earticle

영어

Firms need to try to interact with other related organizations surrounding themselves. In an effort to do it, firms have made a variety of links with other firms, which is called business network (Gulati 1998). In automobile industry which is the subject of this study, the importance of relationship management for independent agencies have been highlighted. That is why the distribution channel of automobile industry in Korea is reorganized into independent agency system from agency system under direct management of manufacturer. However, independent agencies in each automobile manufacturer have organized and managed their business network, namely agency association, in order to gain transactional outcome from automobile manufacturer and to improve agency’s business performance through having more comparative advantages in comparison with the agencies of other automobile manufacturer. Under condition which business performance can be decided by the competition among business networks rather than it among firms (Achrol 1996; Anderson, Håkansson, and Johanson 1994; Bradford, Stringfellow, Weitz 2004; Möller and Halinen 1999), we suggest that scholars should need to study business including network factors which it had not been sufficient to consider in existing studies. Some studies related with distribution channel have also tried to consider network relationship perspective, criticizing servile following toward existing studies which focused on only dyadic relationship (Anderson, Håkansson, and Johanson 1994; Gomes-Casseres 1994; Gulati 1998; Möller and Wilson 1995; Wathne and Heide 2004). These attempts imply that it is necessary to work up business network to advance in studies about dyadic relationship as well. However, there have been scarce of studies verifying influence relation between business network and other variables related with distribution channel. In addition, there have never found studies to verify how (1) environmental changes, (2) network characteristics, (3) relationship characteristics in dyadic relationship, and (4) relationship quality in dyadic relationship have effects on one another. First, this study verified that environmental changes in four sectors of demand, supply, institution, and competition, which are asserted by Achrol, Reve, and Stern(1983), have effects on business network characteristics. This study considered environmental dynamism to figure out environmental changes, and it introduced network density and network centrality as network dimensions. Second, this study verified influence of environmental dynamism on relationship characteristics in terms of network dimensions as well as direct influence of environmental dynamism. Currently, an automobile manufacturer is advised to implement the relational management mechanism in dealing with its agencies under environmental dynamism that customers’ desire changes rapidly and competition among firms increases. The dynamism in Korea grows more and more because e-commerce made a remarkable growth and foreign automobile manufacturer reinforced marketing efforts. This study also considered relationship characteristics variables, communication and equity, as a relational management mechanism. The last one is that this study verified both the influence of network dimensions on relationship characteristics and the influence of relationship characteristics on relationship quality variable, conflict. This research model is as follows. [도표]

한국어

이 연구는 1차적 과업환경인 환경의 동태성과 네트워크 차원들이 관계특성 변수들을 매개로 하여 갈등에 어떠한 영향을 미치는지를 파악하고, 갈등을 해소하고 협력을 이끌어내기 위해 네트워크의 존재를 감안한 기업의 관계관리 메커니즘을 살펴보기 위한 것이다. 국내 자동차 산업을 배경으로 하여 구매업체인 대리점과 공급업체인 자동차 영업본사의 관계에서 대리점의 관점을 대상으로 설문조사를 수행하여 실증분석을 하였다. 샘플들은 국내 자동차 산업의 선두업체와 거래하고 있는 대리점들 중에서 115개의 대리점들을 대상으로 하였다. 구조방정식 모형 분석을 통해 가설을 검증한 결과, 의사소통을 감소시키는 환경의 동태성의 영향력과 네트워크 구심을 증가시키는 환경의 동태성의 영향력 모두가 존재하는 것을 나타났다. 그러나 공정성과 네트워크 밀도에 대한 환경 동태성의 영향력은 나타나지 않았다. 또한 공정성을 증가시키는 네트워크 밀도의 영향력과 공정성을 감소시키는 네트워크 구심의 영향력을 존재하는 것으로 나타난 반면, 네트워크 밀도와 네트워크 구심에 대한 의사소통의 영향력은 나타나지 않았다. 그리고 공정성을 증가시키는 의사소통의 영향력뿐만 아니라 갈등을 감소시키는 의사소통과 공정성의 영향력은 존재하는 것으로 나타났다. 끝으로, 이 연구의 이론적 의의와 관리적 시사점들이 논의되었고, 연구의 한계점들과 향후의 연구방향들이 제시되었다.