Sample
We employ the survey method because the data sought are not available from public
sources.1 Given the central role of manufacturing strategy in our study, we target managers
or directors of manufacturing in manufacturing firms.
To obtain a large enough sample for statistical tests, we include both U.S. and European
firms. Using the Explore database from CorpTech, we restrict the U.S. sample to Southern
California, where the authors’ schools are likely to have some goodwill. We select manufacturing
firms with at least 50 employees and U.S.$2.5 million in annual sales (678 firms)
to ensure that the sample firms would have sufficient sophistication and scale to use advanced
management practices (performance measurement systems, in particular)