DEALING WITH TECHNOLOGY ACQUISITION AND ORGANIZATIONAL LEARNING IN FAST GROWING SMES

摘要

In the early stages of their development, the informality of internal processes can be seen as an advantage in terms of speed and flexibility for fast growing SMEs, named also HGF (High Growth Firms). This advantage could, however, become a threat as the company crosses a particular size threshold. Internal processes become more complex and this, along with a possible geographical dispersion of the company, leads to more challenging change management issues. From this point onwards, the formalization of internal processes and their management become a priority in order to ensure the firm's stability in the long term. Current pervasive IT technologies such as ubiquitous connections, cloud computing, big data, remote planning and control, to name but a few, are today shaping organizations even in traditional sectors. Moreover, there is a growing offer of organizational support technologies, such as ERPs, CRMs, BIM or Agile project management tools. However, adapting the organization to reap the promised benefits of these technologies, in terms of efficiency, reactiveness and cost reduction, is a challenging task for all companies, and especially so for fast growing SMEs. The present paper proposes a practical methodology for achieving big or small technological transfers in fast growing SMEs. The proposed methodology is a four-stage process, based on the technology transfer process. The deployment of the proposed methodology is illustrated through the case study of a successful, fast growing and globally operating French consumer electronic SME.