Managing service delivery networks strategically

The relationship between strategy and structure is one of the long-lasting and rather controversial topic in the strategy literature. It is also an evergreen and unresolved issue in the literature on public networks. While some scholars focus on the importance of structural arrangements and their effect on network performance, others have shed light on the criticality of strategies to manage public networks and of the mechanisms for strategy implementation and network partner interaction. Until this point there are few studies that investigate the causal complexity and interactive effects among network structure, implementation mechanisms and managerial strategies to organize, coordinate and manage the interaction among networks participants. The goal of this chapter is to contribute to the understanding patterns among by network structure, strategies and mechanisms as well as their joint effects on network performance.