Decisions of Managers in Conflict between the Short-Term and the Long-Term (PDF)

Master's Thesis from the year 2010 in the subject Business economics - Business Management, Corporate Governance, grade: 2,7, Anglia Ruskin University, course: Master of Business Administration (MBA), language: English, abstract: This research is about decision-making by managers with a focus on decisions where a conflict between short-term and long-term is present (also known as the problem of intertemporal choice). The discussion in this area has been an ongoing one for many years. Many critics argue that managers focus too much on short-term because of increasing pressure from institutional investors which leads to suboptimal long-term development of their company. But there are other reasons which favour a short-term orientation. In the course of research on this topic, I found that it is not yet clear which factors are the most important ones for managers and their ultimate decisions. Therefore, the main goal of this research is to discover the most important influencing factors and to analyse their relevance.
This research is driven by an explorative approach and includes an extensive literature review combined with ten interviews with managers from different companies. The background is that a great deal of research has been done on this topic, but seldom with a broad approach such as this. Often research focuses on one factor, e.g. pressure from financial markets, bonuses, or others. One finding is that influencing factors stem from many areas and an interdisciplinary approach is necessary for further research. The findings of this research represent a good basis for that by exploring the most important factors that influence managers. It categorizes the influencing factors into indirect and direct factors, the latter representing the economic, organizational, and individual dimension. In addition, four findings are emphasized: too much pressure from financial markets result in the question whether quarterly earnings statements and predictions are still necessary; the importance of corporate strategy and its communication, the need for interdisciplinary research (e.g. combined with psychology), and the importance of developments in society and their interaction with management decisions.