Corporate entrepreneurship has different strategies as referred to by researchers. An entrepreneurial orientation is one of these strategies. In the overall corporate entrepreneurial process, entrepreneurial orientation is referred to as entrepreneurial intensity. Corporate entrepreneurship is a process where organisations think differently to overcome barriers to improve the performance of the organisation. Entrepreneurial orientation is a process of decision making to develop new innovative products, services or processes to intensify the organisation’s performance. The South African banking system is supported with a well-managed regulated framework and is favourable in the global environment. South Africa is the financial gateway to the rest of Africa and the environment is highly competitive. During the last twenty years the banking industry went through exciting changes and turmoil when refering to the financial of 2008 crisis. Retail banks need to think differently and small competitors are more prominent than ever before. The lower end of the market created fierce competition between the retail banks in South Africa. The reason for this study is to focus on entrepreneurial orientations from a customer’s perspective. Customer perspective is critical for the survival of an organisation and banks are no different. Based on the literature, entrepreneurial orientation is the level of intensity of corporate entrepreneurship visible in the organisation. The results obtained in the empirical study enabled recommendations that can provide retail banks with useful information from a customer’s perspective that can assist retail banks in general. Recommendations found in the study include; retail banks need to reinvest in their own systems to mine useful information to assist customers, be more open to autonomy approaches and redesign job descriptions, re-look calculated risk areas that will have no influence on credit processes, regulate innovations better and involve the customer and be more unique to create a better customer experience. / MBA (Master of Business Administration), North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2015

[pt] A atuação em redes estratégicas é fator crítico para o sucesso das empresas frente à complexidade dos empreendimentos contemporâneos. Globalmente, os meios de pagamento estão em franca revolução. Contrariando expectativas, o papel-moeda convive com o dinheiro eletrônico ao alvorecer do terceiro milênio. Esta realidade, presente no mercado doméstico e internacional, demanda dinamismo na gestão da guarda, do processamento e da distribuição de valores. O ambiente competitivo em que os bancos de varejo estão inseridos recomenda gerenciamento eficaz de um sistema logístico em um novo ambiente de maiores exigências por automação, flexibilidade e segurança. A convergência dessas demandas associada à consciência de que a sobrevivência dos empreendimentos depende da capacidade de interações associativas sugerem a importância da integração em redes de alianças estratégicas. O presente trabalho tem como objetivo contribuir às investigações sobre a gestão das empresas em redes de relacionamento, focando na questão de suas implicações sobre sua conduta e seu desempenho. Tem como caso de estudo as Unidades Regionais de Tesouraria do Banco do Brasil, buscando responder a seguinte pergunta: quais as percepções dos gestores das Unidades Regionais de Tesouraria do Banco do Brasil a respeito dos impactos das diversas redes e alianças estabelecidas pelo Banco? Com auxílio de um novo ferramental para realizar análises estratégicas na perspectiva relacional - Modelo Macedo-Soares Strategic Network Analysis (2002) - este trabalho busca analisar as implicações estratégicas da associação em Redes e Alianças sobre os negócios e estratégias do Banco do Brasil, relativos à gestão da guarda, processamento e distribuição de valores. / [en] The performance in strategic networks is a critical factor for the company success, in the face of the current complex environment. Globally, the payment systems are in broad revolution. Against expectations, currency (bills and coins) lives together with the electronic money in the dawn of the third millennium. This reality, true in the domestic and international market, demands dynamism of the keeping, processing and distribution of values. The competitive environment in which retail banks are inserted recommends effective administration of a logistics system in a new context of larger demands for automation, flexibility and security. The convergence of those demands as well as the awareness that the survival of the enterprise depends on the capacity of collaborative interactions suggest the importance of firm integration in strategic networks. The objective of this thesis is to contribute to research in strategic management of firms embedded in organizational networks, highlighting the latter´s implications for firm conduct and performance. It is focused on the Banco do Brasil´s Regional Units of Treasury, in an attempt to answer the following question: what is management´s perception, regarding the strategic of Banco do Brasil´s established networks or alliances? By way of a new framework to help carry out strategic analyses from a relational perspective - Macedo- Soares` Model/ Strategic Network Analysis (2002) - this study aims at analyzing the strategic implications of those Units´ alliances and networks, relative to the keeping, processing and distribution of values.