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This study provides a comprehensive framework of adaptation in triadic business relationship settings in the service sector. The framework is based on the industrial network approach (see, e.g., Axelsson & Easton, 1992; Håkansson & Snehota, 1995a). The study describes how adaptations initiate, how they progress, and what the outcomes of these adaptations are. Furthermore, the framework takes into account how adaptations spread in triadic relationship settings. The empirical context is corporate travel management, which is a chain of activities where an industrial enterprise, and its preferred travel agency and service supplier partners combine their resources. The scientific philosophy, on which the knowledge creation is based, is realist ontology. Epistemologically, the study relies on constructionist processes and interpretation. Case studies with in-depth interviews are the main source of data.

The study here examines how business actors adapt to changes in networks by analyzing their perceptions or their network pictures. The study is exploratory or iterative in the sense that revisions occur to the research question, method, theory, and context as an integral part of the research process.

Changes within networks receive less research attention, although considerable research exists on explaining business network structures in different research traditions. This study analyzes changes in networks in terms of the industrial network approach. This approach sees networks as connected relationships between actors, where interdependent companies interact based on their sensemaking of their relevant network environment. The study develops a concept of network change as well as an operationalization for comparing perceptions of change, where the study introduces a template model of dottograms to systematically analyze differences in perceptions. The study then applies the model to analyze findings from a case study of Norwegian/Japanese seafood distribution, and the chapter provides a rich description of a complex system facing considerable pressure to change. In-depth personal interviews and cognitive mapping techniques are the main research tools applied, in addition to tracer studies and personal observation.

The dottogram method represents a valuable contribution to case study research as it enables systematic within-case and across-case analyses. A further theoretical contribution of the study is the suggestion that network change is about actors seeking to change their network position to gain access to resources. Thereby, the study also implies a close relationship between the concepts network position and the network change that has not been discussed within the network approach in great detail.

Another major contribution of the study is the analysis of the role that network pictures play in actors' efforts to change their network position. The study develops seven propositions in an attempt to describe the role of network pictures in network change. So far, the relevant literature discusses network pictures mainly as a theoretical concept. Finally, the chapter concludes with important implications for management practice.

The emphasis on inter-organizational systems gave rise to concerns about inter-organizational relationships as trading partners became aware of the socio-political factors and trust that affect their relationships. This paper examines the importance of inter-organizational-trust in business-to-business E-commerce organizations. It examines how inter-organizational relationships impact trading partner trust, perceived benefits, perceived risks, and technology trust mechanisms in E-commerce that can in turn influence outcomes of business-to-business E-commerce. This paper develops a conceptual model and tests the model using a case study research methodology. The aim is to solicit qualitative in depth understanding of inter-organizational-trust in business-to-business E-commerce. Eight organizations from a cross section of industries that formed four bi-directional dyads participated in the third stage of this study. The first two stages include exploratory case studies in three organizations in the automotive industry that applied EDI via Value-Added-Networks in 1997, and a nationwide survey of organizations that examined the extent of E-commerce adoption in Australia and New Zealand in 1998. The findings identify the need for trustworthy business relationships in an E-commerce environment.

Missing in most of the research on selling has been an examination of the process from the point of view of the customer. When satisfaction in selling has been considered, researchers have focused on the satisfaction of the salesperson with his job and/or the impact of this job satisfaction on performance (e.g. Bluen, Barling & Burns, 1990; Churchill, Ford & Walker, 1979; Pruden & Peterson, 1971). To concentrate on salesperson performance while neglecting customers is to ignore the most important half of the relationship between buyers and sellers and entirely disregards the marketing concept and the streams of research in customer satisfaction. This research takes a different approach and examines customers’ satisfaction with salespeople.

The purpose is to theorize and empirically estimate the impact of the gendered nature of the offender-victim dyad and crime type on time to arrest.

Predictions regarding the impact of gendered offender-victim dyads and crime type on time to arrest are constructed by extending role congruity theory and tested using data from the FBI's National Incident-Based Reporting System across five crime types using dyadic-based event history methods.

The authors find strong empirical support that role expectations derived from the gender composition of offender-victim dyads and the masculinity of the crime type affect time to clearance.

This research is the first to theorize and empirically test the relative impact of role congruency and the relational nature of the offender-victim dyad in the adjudication process. Furthermore, the research shows that the construction of “normal crime” can be enhanced by applying a gendered and relational approach, based on social psychological theory, which is predictive of crime clearance.

Future research is required to validate the results for crimes where law enforcement has less discretion and are feminine typed.

The results imply that by accounting for the expectations generated by gender roles when applied to offender-victim dyads a casual mechanism is established that better organizes previously inconsistent results with respect to the impact of gender on time to clearance. Thus, the authors' utilization of role congruity theory of gender provides a more consistent explanation for inequalities in time to clearance that may be fruitful for evaluating other steps in the adjudication process.

