Global economic trends in the context of investor relations and strategic management. A longitudinal analysis of trends utilized in annual reports of German blue chip corporations.
Author/s
Bezjak, FrankDate
2016Discipline/s
Administración y Dirección de EmpresasSubject/s
Finanzas InternacionalesAbstract
Besides being confronted with fierce competition, today’s corporations face macroeconomic driving forces that change the configuration of existing and future markets that are also called “global economic trends” (GET) or “megatrends”. Currently, research does not provide a coherent view or theory for the assessment of these trends, which often leads to misinterpretation in business and academics. Literature such as publications provided by governmental institutions, multinational corporations, or consulting companies provide numerous examples where economic trends like globalization or the over-aging of western societies are depicted as global megatrends in the context of strategic management and economic research. The rather arbitrary use of the terms in literature leads to the idea that trend terms are vehicles to transport subjective assumptions about future developments that stem from foresight and innovation activities. Authors like Groddeck and Schwarz (2013) or Rust (2008) cri...