




































AGORA International Journal of Economical Sciences, http://univagora.ro/jour/index.php/aijes 

ISSN 2067-3310, E-ISSN 2067-7669 

Vol. 17, No. 2 (2023), pp. 121-129 

 

121 

 

MODERN TRENDS IN BUSINESS IN THE FUNCTION OF BUSINESS 

SUCCESS 
 

G. NIKČEVIĆ 
 

Gordana Nikčević 

University Adriatic Bar, Faculty of Business Economics and Law,  Montenegro 

 ORCID ID: orcid.org/0000-0002-9804-6917, E-mail: gogan@t-com.me  
 

Abstract: The aim of this paper is to point out the importance of new trends in the 

business of modern organizations. Emphasis is placed on the processes that characterize 

modern organizations, namely: globalization, sustainability, information technology and 

modern organizational structures. The paper analyzes the extent to which modern 

organizations fit into the trends of globalization and sustainability, and the extent to which 

they apply modern information technologies and organizational structures. In order to have a 

more successful analysis, the advantages and disadvantages of these trends have been 

identified. The paper shows that the successful operation of modern organizations depends 

on the degree to which they have managed to master these trends and implement them in 

their business strategies. All these processes result in connecting and networking 

organizations, developing democratic relations in management and decision -making, which 

has a positive impact to greater employee motivation and more efficient business. 

Keywords: modern trends, globalization, information technologies, sustainability, 

organizational structure  

 

INTRODUCTION 

A modern and dynamic market requires constant changes in the way organizations 

operate and their adaptation to these changes. Many organizations find the answer to the 

dynamic environment by introducing and applying some of the modern trends or even 

applying more of them. Organizations apply a certain trend depending on their wishes and 

needs. Timely introduction of a trend is one of the main keys to success, because trends can 

only be successful if they are applied in the given circumstances. Otherwise it will not have 

the desired effect within the organization. For this reason, organizations need to be very 

careful when introducing them, because it can have greater consequences than benefits. In the 

sense of the above, the paper first analyzes competitiveness, as a feature of modern 

organizations. Through the implementation of trends in their business strategies, 

organizations will be competitive in the modern market. 

  The paper identifies strategies that organizations can use to acquire and maintain 

competitiveness. Furthermore, the important characteristics of modern trends are presented, 

namely globalization, sustainable development and information technologies and their impact 

on the business of organizations. In this context, the importance of modern organizational 

structures in shaping organizations was especially emphasized. This is because new trends 

require newer organizational structures. The paper presents some of the newer forms of 

organizational structures, namely: team organizational structure, network organizational 

structure and externalization of activities. At the end of the paper, concluding remarks are 

given that refer to the treated issues. 

mailto:gogan@t-com.me


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1. Competitiveness as a feature of modern business 

Competitive advantage is a characteristic that distinguishes one organization from 

another, i.e. striving to gain an advantage over others. This is a characteristic that makes an 

organization better and more successful than others, because it can better meet its own needs 

and the needs of others. Today, competitive advantage is increasingly difficult to achieve, and 

even more difficult to maintain because we live in a turbulent time in which changes are 

happening every day. Achieving and maintaining a competitive advantage means that 

companies adapt to global trends in doing business on the global market, which means: high 

quality goods and services, diversity of the workforce, entrepreneurship, etc.  

Given that the main purpose of the business strategy of the company gaining and 

maintaining an advantage over the competition, it is clear that with the change of business 

conditions, the strategies with which companies appeared on the market must be 

reconsidered. Therefore, organizations can take some of the strategies to gain a competitive 

advantage (Robbins et al., 2014). 

 Strategy of industrial organization - involves the analysis of the impact of external 

factors and making strategic decisions based on them. According to Porter, the factors 

that affect the organization are: the bargaining power of customers, the bargaining power 

of suppliers, the existing rivalry, the danger of the existence of substitute products. 

 Resource - based strategy - involves the analysis of resources and starts from the fact that 

the company's resources are crucial for gaining and maintaining a competitive advantage. 

This strategy involves developing and using unique organizational resources    and   

capabilities. Resources include all financial, physical, human, intangible and structural-

cultural assets that an organization uses to produce and deliver products and services to 

its customers. Also, resources need to be scarce, difficult to imitate and copy. However, 

the weakness of this strategy is that resources change their properties over time. In that 

sense, what is valuable today may not be tomorrow. Also, new technologies make it easy 

to copy what is not possible today, so it can happen that the organization cannot use its 

resources in the best way.                            

