Strategies for Small Domestic Firms in Decline Industries

Abstract

DR.BARBARA PARKER IS AN ASSISTANT professor of management and international business at Florida Atlantic University, U.S.A. Her interest in organisational responses to decline led her to the research described in this paper on how smalloperate when domestic decline occurs because of increased international competition. The main purpose of the work is to apply a general management framework of decline to small firms. Strategies of efficiency, entrepreneurship and expediency were measured for small domestic textile firms in two industrialised countries: Britain and the United States. The paper also examines relationships between strategies and job growth for firms studied. The results indicate that single, unified strategies of efficieincy or entrepreneurship exist in this industry but that firms also pursue expedient. i.e. mixed, strategies. The latter do not show meaningful numerical relationships with the outcome measure exainined, suggesting that single, unified strategies are more useful than expedient or mixed strategies for small firms in decline indtustries. This suggests that ageneral management model of decline can be applied to small firms; the implications for management are discussed.