Heike Nolte

Hochschule Emden/Leer · Business Studies

This case provides background material about the takeover attempt of one of the world’s largest automobile manufacturers, Volkswagen, by the small sports car manufacturer, Porsche. It covers the period from spring 2005 through August 2009. This drama ends in a complete reversal, the acquisition of Porsche by Volkswagen. The case includes such topic...

Today we have a trove of research about knowledge-based firms that derive a competitive advantage from the knowledge and problem-solving competences of their personnel. The assumption is that personnel-based assets become more important in conjunction with the firm's differentiation strategy. In order to profit from these assets, firms need to incr...

This article presents an interview technique adjusted for use within a firm's environment. The Structure Laying Technique (Flick, 2009) is a powerful form of a problem-centered interview, most appropriate for revealing the implicit theories held by interviewees. The issue is that this method requires long interview sessions and – in its pure form –...

In September 2009 General Motors' board of directors announces it would sell the majority of its European subsidiary Opel to a group led by Magna International Inc. But two months later it decides to keep Opel, upsetting German officials and workers and harming its reputation in Germany. Why did GM’s board steer such a vacillating obscure course? W...

This article with the title "Human resource management of the Best-Fit and its implications" discusses the contingency and configurational schools in strategic human resource management, summarized as the "Best-Fit Approach". It concludes that the Best-Fit approach helps the practitioner to see the idiosyncrasy of the firm and prevents her from ada...

High Performance Work Systems are generally considered to have a positive impact on workers' well-being. But is this actually the case? This article will discuss this question from the point of view of "End of Fun", a controversial and widely-discussed book by Judith Mair (2003), claiming that traditional work systems provide a more beneficial work...

High Performance Work Systems are generally considered to have a positive impact on workers’ well-being. But is this actually the case? This classroom-material will discuss this question from the point of view of “End of Fun”, a controversial and widely-discussed book by Judith Mair (2003), claiming that traditional work systems provide a more bene...

Strategic networks originate from the access to additional resources without purchasing them. But don’t these kinds of cooperation imply risks for the involved firms, esp. for those to whose resources cooperating firms have access? This article aims to show the limitations of integration of resources into a strategic network for competition reasons...

This article compares instruments which IT-firms use to integrate their business consultants - esp. the way monitoring and coordination of activities works. It is based empirically on interviews with consultants and managers of consulting units of a U.S. American firm in Germany, the Swiss subsidiary of a German IT-firm and business units of this f...

This article presents an organizational model of a firm's viability based on the employees' subjective theories. The organizational model is derived from Stafford Beer's model of a viable system (see Beer, 1979, 1981). In order to find empirical evidence for it, it is first necessary to operationalize Beer's System 1 through System 5--achieved in t...