Categories
Change Aspects
The change aspects that affect the state aspect are current activities and commitment decisions.
Current Business Activities
There is "a lag between most current activities and their consequences". The longer the lag, the higher the commitment of the company mounts. It is reasonable to assume that the more complicated and the more differentiated the product is, the larger the total commitment as a consequence of current activities will be.
Current activities are also the prime source of experience. Experience can be gained both through hiring personnel with experience or through advice from persons with experience. It is possible to distinguish between company experience and market experience. "Persons working on the boundary between the firm and its market must be able to interpret information from inside the firm and from the market". It is only possible to interpret one kind of information for one who has experience with the other part.
It is to some extent possible to hire personnel with market experience and to use the profitably after some time in the market activities. A delay will occur with the need for the new personnel to gain the necessary experience in the company. The best way to obtain market experience is to hire a sales manager or a salesman of a representative or to buy the whole or a part of the company. This kind of experiences is often not for sale, then it has o be acquired through a long learning process in connection with current activities. This factor is an important reason why the internationalisation process often proceeds slowly.
Commitment Decisions
The second change aspect deals with decisions to commit resources to foreign operations. Here Buckley and Ghauri assumed that decisions are made in response to problems and opportunities on the market. These problems are assumed to be dependent on experience from activities on the specific market. Other factors that plays an important role in decision making is existing market risk and existing market uncertainty.