Haier Company Essay Example

Haier Company Paper The conflict may occur in teams when JVC tries to integrate the staff from partners. There are many reasons for it. Some of the more important ones relate to limited resources, communication problems, differences in interests and goals, different perceptions and attitudes, and lack of clarity about responsibilities (Sanchez, et al. , 2000). A case about Haier Company will help to illustrate it. Haier, Chinese appliance maker, has the first Chinese major manufacturing plant in the U. S. It is slowly but clearly importing its corporate philosophy and culture to its Camden, South Carolina, plant. The upper management and the technical group is Chinese and the operating employees are American. The American employees at plant are majority at the plant. The Hair Chinese group is using the 6-S concept, which is an adaptation of Japanese quality control concept (Konopaske and Ivancevich, 2004). The U. S. employees prefer to stick photos on the wall. This comes into conflict with one S of the 6-S concept, seisoh (keep the workplace clean). Haier pays more attention to quality, this behaviour is not permit. With communication, they all agree that the photos can be showed out when not at work. Another conflict in the team is about the punishment. The punishment is let the employee with the worst performance stand on the big footprint to criticize himself loudly. In Americans view, it infringes their rights. In this condition, Haier changes the punishment to encouragement. They let the best employee stand on the big footprint and speak out they are the best. The conflicts in the case are caused by different cultural habits, and attitudes. The case presents how Haier solve the conflict and blended its corporate style to one of its oversees plants. We can see from the case, communication is quite important in the team. With communication, we can understand each other better, and find out the reason of conflict. In this way, we can build a better inter-personal relationship, and enhance trust, too. And building trust between the partners through encouraging personal relationships between the staff, who have to work together for the JVC to succeed: senior managers, functional managers, engineers, and technical staff is to establishing the right one (Yoshino and Rangan, 1995), the one coherent team. We will write a custom essay sample on Haier Company specifically for you for only $16.38 $13.9/page Order now We will write a custom essay sample on Haier Company specifically for you FOR ONLY $16.38 $13.9/page Hire Writer We will write a custom essay sample on Haier Company specifically for you FOR ONLY $16.38 $13.9/page Hire Writer Although JVC has independent equity, it cant live without the parent company. The intervention of parent company to JVC is the control. Generally, there are two forms of control: direct control and indirect control (Johnson, J. L. , et al 2001). Direct parent control is similar to dominant management. The parents attempt to influence activities or decisions in a way consistent with its own interests and expectations. Indirect control is based on the IJVs need for consultation with the parent firm, similar to shared management (Johnson, J. L. , et al 2001). The control bases on the parents equity position. The fifty-fifty ownership is a common form. These JVCs are usually shared management. When one partner holds a majority shares, the JVC seems to apply dominant management or split management. Bleeke and Ernst (2002) indicate the fifty-fifty equity JVCs are not as successful as the split ownership JVCs in which one partner has majority shares. 50-50 ownership can build trust through the mutual success, but it indeed has many problems. The case about control in the Dowty-Sema JV (Faulkner 1995) shows the problem clearly. Dowty-Sema was a JV set up by the two eponymous companies with 50:50 equity in 1982 to provide command and control systems for the British navy. Dowty provided the hardware and Sema provided the software. The venture company was largely a shop window for tendering, in that the 100-odd staff were all assigned to the payrolls of one parent or the other, dependent on their function. Software engineers were assigned to Sema and hardware engineers to Dowty. Control was exercised in the following way. A project was divided up between the two companies and 90 percent of it was carried out in the parent companies, leaving only 10 percent, principally project management, for the venture company to do. Dowty controlled contract negotiation and administration and Sema controlled finance. Each parent appointed its own project teams, and an element of competition and tension developed between them. The board membership was 50% from each partner. Difficult decisions led to very lengthy meetings by a committee of the board. The venture grew to i 50 million sales but unclear control meant that deadlines were missed and the venture made no profit. From the case, we can see the inefficient management of 50-50 equity JVC. But it doesnt means 50-50 equity JVC always perform worse than other form management. It depends on the relationship with partners and good communication between JVC and parents companies. And no matter