Leadership styles have been shown to have an impact on the success or failure of projects in organizations. Effective leadership is therefore required by organizations to ensure the successful delivery of projects. The study aimed at investigating the leadership styles utilized by women project managers in the Eskom Enterprise Division and possible barriers that prevent them from reaching top positions. The study utilized leadership theories as the theoretical framework and used the qualitative research approach. In-depth, semi-structured interviews were conducted with 15 female project managers in Eskom Enterprise Division and thematic analysis was used to analyze the data. Certain leadership styles and characteristics were identified as being critical for successful project managers. The characteristics that these women project managers exhibit described qualities of transformational, democratic and people oriented leadership styles. The women project managers seem to be successful and there were a number of factors that contributed to their success. The female project managers did not believe that gender should determine their leadership style, but they believed that working as a project manager required certain leadership skills and competencies to meet the project’s objectives and the leadership style was not influenced by gender. Some of the barriers identified were: gender stereotyping, lack of qualifications, fear of not succeeding, family responsibilities and lack of networking skills and time. Most of the women believe that breaking some of the barriers requires that they should work twice as hard as their male counterparts, and that they should prove wrong the stereotype that men are better project managers. Furthermore, the findings show that Eskom has few women occupying top management positions. Eskom is still a male dominated environment even though initiatives for gender transformation exist. / Thesis (M.Com.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Westville, 2011.

This dissertation explores the applicability of the Critical System Thinking (CST) methodology known as Total Systems Intervention (TSI) version one to the complex problems related to the practice of the Performance Management System at Telkom SA. As a point of departure, this research provides a historical analysis of a non-systemic management approach - Business Process Reengineering (BPR) and several uni-demensional hard and soft systems approaches and their contributions to the emergence and development of CST. It is argued that, given the messy and ill-structured problems that emerge as a result of the implementation of Performance Management Systems (PMS) at Telkom, a pluralist problem solving methodology such as TSI is the appropriate methodology applicable to the problem under concern. / Thesis (M.Com.)-University of Natal, Durban, 2000.

This paper provides an overview on the evolutionary theory of the firm. The specific feature of the evolutionary approach is that it explains the adaptive behaviors of firms through the tension between innovation and selection. It is suggested that the evolutionary theory can provide a useful basis for a theory of the firm which is concerned with change over time and development. (author's abstract) / Series: Working Papers Series "Growth and Employment in Europe: Sustainability and Competitiveness"

BACKGROUND Exploring, on the one hand, the literature stream of authenticity and brand authenticity, and on the other hand, that of firm growth, to further connect the two phenomena. AIM Researching whether firms can achieve both above-average industry growth and brandauthenticity METHODOLOGY The study entails 21 firms evolving in three industries (beer, cosmetic and food-processing). Brand authenticity is measured through a consumer survey, while growth is measured through a comparison of financial numbers in an official database (Amadeus). FINDINGS Companies can achieve both above-average industry growth rate and brand authenticity

This study sheds light on the firm-lifecycle and the impact of leadership and how itdevelops negatively when the entrepreneurial firm becomes administrative andmanagerial. The ambivalent fact is that the firm, when growing in size, need to becomemore managerial, though without undermining the previously entrepreneurial mind-setthat pervade the organization. The term corporate entrepreneurship has emerged andcomprises that the firm can continue to be entrepreneurial in the managerial stage. Thatis to resume the firm’s work to keep innovative. The article seeks to find out how theleadership can be adapted for the firm to stay innovative through the managerial stage.

Google Inc. struggles arduously on the digital battlefield in China’s Internet search engine market. In China, Baidu.com has been described as China’s Google for years and challenged Google’s expansion. This study provides an overview of the Internet service development in China, an illustration of the search engines’ profitability models, and an evaluation of Guge (Google China) and Baidu’s service designs. Overall, the research shows an attempt to understand the possible advantages and disadvantages when a multinational Internet service company enters China. Two notions emerge. First, standardization and adaptation may need to be nicely balanced for the subsidiary company in order to profit in China’s Internet market. Second, Google’s operation in China, Guge, stands strong on the service design end, especially in the area of “ease of use,” “informativeness,” and “fulfillment/reliability.” However, Guge’s major rival, Baidu, shows its advantage on a wider selection of online services. Therefore, in the long run, which company will win at the finishing line is still too early to tell / Google in China -- Google, Baidu and Guge -- Search engine's revenue model in China. / Department of Telecommunications

