The importance of aligning managerial characteristics to functional strategy in public sector organisations: An empirical study of Dubai government.

摘要

Managerial characteristics have an important influence on strategyudimplementation. Previous studies have looked at the alignment ofudmanagerial characteristics with strategic type and aspects of performance.udIn all cases, the focus has been on corporate strategy and, predominantly,udin private sector organisations. This study combines these objectives andudinvestigates alignment between managerial characteristics, strategy andudperceived performance. It focuses on management at the functional level inuda public sector setting and demonstrates that classical upper-echelon theoryudis also relevant when applied at the functional level of management.udThe Miles and Snow (1978) typology is applied to the functional strategy forudDubai government organisations, to investigate whether functional unitsudpursuing strategies are led by functional managers with dissimilar attributes,udand whether the alignment between managerial characteristics and strategyudis related to performance of the functional unit.udBased on the extant literature, a research model has been developed,udwhich yields two types of hypothesis. Data was collected by means ofudinterviews and surveys to obtain knowledge of strategy types, anduddemographic and psychological characteristics for the functional managers.udRegression techniques have been used for data analysis rendering supportudfor two types of hypothesis. Consequently, this study supports the view thatudUpper Echelon theory can also apply at the functional level, emphasisingudthe role of the functional managers, at the lower management levels of theudorganisations, in strategy implementation.