what kind of control of parents companies, the constant presence of a parent interferes with the development of organisational cohesiveness within theJVC. The activity of organisational learning is the way for the company to gain knowledge for its partner. These activities affect the prospect of JVC. The communication with parent companies to transfer technology from them to JVC is one of the key success factors. The collaborative attitude allows for JVC learning by both partners and is likely to be more productive over the long run. There are three levels of organisational learning: technical, systemic, and strategic (Child, J. , et al. 2005). Collaboration with partner organisations offers a potential to learn at all three levels. It can provide access to techniques, facilitate the transfer of new systems, and enhance a firms ability to undertake new strategic initiatives (Child, J. , et al. 2005). The case about GM-Suzuki joint venture can be used to explain the learning and skills transfer to JVC. CAMI Automotive, Inc. , was set up to manufacture low-end cars for the U. S. market. The plant, run by Suzuki management, produces the Geo Metro/Suzuki Swift, the smallest, highest gas-mileage GM car sold in North America, as well as the Geo Tracker/Suzuki Sidekick spot utility vehicle. Through CAMI, Suzuki has obtained access to GMs dealer network and an expanded market for parts and components. GM avoided the cost of developing low-end cars and gained models it needed to help revitalize the lower end of the Chevrolet product line and to improve GMs average fuel economy rating. And once the CAMI factory reaches full capacity, GM took it as a test bed for to learn Japanese management of work teams, flexible assembly lines, and quality control (Bleeke and Ernst, 2002). The case indicates if the partners both bring specific strengths, both will benefit. JVC maintain relations with parent company to improve their performance. In the CAMI case, JVC run smoothly and reach the full capacity. From the parent organisations view, JVC is a great place to learn from partners. When we discuss learning and skills transfer, the intellectual property rights (IPR) is an important issue in an ongoing JVC. Legal protections go only so far. In addition to IPR protection of their own, the new technology and intelligence in JVC should be identified the ownership. Three structural tactics can protect IPR successfully (Bleeke and Ernst, 2002). First is to separate sensitive technologies from JVC. For instance, GE modularized the production of high value-added engine-core components to protect its know-how from Snecma. Second, some companies centralise contact points between the JVC and the parents. It is easier in highly centralised companies like Japanese businesses, than in more decentralised firms, like Western ones. Third, they combine complementary strengths and can not succee without the other. Toshiba and Motorola would not keep their strategic position if either terminated the alliance, because the two companies have such a high level of interdependence in the form of shared factories, distribution, and complementary specialised skills (Bleeke and Ernst, 2002). JVC success is often an ambiguous notion (Dussauge and Garrette, 1999): should attention focus on the success of the JVC itself-i. e. , its survival, duration, growth, and profits-or should it focus on the positive or negative consequences of the alliance for each of the parent companies? It is a dilemma, parent-local management conflict. Johnson, J. L. , et al. (2001) indicates there exits the logic that parental control of the IJV keeps IJV management loyal to the parent and focused on the parents needs. In such cases, although partner-partner conflict may result, control should reduce any. On the other hand, the characteristics of JVC can create an independence. JVC is not only separate legal entity, it is also a new established organisation, staffed by entrepreneurial managers, and quickly develops an entrepreneurial culture. In such cases, a prevailing climate of we versus them may lead to increased parent-local management conflict when parents intervene in IJV operations. There is a case about a JVC. The aim of foreign partner is to develop its business in the targeted country and the goal of the local partner is to derive adequate profits from its investment. The profitability of the JVC is strongly affected by decisions made by the parent companies. When the strategic direction of parent companies has changed, it affects the performance of JVC significantly. A typical example of this is when a multinational parent decides to limit the exports of the JVC to a neighboring country because that local market can be more profitably supplied via a wholly owned subsidiary confronted with excess capacity. The consequence of such a decision is decreased sales and profits for the JVC (Dussauge and Garrette, 1999). But in another way, they may offer opportunities for JVC to propose new activities which will contribute to its long-term development. We can see the importance to maintain relations with the parent companies from the case obviously. The performances and strategy direction of parent companies even determine the JVC survive or not.