Challenges in the Era of Globalization - iaabd

Challenges in the Era of Globalization
Edited by Emmanuel Obuah
Six main concepts were derived from the data as a result of the open and axial coding, and ‘pieced’
together during the selective coding. Those six primary concepts are industrial attributes; network
diversity value; network diversity structure; breakthroughs; network restructuring; and entrepreneurial
progress.
Industrial attributes represent the condition of the core category, and refer to the specific characteristics
of the entrepreneurs and their environment that inform the constitution of their networks. The analytical
process revealed differences along two major criteria across industries. One was entrepreneurs’
perceptions of their sensitivity to global competition. Entrepreneurs of the clothing manufacturing
industry, such as those quoted below, would readily mention the challenges of competing with global
imports that were priced at significantly lower rates.
“ I mean now, the Chinese are killing the market, so it’s getting tough. They are
making our – they are copying what we are doing and – selling them cheap…
Cheap –like 50 bucks, 60 bucks and then they are really killing us. “
~ O and M
In contrast to clothing manufacturers, service entrepreneurs rarely emphasized the impact of global
competition, but rather, stressed competing with local established corporations, and hence, their strategy
to be sub-contracted by such organizations in order to enter the market. The second criteria, is labor
intensiveness, describing the time-consuming steps involved in the production activity. Clothing
manufacturers would describe a demanding process, for which they would “outsource” their work to
others- mostly immigrant entrepreneurs – by which to manage the labor-intensive nature of production.
“Uh, sometimes when I have a lot of work, I ‘ll call maybe two Malawian guys.
I know they’re fast, and they don’t charge you too much, and they’ll help…” ~H
“I’d rather outsource. I’ll do the cutting and take my garment to those places – to
somebody who has a business. I know whatever that he charges me, I’m able to
pay because the product, I don’t have to do any alteration… So when you’re
overloaded, you have to go around and check who’s not busy.” ~ P
In contrast, service entrepreneurs, utilizing various sub-contracting methods, and relying upon technology
so as to streamline production, did not appear to undergo the same intensiveness of labor. Additionally,
these two criteria would vary in respect to business phase, i.e. start-up versus a new or established firm.
Hence the model proposes that the nature of the industrial sector presents the initial conditions that
influence network structure and value. This proposition implies that social networks are not the same for
entrepreneurs by virtue of their size alone, as previous literature has implied.
Network Diversity Value (NDV), the core category of this study, refers to the value which
entrepreneurs associate with various relationships in regard to their business’s development. It is informed
by respondents’ answers to the question, “How is this relationship valuable to your business?” and coded
into four major concepts of value, referred to as value orientations.
Capacity-oriented value refers to the factors derived from an entrepreneur’s social network which
contribute to how much the entrepreneur’s small business is able to produce. These aspects of value assist
in augmenting the small entrepreneur’s capacity to operate soundly, produce efficiently, and respond
effectively to shifts in demand. A primary example of this orientation from the data was the combining of
production capacities between entrepreneurs or machinery or training acquired from an organization.
“…April, I took, I took my stuff, and went to the Bruma – you know Bruma flee market?...
I went there and I got a stall. The stall, it was R160. We shared with one lady.
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