Success through commitment and trust: the soft side of strategic alliance management

John B. Cullen, Jean L. Johnson and Tomoaki Sakano

Journal of World Business, 2000, vol. 35, issue 3, 223-240

Abstract: This article argues that the success of international strategic alliances requires attention not only to the hard side of alliance management (e.g., financial issues and other operational issues) but, also, to the soft side. The soft side refers to the development and management of relationship capital in the alliance. Relationship capital consists of the socio-psychological aspects of the alliance that are positive and beneficial to the alliance. Two important areas of relationship capital are mutual trust and commitment. Based on our findings from two major studies of Japanese strategic alliances, we develop a dynamic model of trust and commitment based on mutual adjustments of alliance partners. We also show how the dynamics of trust and commitment affect the performance of international strategic alliances with the Japanese. The article concludes with a discussion of the managerial implications of our findings and the dynamic model.

Date: 2000
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (79)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1090951600000365
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:worbus:v:35:y:2000:i:3:p:223-240

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/620401/bibliographic
http://www.elsevier. ... 620401/bibliographic

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of World Business is currently edited by David Collings and Jonathan Doh

More articles in Journal of World Business from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().