Sustaining firm competitiveness under multipolar fragmentation: a high-performance organization response architecture

Purpose This study aims to examine how firms can sustain competitiveness in a multipolar economy characterized by geoeconomic fragmentation, politicized markets, differentiated regional rules and increasing uncertainty. It focuses on the internal management practices through which firms translate external fragmentation into organizational coherence, resilience, legitimacy and renewal. Design/methodology/approach This study develops an integrative conceptual synthesis. It first draws on the multipolar economy and strategy literatures to identify firm-level competitiveness pressures. It then uses published high-performance organization (HPO) case studies to derive practice bundles that support adaptation under fragmented external conditions. The study seeks analytical rather than statistical generalization. Findings The synthesis identifies four firm-level competitiveness pressures: uncertainty and complexity, operating-model and value-chain redesign, nonmarket and legitimacy pressure, and talent, learning and coordination pressure. From the HPO literature, six HPO practice bundles are proposed as a response architecture: execution backbone, capability carriers, legitimacy and resilience platform, ecosystem sensing and stakeholder orchestration, adaptive operating model and innovation-for-adaptation. Originality/value This study connects multipolar-economy research with HPO research and shows how internal management routines can operate as firm-level carriers of competitiveness under differentiated location conditions.