Building sustainable organisations through restructuring: the role of organisational character in France and India

In today's era of hyper competition and change, one of the crucial challenges facing organisations is to build sustainable competitive organisations. A changing environment necessitates a change in strategic initiatives. The changes in strategic initiatives such mergers and acquisitions, new product and market strategy, joint ventures, strategic alliances, diversification and outsourcing, call for organisational restructuring and the emplacement of an integrative mechanism that cements these changes. Few empirical studies have been done to date regarding the role of organisational character during an organisational restructuring process. Organisational character, which is embedded in the vision, mission, goals, values and leadership, can be explained in terms of history, culture, collective memory, knowledge, politics, habits, emotions and policies of the organisation. An extensive in-depth study of four large, complex manufacturing organisations and market leaders in France and India support our belief that the role of organisational character defined by human resource policies and the linkage between the vision, mission, goals, values and leadership of the organisation are the key success factors during an organisational restructuring process. Based on both specific policies and the actual practices, as perceived by the top management (those who formulate those policies) and middle management (those that implement them), the article presents a contingency framework, which offers valuable insights into the role of organisational character during a restructuring process.