 Guerrilla strategy, means that the competitive advantage of an organization is current, 

because the environment is characterized by change. According to this strategy, in order 

for an organization to be successful, it must be ready to quickly and constantly surprise 

competitors with strategic actions in order to throw them off balance.  

Each of these strategies indicates the need to gain and maintain a competitive 

advantage in its own way. However, all together they say that it is necessary to constantly 

analyze both the external and internal environment of the organization, then use unique 

resources and capabilities to take advantage of all the positive changes and protect yourself 

from negative changes. Maintaining a competitive advantage is even harder than gaining it. 

This means that other organizations have failed to reach that business level by applying 

strategic analysis and business strategies in order to jeopardize the acquired competitive 

advantage (Porter, 2001; Huggins & Izushi, 2015; Drobyazko et.al., 2019).    

 

2. Contemporary trends in the business environment 

 



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2.1. Globalization 

Globalization can be defined in different ways, but simply put, globalization is 

connecting people and their cultures in different areas: economic, technological, 

informational, political and cultural. Globalization means connecting world markets, creating 

a global market and facilitating the flow of people, ideas, goods, capital and technology. It is 

believed that there are various factors that encourage the process of globalization, primarily 

the accelerated growth and development of science and technology, the emergence of 

multinational companies, global problems and the liberalization of relations (Cingula et al., 

2016).  Globalization has intensified the intensity of relations and established a global way of 

thinking. Today’s global lifestyle requires constant investment in knowledge, advances in 

technology, research and development. Companies that do not get involved in the 

globalization process in time lag behind in development. Therefore, it is rightly said that the 

world has become one big "global village" because through the process of globalization it 

opens more and more, but in that way it decreases accordingly. The explanation lies in the 

fact that, as an idea, globalization refers to the "reduction of the world" with the 

strengthening of awareness of the world as a whole (Rizescu & Tileagă, 2017).   

The goal of globalization is to improve all aspects of life through its actions, so it is 

important to emphasize its positive aspects. The positive aspects of globalization have an 

impact on economic, technological, political and cultural aspect of society. In economic 

terms, globalization is through free trade, increased exports, increased revenues, reducing 

production costs, accessing new and cheaper resources, enabling economic growth and 

development for many countries. It enabled the penetration of new products and services on 

the market, removed barriers between the markets of different countries, increased 

competitiveness and thus innovation. Politically encouraged cooperation between different 

countries as a joint work on the same goals similar values. In terms of technology and culture, 

thanks to fast access and flow of information, organizations achieve more efficiency 

communication with customers and partners. The progress of the countries, the greater the 

inflow of money, the living standard of the people and their purchasing power also increased. 

However, globalization also has negative sides: the departure of labor from certain countries, 

excessive profits and power are enabled for companies that have a large amount of capital, 

pronounced inequality between underdeveloped and developed countries, etc. (Deardorff, A 

& Stern, 2002).     

The biggest advantage, but also the disadvantage of globalization is the great 

competition on the market. Since organizations no longer trade on the national but on the 

world market, there is also a lot of competition. With so much competition, it is very difficult 

to break through and stay competitive. If an organization takes advantage of all the positive 

aspects of globalization, globalization can be a very positive thing for it (Bresser Pereira, 

2010). Therefore, theoretically, globalization is a complex phenomenon that has two sides, 

but provides equal opportunities for all. However, the question is to what extent and in what 

way individual countries will take advantage of the positive and avoid the negative sides of 

the globalization process. 

 

2.2. Sustainability  



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Sustainability is a trend that has been constantly present, especially in recent times. 

The concept of sustainability arose based on the need to change attitudes towards the 

environment and less and less available renewable and non-renewable resources. Its essence 

is to achieve not only economic, but also social and cultural development that does not 

endanger the environment . All this is aimed at meeting the needs of the current generation, 

without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. 

Companies are generally facing the same challenge as finding a business opportunity 

to develop sustainable solutions. Achieving sustainable development at the global level 

requires systemic changes that support sustainable development. Companies should 

incorporate the concept of sustainability into their business practices in order to survive in the 

market. However, many do not understand what this involves and how to initiate the systemic 

changes that are needed. Therefore, public administrations have a key role to play here as 

they need to steer the markets towards sustainable development and encourage companies to 

transition towards sustainable development. It is necessary to develop regulations that 

encourage companies to be efficient and respect natural resources (Lubin & Esty, 2010).      

 

2.3. Information Technology 

It is known that the success of a company depends on a well-organized information 

sector. In the broadest context, information technology means" use of computers for storage, 

calling, transmission i manipulation of data and information" (Varian, 2003).   

