The authors argue that in an environment of increasing complexity, diversity, and change, companies cannot manage through structures that are unidimensional, symmetrical, and static. Firms that develop the organizational capability to embrace the complexity and dynamism rather than deny it will have an enormous source of competitive advantage. Bartlett and Ghoshal not only describe the characteristics of the emerging transnational organization - the new configuration of assets and resources, the shifting distribution of roles and relationships, and the different set of management skills and capabilities - they also provide specific guidance on how companies can develop them. Managing Across Borders is the product of the five-year worldwide research project that involved interviews with 236 managers in some of the world's leading companies based in the United States, Japan and Europe. The book is essential reading for executives who recognize that the structures, processes, and mentalities developed in response to opportunities and demands of an earlier era will not carry their firms through the 1990s. It provides a vision for a new organizational form that will take companies into the twenty-first century.