The assignment for the Professorship International Business focuses on matters concerned with organising international economic relations and the role governance plays in this. For instance, how organisations can be successful in various different markets, and how businesses should be organised internally to remain internationally connected.
Governance, and in particular the ownership of characteristics, is a determining factor in this and has been getting a lot of attention in the media as well as in research over the last few years (Hollenstein 2006). The public discussion mainly concerns the relationship between stakeholders and the management of companies in which questions regarding legitimacy play an important role (De Graaf & Herkströter, 2007).
Research Programme
Although multinationals also play a role in the research programme of the Professorship International Business, the programme focuses mainly on SMEs in the northern part of the Netherlands. The aim of the programme is to enable SMEs to learn from large organisations and vice versa. In addition, international networks in the economy and the relationship between great economic alliances such as the financial markets with small scale (often regional) economic developments are a crucial aspect of the research programme.
Hanze University Groningen is actually named after the Hanze Alliance which was one of the first international economic networks.
Professor: dr. Frank Jan de Graaf
(050) 595 2321
f.j.de.graaf@pl.hanze.nl