The business value of information technology is based on automation of business 

processes, providing information for decision making, and connecting companies with 

customers and providing productivity tools efficiency (Proctor, 2011).     

  A well-organized and well-built information system enables easier management. The 

Internet, as a modern technology, improves the coordination of all functions in companies. 

Modern information technologies enable easier and faster access to information in all areas 

(production, health care, science, culture). In this sense, the introduction of information 

technology provides greater transparency, speed and simplicity and flexibility. The basic 

issues that inevitably arise in this context are the provision of security and the timely 

provision of information about the user. However, a large number of companies have an 

unmatched system of needs with the number of computers, which certainly leads to increased 

costs and reduced quality of work. This shows that network management and end-user 

service are underestimated in some organizations and that more attention needs to be paid to 

this issue ( O'Neill & Salas, 2018; Dickson, G.W., & DeSanctis, 2000).        

Given the above, companies should proactively respond to all challenges. In that 

sense, there are different methods and all of them are aimed at economic growth, investment 

in human resources, increased use of information technologies, especially the Internet, etc. 

The management of companies in developed economies will respond differently to these 

challenges compared to the management of developing countries. Experience shows that in 

developing countries, it is necessary to ensure greater state participation through the creation 

of a favourable legal environment as well as financial resources (Haag, Cummings & 

Dawkins, 1998).   

 



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3. New tendencies of organization design and their implementation 

Successful business operations are not possible if managers do not follow the latest 

business trends. Traditional organizational forms functioned well within an environment that 

was stable and predictable. However, in a dynamic environment such as today, they can 

jeopardize a company's business. In order to overcome the uncertainty, the change of 

traditional organizational structures and the creation of new organizational structures will 

significantly improve the existing business. In the continuation of the paper, we will present 

new organizational structures that have proven to be good forms of lending to modern 

companies. 

 

3.1. Team organizational structure 

Team organization is a newer form of organizational structure in which teams have 

the main place. This organizational structure aims to break down centralized and hierarchical 

structures and, through team development, create flexible and dynamic structures. Therefore, 

the basic characteristic of a team organizational structure is dynamism. Team organization 

removes the boundaries of division of labour and makes the organization much more flexible. 

In order for an individual to be part of a team, it is necessary to have the following 

characteristics: ability to cooperate and communicate, ability to resolve conflicts, ability to 

set goals and manage change, ability to plan and coordinate (Stevens & Campion, 1994).    

Given that the team is a small group of people who have common goals and who  

work together to achieve them, teamwork brings a number of possible solutions, successful 

coping and increased availability of relevant information ( Cirella, 2021; Daft, 2000). 

Teamwork is a professional orientation for many companies. Today, companies feel the need 

to perform their tasks with several employees and thus increase the speed and quality of their 

products and services. These requirements for companies create a need for teamwork.  

A team can also be described as a product of goal, establishment, development and 

results. Therefore, in order for teams to exist, two conditions need to be met, namely: there 

should be as many members in the team as possible to maintain interconnectedness, while the 

second condition refers to the joint responsibility of all members in achieving goals (Senge, 

2000). Like any other organizational structure, team organization has its advantages and  

disadvantages. Some of the advantages are: Fast decision making, improved exchange of 

information between team members, willingness to compromise, easier development of level 

ideas, better morale of employees and enthusiasm for their involvement, improved exchange 

of information between team members, easier development of new ideas and solutions to 

existing problems. The disadvantages of the team organizational structure are: the possibility 

of conflict, a lot of time and resources spent on agreements and meetings, unplanned 

decentralization (Nancarrow, 2013).    

 

3.2. Network organization 

A network organization is a form of organization that is most closely related to a 

virtual organization. Namely, it is a network through which a virtual organization is built. 

Networking is emerging in response to increasingly complex business conditions and 

increasing changes in the way we do business.  



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Unlike modern forms of organization that open the organization inwards, the network 

organization breaks all boundaries between organizations by opening them outwards. There is 

no structure in a network organization, and members of the organization may have mild 

hierarchical relationships. The network is dominated by relationships of cooperation, 

exchange of knowledge, skills, information, technology, human resources, etc. That is 

understandable because the most common reasons for joining the network are: exchange of 

resources, cost reduction, risk sharing, access to markets, protection of innovations, etc. 

Starting from the degree of dislocation of activities and management methods, Miles and 

Snow distinguish three types of networks, namely: internal, stable, and dynamic networks. 

