Identity and the Baby Bells: Applying structuration theory to strategic management

Current theories in strategic management provide limited explanations for firm differences and in general bypass the question, 'Why this particular strategy?'. This dissertation draws upon Structuration Theory and research on organizational identity to improve understanding of firm differences and strategic transformation. It argues that Structuration Theory answers questions about how strategic differences evolve and organizational identity explains why organizations take the directions they take.; The 1984 divestiture of the Bell System provides a natural experiment in the business world to investigate research questions about firm differences. One of the world largest corporations was broken apart into seven autonomous units to provide local telephone service. Despite initial similarities in internal and external environments, ten years later the Baby Bells look and act very different from each other. To explore basic research question about these difference, a multiple case, multiple level research design is used. Three organizations are investigated: U S WEST, Pacific Telesis Group, and Ameritech. One organization, U S WEST, is investigated in detail and at multiple levels.; Results of the investigation show that managers at the organizations show a conviction in the correctness of their organization's strategy and the fallibility of the paths of the other Baby Bells beyond what would be expected. Recognizing that U S WEST identifies itself as a multimedia company and Pacific Telesis and Ameritech identify themselves as telecommunication companies, contributes to our understanding of strategic differences. Some of the variance in perceptions of the identity was explained by the result that identity beliefs depend, in part, on job level and division employed in the company.; Other contributions of this dissertation include the introduction of Structuration Theory, a robust sociological theory, to the field of strategic management. In addition, organizational identity is explored to a new depth of understanding by clarifying the difference in organizational identity and organizational culture and by offering a new definition of organizational identity. A procedure for measuring senior managers shared sense of their organization and how to evaluate the extent that this sense is shared among other employees is presented. This dissertation has implications for managers as well as scholars.