Purpose: In an era of geopolitical volatility, digital transformation, and persistent institutional constraints, particularly in developing economies, understanding how exporting firms formulate and enact their export development strategies is crucial. While dominant internationalization theories (e.g., Uppsala, Born Global) assume relatively stable, institutionally supportive environments, they often fall short in explaining strategic behavior under conditions of sanctions, currency instability, weak legal frameworks, and limited access to global digital infrastructure. This study aims to bridge this gap by conducting an in-depth, context-sensitive investigation into the export development strategies employed by managers of exporting firms in Iran, a representative case of an emerging economy facing acute institutional and macroeconomic challenges. Specifically, the research seeks to answer: How do managers in such constrained environments conceptualize, design, and execute export strategies in practice? By centering managerial agency and lived experience, this study enriches contextually grounded theorizing in international business and export management.
Design/Methodology/Approach: A qualitative case study design was adopted to capture the complexity, dynamism, and embeddedness of strategic decision-making in real-world exporting contexts. Data were collected via 15 semi-structured interviews with senior and mid-level managers from exporting firms operating across three key non-oil sectors: industrial manufacturing (7 firms), agriculture (4 firms), and services (4 firms). All participants had at least two years of active international export experience, with export tenures ranging from 2 to 15 years (mean = 7.8 years). Purposive sampling ensured diversity in firm size, sector, gender (12 male, 3 female), and international market exposure (including destinations in the Middle East, Africa, Southeast Asia, and Europe). Interviews, lasting 45–75 minutes each, were audio-recorded, transcribed verbatim, and analyzed using thematic analysis following Braun & Clarke’s (2006) six-phase framework. Data saturation was achieved after the 15th interview, as no new themes emerged. Rigor was ensured through methodological triangulation, member checking (participant validation of preliminary findings), and intercoder reliability (>92% agreement between two independent coders). MAXQDA 2024 software supported coding and theme development.
Findings: Analysis yielded four overarching strategic themes, each comprising several sub-themes, revealing a hybrid and highly adaptive strategic repertoire. 1. Network-Based and Informal Strategies: Faced with institutional voids and sanctions, managers systematically rely on non-formal networks as strategic infrastructure. Key tactics include: (a) leveraging personal and ethnic ties (e.g., relatives or alumni in target countries) to initiate market entry and facilitate customs clearance; (b) mobilizing cultural and religious affinity (e.g., shared language or sect in Iraq, Afghanistan) as social capital to overcome trust deficits; and (c) deploying third-country intermediaries (e.g., in UAE, Turkey, or Malaysia) to circumvent financial and logistical sanctions. As one agri-exporter noted: “Without this network, we couldn’t clear even a single shipment.” This reflects the displacement of formal institutions by embedded relational capital.  2. Adaptive and Reactive Strategies: In highly volatile environments, long-term planning is supplanted by real-time responsiveness. Managers exhibit: (a) rapid market switching—e.g., shifting from China to Uzbekistan amid supply chain disruptions; (b) product adaptation without formal market research, relying instead on iterative customer feedback from early shipments; and (c) dynamic pricing mechanisms tied directly to daily exchange-rate fluctuations. A food-industry manager explained: “Every morning, the first task is checking the dollar rate and reconfirming prices with clients before loading.” This confirms the prevalence of emergent rather than deliberate strategies (Mintzberg, 1994). 3. Digital and Platform-Driven Strategies: Digital tools are widely adopted—yet with critical limitations. Firms use Alibaba and Amazon as “digital showrooms” for global visibility, while Instagram, Telegram, and WhatsApp serve for direct B2B communication. However, a phenomenon termed “incomplete digitalization” emerges: while marketing leverages digital channels, transactions are forced offline due to blocked international payment systems (e.g., PayPal, Stripe). As a design-services exporter stated: “We attract clients via Instagram, but receive payments only via Western Union or informal hawala.” This decoupling of digital outreach from digital transaction infrastructure distinguishes export behavior in sanctioned contexts. 4. Institutional and Support-Related Strategies: Governmental and quasi-governmental bodies (e.g., Export Promotion Center, Chambers of Commerce) are perceived ambivalently. While useful for market intelligence and trade fair participation, they are criticized for bureaucratic delays, inequitable financial support (favoring large firms), and symbolic—rather than substantive—assistance. One pharmaceutical exporter remarked: “The Chamber gave us booth space in Doha, but we covered 90% of the costs ourselves.” Thus, institutions are experienced less as enablers and more as administrative burdens, reinforcing the need for self-reliance.
Discussion and Conclusion: The findings extend and challenge dominant export strategy literature in several ways. First, they validate—but also refine—the contextual embeddedness framework (Prashantham & Dhanaraj, 2021), showing that in high-institutional-complexity settings, firms do not merely embed in formal ecosystems but actively construct informal strategic ecosystems through transnational social capital. Second, the documented prevalence of reactive adaptation supports the notion of strategic emergence in turbulent environments, suggesting that linear, stage-based internationalization models are ill-suited for such contexts. Most significantly, the study introduces two original theoretical constructs: Incomplete Digitalization: A condition where firms access digital marketing tools but remain excluded from core digital transaction infrastructure, creating a “visibility–viability gap.” Hybrid Formal–Informal Export Strategies: A deliberate, skillful blending of formal tactics (e.g., digital branding, participation in trade fairs) with informal practices (e.g., kinship-based brokerage, third-country routing). This hybridity is not a sign of weakness but of contextual strategic competence. Managerially, the study underscores that export success in constrained environments depends less on textbook international marketing and more on operational agility, network orchestration, and institutional navigation. Policy-wise, findings call for: (1) developing alternative financial channels (e.g., cryptocurrency corridors, barter mechanisms); (2) upgrading digital infrastructure to enable end-to-end e-exporting; (3) renegotiating bilateral trade agreements to reduce market-entry uncertainty; and (4) streamlining export bureaucracy through integrated digital platforms. While the study’s context-specific focus limits statistical generalizability, its theoretical transferability to other sanctioned or institutionally fragile economies (e.g., Venezuela, Belarus, Myanmar) is high. Future research should explore comparative cases and quantitatively test the proposed.