About AMA

Executive Summary
A global account is of strategic importance to a supplier; it requires coordinated strategies on a worldwide basis and demands globally integrated product or service offerings from the supplier. Suppliers in all types of industries must cater to their global customers by organizing global account managers or teams that take on the responsibility of managing the buyer–seller interface. Suppliers also must develop distinctive organizational, team, and personal competencies that are essential to meet global account expectations.

Global account management (GAM) has become a strategic focus among most multinational companies, but there is little empirical research on what type of organizational capability fosters GAM programs. The authors synthesize selected literature on the topic and reveal their findings from in-depth field interviews with global account managers. The interviews were conducted with leading global suppliers that have active GAM programs in place.

The authors argue that the processes that constitute GAM capability are sources of market performance and profitability. Three processes are highlighted: intelligence acquisition, coordination (which incorporates both interorganizational coordination and cross-country coordination), and reconfiguration. Intelligence acquisition refers to the process of scanning and evaluating the global account needs and the environmental needs. Interorganizational coordination refers to the process of purposively organizing joint activities at each level of two organizations, and cross-country coordination refers to the process of cross-subsidizing global resources and interdependently planning competitive strategies to obtain or retain global accounts. Reconfiguration refers to the process of changing resources and practices according to environmental changes and making the necessary adjustments ahead of competition. To secure and satisfy a global account, a supplier must be able to cross-subsidize its operations across the world and initiate coordinated strategies against its competitors simultaneously in multiple markets.

When suppliers are faced with the awesome task of servicing customers on a global scale, they have no choice but to reorganize their organizations, capabilities, and processes in ways that can be considered radical. Those suppliers that effectively sharpen their GAM capability can expect favorable outcomes in terms of market performance and profitability. Companies that proactively and systematically implement these processes are likely to outperform their competitors in the global marketplace.

Biography
Linda H. Shi is currently a doctoral candidate at Michigan State University. As of July 1, 2005, she will join the Faculty of Business at University of Victoria, Canada. Her research interests are primarily in the areas of global marketing strategy, global business-to-business customer relationship management, and business-to-consumer customer relationship management. In 2003, as one of six winners of the 13th ISBM Business Marketing Doctoral Support Award Competition, which is sponsored by the Institute for the Study of Business Markets (ISBM) at Pennsylvania State University and the Teradata Center for Customer Relationship Management at Duke University, her dissertation proposal about global account management capability was awarded $5,000. Before joining the doctoral program in Marketing at Michigan State University, she worked at Procter & Gamble’s China headquarters and was responsible for several key new projects regarding inventory reduction, supplier and customer management, and cost-accounting process optimization. The company gave her an outstanding contribution award in recognition of her work. She has recently published in International Business Review and Cases in International Business and has presented at the 2004 ACR Annual Conference in Portland.

Shaoming Zou received his doctoral degree from Michigan State University in 1994 and is now Associate Professor of Marketing and International Business. His expertise is in export marketing, global marketing strategy, and marketing management. Currently, he is researching issues related to global account management and global marketing strategy implementation. His has recently published in Journal of Marketing, Decision Sciences, Journal of International Marketing, and Journal of Advertising.

J. Chris White received his doctoral degree in Marketing from Texas A&M University at College Station. His research interests include marketing strategy and management—specifically, strategic decision making, marketing strategy formulation and implementation, and managerial information processing. His research has been published in Journal of Marketing, Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Journal of Retailing, Marketing Education Review, and Marketing Letters.

Regina C. McNally completed her doctoral degree in Business Administration from University of Illinois in 2002. She also has an MBA from the Illinois Institute of Technology, a Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering, and a Bachelor of Arts in Spanish from Bradley University. Before becoming an academic, she worked 14 years in industry, primarily in telecommunications, as a manufacturing engineer and marketing manager. Her research interests are in the area of decision making in business-to-business marketing and customer relationship management. She has recently published in Journal of Supply Chain Management and has a forthcoming article in Journal of Business-to-Business Marketing.

S. Tamer Cavusgil is University Distinguished Faculty and John W. Byington Endowed Chair in Global Marketing at Michigan State University. He also serves as Executive Director of Michigan State University's Center for International Business Education and Research (MSU-CIBER). He specializes in international marketing strategy, early internationalization, and emerging markets. He is the author of several books and more than 100 peer-reviewed articles. Doing Business in Emerging Markets (Sage Publications, 2002) is his most recent contribution. He is also the author of several computer-aided diagnostic tools for managers, including CORE V, Company Readiness to Export. He served as inaugural Editor-in-Chief of Journal of International Marketing, and he is Associate Editor-in-Chief of Journal of International Business Studies and Editor of the Elsevier book series Advances in International Marketing.