Porter's value chain concept, which groups all activities in the company into primary 

(incoming logistics, production, outgoing logistics, marketing, and service) and support 

activities (procurement, development technologies, resource management, and enterprise 

infrastructure), served as the basis for building a network organization. (Porter, 2001)  

Namely, managers can use the value chain to look at all the activities they perform and keep 

those in which they can achieve competence and dislocate other activities to other 

organizations. So, organizations are oriented to their core program and release less effective 

and inefficient functions. The bottom line is that every member of the network produces what 

is better than others that is the competition. At the same time, by involving external 

collaborators, border organizations become open. According to this concept, they 

distinguish are modular, virtual, and open organizations. 

Network organizations have certain advantages, which are: 

 efficient production, ie. the network allows production to be carried out at lower 

operating costs.  

 efficient organization, ie. the network form reduces the middle layer of managers and 

employs a smaller number of workers.  

 flexibility - an important advantage of networks is the possibility of fast responding to 

changing environmental demands. 

 market and resources - the network provides access to markets, and that as for the 

supply of cheaper raw materials and labour, as well as in terms of marketing products 

and services. 

The disadvantages of network organization are: the problem of coordination of 

activities, lack of equal control of all employees, difficulties in motivating employees, and 

difficulties in building employee loyalty. However, as long as the company is sufficiently 

independent and strong, there is no need to invest in a network organization (Miles & Snow, 

1995; Moliterno & Mahony, 2011).     

   

3.3. Externalization of activities 

Externalization of activities is the transfer of activities that were performed within the 

company to external partners, who will now perform them instead of the parent organization. 

Which activities will be outsourced depends on the company's strategic commitment. 

Companies can outsource basic activities, such as information technology, human resource 

management, etc. They can also externalize ancillary activities, such as cleaning, nutrition, 

and so. Which of these activities will be considered important depends on the activity of the 



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company. Having in mind the above, we distinguish two types of externalization of activities: 

separation of basic activities and separation of secondary activities (Sarwat & Abbas, 2021).     

The most important reason why several companies decide to outsource certain 

activities is the advantages of externalization. This process allows companies to concentrate 

on those activities that work best, while all other activities can be transferred to external 

partners. In that case, the company will externalize all those activities that do not achieve 

satisfactory results in the long run and thus get rid of operational problems. Since external 

operators can often do business at a lower cost than the company itself, companies can 

significantly reduce their costs. Since interpersonal relationships are very often the cause of 

poor results in companies, in this way problematic situations among employees are avoided. 

Outsourcing improves quality, improves company focus, increases flexibility, and reduces 

risk (Kalleberg & Marsden, 2005).   

Externalization of activities has recently become one of the most used business 

structures, precisely because of the transfer of activities to external partners and the automatic 

reduction of workload within the organization (Pellicelli, 2018).    

 

CONCLUSIONS 

The development of technology, but also the growth and development of human 

knowledge, encourages changes to which organizations need to adapt. This can result in a 

change of mindset within organizations, the introduction of new technologies, changes in 

organizational structure, and many other changes. 

With the advent of globalization, the world market is expanding, and with it, more and 

more competition is emerging. In an environment where there are a large number of 

competing organizations, the organization must stand out from others in some of its 

characteristics. In that sense, organizations should apply certain business strategies to remain 

competitive. 

 Monitoring modern trends in the organization, if they are adequately implemented in 

business strategies, can have very great advantages and positive effects on the overall 

business of the organization. Thus, by taking advantage of these trends, which are highlighted 

in the paper, organizations can achieve better business results, a better quality of final 

products or services, and reduce operating costs. For an organization to successfully 

implement trends, it is first necessary to identify its needs and priorities. After that, the 

positive effects of these trends should be used. Careful selection of the trend opens up many 

positive opportunities for organizations, about what they need, given all the conditions that 

surround them. 

  To implement new trends in modern business, it is necessary to have flexible 

organizational structures as well as an environment that will be suitable for their 

implementation. In that sense, the environment should be open to the environment. Since 

companies operate in a dynamic environment, it needs to be open to environmental 

influences. Only as an open system, the company can accept new knowledge from the 

environment and turn it into useful knowledge. Furthermore, the company must be value-

oriented. These are values related to employees, shareholders, and consumers. In this 



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way, employees will be motivated to learn and acquire new knowledge that they will apply in 

the companies in which they work. 

Since the acquisition of new knowledge implies the application of new methods of 

work, new ideas, and new products, it is necessary to accept the risk of the unknown. 

Therefore, it is necessary to develop employees' feelings and attitudes about accepting the 

possible mistakes and risks, and thus a positive attitude of employees towards change. 

Certainly, since employees are the most valuable resource in a company, investing in human 

resources should be their focus.  This is because modern society is a knowledge society that 

is the most suitable environment for the development of new trends in modern companies.  

 

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