Essay 1: I examine sales of private firms to better understand the effect of relaxing financial constraints on firm value. My empirical tests exploit an exogenous shock to financial constraints caused by interstate bank branching deregulation. On a sample of 557 sales of private firms to public acquirers, I find that relaxed financial constraints lead to a statistically significant increase of 7.3% in valuation multiples of private targets. I also find a significant increase in private target valuation multiples benchmarked to public target valuation multiples. These effects are more pronounced for firms in the sample with below median annual sales. Acquirer returns are negatively impacted when financial constraints on private targets are relaxed. The evidence supports the prediction that relaxing financial constraints allows private targets to substitute bank credit for some of the financing benefits provided by acquirers and bargain for a higher valuation.

This paper investigates the academic conclusions on how CEO gender and salary affect firm value, while at the same time adding data on how CEO age affects firm value. Via an event study of S&P 500 CEO changes from 2000 to 2006 I confirm the current academic findings and discover that CEOs promoted during their 40s negatively influence firm value, while CEOs in older age brackets show a positive abnormal return on firm value. With this validation and addition to the existing data, firms and investors can more effectively assess proper candidates for the position of CEO and allocate resources accordingly.

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This study investigates small firm internationalisation from an individual owner-manager’s perspective. Despite advancing our understanding of small firm internationalisation, process-based theories including the Uppsala, innovation-related and networks explanations, and more recently entrepreneurial-based theories remain vague in relation to what characterises and constitutes the internationalisation practices of small owner-managed firms. Process theories overlook the owner-manager and their practices, while entrepreneurial explanations focus on individual characteristics to the exclusion of their internationalisation practices. Furthermore, existing explanations are constrained by rationalistic assumptions prevalent in small firm internationalisation research which de-emphasise comprehensiveness, connectedness and complexity in favour of de-contextualised parsimonious causal relationships, thereby limiting investigations into how owner-managers understand and practice firm internationalisation. As a way forward, an alternative interpretive lens is adopted using a phenomenographic approach to explore how owner-managers understand and practise firm internationalisation. Consequently, the owner-manager’s lived experiences of firm internationalisation provide the point of departure for this study. In-depth interviews with owner-managers of small internationalising wineries, together with observations, field notes, documentation and secondary data formed the basis of my empirical material which was analysed in two-stages. The material was initially analysed in terms of what constituted firm internationalisation practice, and was subsequently examined to explore how owner-managers understand firm internationalisation. A small firm internationalisation activity cycle comprising: assessing and knowing markets, prospecting and attracting agent interest, assessing agent compatibility, supporting and sustaining agent relationships and termination or failure of agent relationships emerged as what constituted their internationalisation practice. Subsequent analysis revealed how owner-managers understood firm internationalisation by identifying four qualitatively different understandings of firm internationalisation practices: seeking market knowledge, competing on price, portraying distinctiveness and storytelling. The internationalisation activity cycle and the understandings of firm internationalisation were later connected to form an understanding-based theory of small firm internationalisation. This study contributes to small firm internationalisation theory in two ways: first, the articulation of an on-going and inter-connected internationalisation activity cycle of the small firm extends existing theories by providing a more complete and accurate explanation of how owner-managers of small firms conduct their internationalisation practices. It makes visible the activities, processes and relationships obscured by existing theories. The internationalisation activity cycle, through the inter-relatedness of each of the activities concurrently, combines market knowledge processes with processes of attracting, building and replacing network relationships with domestic and foreign-based actors. Second, revealing different understandings of internationalisation practices of small owner-managed firms, and associating these understandings of internationalisation with their internationalisation activity cycle not only extends existing theories but offers a new explanation of small firm internationalisation. An understanding-based theory of small firm internationalisation advocates that variations in conduct and activities undertaken by owner-managers are determined by their different understandings of firm internationalisation. As a result, owner-managers attach different meanings to the activities within the internationalisation activity cycle as they conduct their internationalisation practices. Consequently, the variability and idiosyncratic nature of small firm internationalisation is captured as one of multiplicity, rather than demanding universal explanation proposed by existing theories. Keywords: small firm, internationalisation, understanding-based theory, internationalisation activity cycle, phenomenography Australian and New Zealand Standard Research Classifications (ANZSRC): 150304 entrepreneurship 10%, 150308 international business 70%, 150314 small business management 20%