While women remain the majority of caregivers, gender parity is reported among Millennials, people of color, and LGBTQ caregivers. Such dynamics of care dyads are rarely explored in relationship with caregiver selection, social support, or care outcomes, and without standardized measures we are uncertain whether this trend is associated with youth, demographic changes, or a societal shift. Utilizing the Caregiving in the US 2015 data set, this exploratory, quantitative study examines relationships between gender, primary condition, and two social designations around age (kinship generations and birth cohorts) to develop a preliminary categorization of informal caregivers in the United States by reviewing descriptives and correlations, then testing with multivariate regression. A model combining Millennial caregivers, same-generation dyads, and two primary conditions (mental illness and stroke) successfully predicts variance as to whether a dyad will comprise one woman caring for another woman, the most common dyad. Findings demonstrate the interconnectedness of caregiving generational models, suggesting that categorizing dyads from such variables is viable. This study deepens inquiry into intergenerational caregiving and makes a case for generationality and caregiving to be studied together.

Existing descriptions of trust in health care largely assume a straightforward association between a patient’s relationship with a regular provider and his or her trust in health care. I extend status characteristics theory (SCT) and social identity theory (SIT) to suggest greater variability in this association by investigating the role of social differences between patients and their regular providers. Whereas the SIT extension predicts lower trust in dissimilar than similar dyads, the predictions from the SCT extension depend on status in dissimilar dyads. Further, research examining how social differences in patient–provider dyads shape trust largely emphasizes racial differences, but the theories implicate gender differences too.

I analyze a longitudinal dataset of patient–provider dyads offering a conservative test of the extensions.

Results generally support predictions from the SCT extension. Specifically, patients’ status based on differences in either race or gender: (1) is inversely related to their trust in health care and (2) influences the resiliency of their trust, whereby the degree health care met prior expectations matters less (more) for the trust of low (high) status patients than equal status patients.

When patients and providers differ on both race and gender, findings sometimes depart from predictions. This indicates differences in two social categories is a unique situation where the contributions of each category are distinct from that of the other.

This research extends SCT to explain greater variability in the connection between patient–provider dyads and trust in health care, while also showing how gender compares to race.

In this research, we address the following questions: (1) Do joint ventures (JVs) create value for both parent firms in the dyad? (2) How is the total value created in the venture influenced by resources and capabilities of the two parent firms? In addressing these questions, our objective is to provide added insight into the performance of JVs by shifting the level of analysis to the dyad from the individual parent firm. Our results indicate that a significant proportion of JVs created value for both parents. However, there was also considerable evidence of value destruction with a large proportion of JVs resulting in positive returns to one parent and negative returns to the other. In terms of the second question, we find that the total value created in a JV increases as the value of resources in the dyad increases and decreases with the differential in the value of resources between parents. We argue that the latter effect occurs because when there is a wide differential in capabilities, incentives are shifted away from joint value creation and cooperative behavior toward non-cooperative behavior and appropriating private benefits. Our findings broadly highlight the important role of private benefits in JVs and provide evidence that these benefits significantly influence the performance and dynamics of inter-firm collaboration in various ways.

Following from the cutting-edge work of Stephen Wolfram in A New Kind of Science (2002), in this chapter we propose “a new kind of OB” (organizational behavior) based on the varient approach to theory building and testing. In particular, we offer four simple, yet comprehensive theories to account for individual behavior, interpersonal relationships, group dynamics, and collectivized processes in organizations. In each case, two constructs, their association, and the levels of analysis of their operation are proposed. While the four theories proposed here are simple notions, they can explain a variety of complex phenomena and behavior in organizations.

Firms tend to transfer more knowledge in technology joint ventures compared to contractual technology agreements. Using insights from new institutional economics, this chapter explores to what extent the alliance governance association with interfirm knowledge transfer is sensitive to an evolving industry norm of collaboration connected to the logic of open innovation. The chapter examines 1,888 dyad-year observations on firms engaged in technology alliances in the U.S. information technology industry during 1980–1999. Using fixed effects linear models, it analyzes longitudinal changes in the alliance governance association with interfirm knowledge transfer, and how such changes vary in magnitude across bilateral versus multipartner alliances, and across computers, telecommunications equipment, software, and microelectronics subsectors. Increases in industry-level alliance activity during 1980–1999 improved the knowledge transfer performance of contractual technology agreements relative to more hierarchical equity joint ventures. This effect was concentrated in bilateral rather than multipartner alliances, and in the software and microelectronics rather than computers and telecommunications equipment subsectors. Therefore, an evolving industry norm of collaboration may sometimes make more arms-length governance of a technology alliance a credible substitute for equity ownership, which can reduce the costs of interfirm R&D. Overall, the chapter shows that the performance of material practices that constitute innovation ecosystems, such as interfirm technology alliances, may differ over time subject to prevailing institutional norms of open innovation. This finding generates novel implications for the literatures on alliances, open innovation, and innovation ecosystems.