2007 Oxford Business & Economics Conference
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
AN ASSESSMENT OF THE MILLER PERCEIVED ENVIRONMENTAL
UNCERTAINTY MEASURE IN THE EGYPTIAN
MANUFACTURING SECTOR
Said Elbanna
College of Business & Economics
United Arab Emirates University
P.O. Box: 17555 Al Ain
United Arab Emirates
Tel: (+971) 3 713 3438
Fax: (+971) 3 762 4384
Email: Selbanna@uaeu.ac.ae
June 24-26, 2007
Oxford University, UK
1
2007 Oxford Business & Economics Conference
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
AN ASSESSMENT OF THE MILLER PERCEIVED ENVIRONMENTAL
UNCERTAINTY MEASURE IN THE EGYPTIAN
MANUFACTURING SECTOR
Attempts at transferring strategy measures to another country with a different culture
without taking into account the effect of this culture is problematic (Elbanna & Child,
2007; Elenkov, 1998; Newman & Nollen, 1996; Schneider, 1989). Taking the above into
account and also the fact that, so far, little research on operationalization of strategy
variables has been conducted in Egypt, the two-stage design of the present study tackled
this issue.
On the basis of the results of the first stage, the Miller’s measure of
environmental uncertainty, the most comprehensive framework of perceived environmental
uncertainty to date (Werner et al., 1996), was re-operationalized to be more applicable to
the Egyptian context and to take full advantage of different aspects of the validity and
reliability of the construct. Investigating Miller’s measure at the first stage suggested that
several changes in the measure were warranted, resulting in a refinement of this measure so
as to be more appropriate to the Egyptian executives and to overcome the practical
problems of using this measure as reported at the first stage. The refined measure of
environmental uncertainty has a satisfactory degree of both reliability and validity.
Although it has four factors with 22 items comparing to Miller’s six factors with 35 items,
its structure is reasonably similar to the corresponding factors in Miller’s original scale. In
general, this study recommends that researchers should consider the effect of context when
transferring the management concepts from one culture to another.
June 24-26, 2007
Oxford University, UK
2
2007 Oxford Business & Economics Conference
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
References
Elbanna S, Child J. 2007. Influences on strategic decision effectiveness: Development and
test of an integrative model. Strategic Management Journal (forthcoming, May)
Elenkov DS. 1998. Can American management concepts work in Russia? A cross-cultural
comparative study. California Management Review 40(4): 133-156
Miller D. 1993. Industry and country effects on managers' perceptions of environmental
uncertainties. Journal of International Business Studies 24(4): 693-714
Newman KL, Nollen SD. 1996. Culture and congruence: The fit between management
practises and national culture. Journal of International Business Studies 27(4): 753-779
Schneider SC. 1989. Strategy formulation: The impact of national culture. Organisation
Studies 10(2): 149-168
Werner S, Brouthers LE, Brouthers KD. 1996. International risk and perceived
environmental uncertainty: The dimensionality and internal consistency of Miller's
measure. Journal of International Business Studies 27(3): 571-587
June 24-26, 2007
Oxford University, UK
3