approaches as seen from Saunders research

onion design are presented in the below table.

Table 2: Different Research Approaches

1 Qualitative & Quantitative

3 Deductive and Inductive

5 Explanatory, Exploratory & Descriptive

Based on the research onion as proposed by Saunders et al., (2007)

1.14.1 Qualitative & Quantitative

In a qualitative research approach, the analyst describes and interprets that

which is being observed setting the reference point as the phenomenon and not the

analyst himself. Authors, Rossman & Marshall (1999), defined qualitative research

approach as the study approach which inquires into why things are observed the way

they are observed while occurring in their social surroundings. However, quantitative

approach is rather plain and does not involve complex interpretations, etc. Quantitative

approach originated from within the scientific studies involving physical, biological and

geological phenomena. This kind of approach is more statistical in nature and is often

used to validate results. In fact, quantitative approach is used for ascertaining

measurable phenomena.

1.14.1.1 Justification for Qualitative

Social science research, which got to do with sociological, psychological and

anthropological phenomena, requires evaluation and interpretation of behavioural

attributes of humans. Therefore, as opined by Morgan (1983), social science research

cannot be done by measurable methods and subsequently quantitative analysis fails

here. As such, the current study focuses on investigating into organisational growth

internationally i.e. by merging and acquisitions with other organisations which are

related to that particular sector and also attempts to know the impact of organisation

values and cultures on the internationalisation. Therefore, as the nature of current study

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needs more exploration and as it does not ask for measurements and calculations of the

quantitative approach, the researcher chose to adopt qualitative approach. The

researchers choice was also based on Hoepfls (1997) viewpoint according to which

qualitative approach involves in-depth understanding and exploration of the

phenomenon under focus.

1.14.2 Deductive and Inductive

Author Fisher (2007) defined both the processes of deductive and inductive.

According to the author, in a deductive approach, an analyst makes inferences using

scientific logic and understanding, on the other hand, the analyst makes use of his

experience in past experimentation to arrive at inferences within data findings of the

study.

1.14.2.1 Justification for Inductive

A deductive approach is mostly used in researches in context of scientific

studies as also opined by Saunders et al (2007), who also stated that statistical findings

and quantitative data are utilised in this kind of approach. However, as the current study

has nothing to do either with science or with quantitative data which is used mostly for validation purpose, the researcher has chosen to apply qualitative approach to obtain

useful results in the context of the research being done but also allows to develop a

better understanding of research context. The qualitative approach that is being

employed is flexible and allows the researcher to make useful interpretations from the

opinions and expressions obtained from the representatives of case study institutions.

1.14.3 Exploratory-Explanatory-Descriptive approaches

An exploratory research approach is basically a method in which the subject of

examination is described in-depth as observed by Babbie (1989). The author further

explained that within an explanatory approach the question and reasoning around

why is focussed through discussions based on qualitative analysis. On the other hand,

a descriptive approach makes use of quantitative as well as qualitative research

approaches as opined by Glass and Hopkins (1984).

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1.14.3.1 Justification for Explanatory:

The current study that investigates into the cultural aspect of mergers and

acquisitions in the context of globalisation of businesses, deals with researching around

the why concerns within the study framework and its various dimensions, therefore it

becomes imperative to adopt explanatory research approach. The study majorly

discusses on impact of the organisational culture and values in international business

while addressing mergers and acquisitions.

Author, Saunders et al (2007) observed that in an e

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