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The purpose of this study is to consolidate existing research on ‘service networks’ and to frame this literature as a new ‘context for learning’. Research from inter-organizational learning is used to qualify this consolidation and advances from inter-organizational learning are used to operationalize how service network actors in this new context can organize for inter-organizational learning to create more value for themselves and their customers.

By conceptualizing the learning context of a service network and the interrelated dimensions, an overview of the learning challenges for improved service performance is provided.

Inspired by the service triangle, the proposed framework highlights the learning challenges among two or more actors and the knowledge and skills needed for them to organize the service network. To build a collaboration characterized by trust, behaviors associated with transparency and receptivity are argued to be imperative.

The framework can increase the opportunities for inter-organizational learning in a service network. Knowing the learning context and the challenges associated with this learning allows for a more accurate intervention and allocation of resources to improve service network performance.

The novelty lies in the consolidation of the literature of service networks and the extension of the literature on inter-organizational learning hereto.

The purpose of the study is to investigate how the processes of exploration and exploitation have developed in parallel in the literature of organizational ambidexterity and organizational learning, since James March published his seminal paper in 1991. The goal of the paper is to provide a synthesis of exploration and exploitation based on the two areas of literature.

The study is conceptual and no empirical data have been used.

The study advances current understanding of exploration and exploitation by building a new model for organizational ambidexterity that takes into account multiple levels of learning, perspectives from absorptive capacity and inter-organizational learning.

The study’s novelty lies in the creation and discussion of a synthesis of exploration and exploitation stemming from organizational ambidexterity and organizational learning.

The purpose of this paper is to propose how a bottom-up creation of an ambidextrous organization can be enabled. By integrating research on “contextual ambidexterity” and “individual and organizational capacity building”, an “innovation capacity building” framework is conceptualized that suggests how balance between exploration and exploitation can be maintained.

The study is conceptual. As no data are utilized, focus is on discussing the links between the two theoretical perspectives and the advantages of the proposed innovation capacity building framework.

The innovation capacity building framework discusses the influence, both positive and negative, of the local organizational context for ambidexterity, and the interactions required such as feedback between the management team and the employees so they together can build an ambidextrous working culture. A culture in which it is the individual employee that is responsible for switching between activities related to exploration and exploitation and where the management team empowers the employees to do so.

This study focuses on contextual ambidexterity and how contextual ambidexterity can be implemented as a way of working in contemporary organizations. The originality lies in the proposed framework and in the dedicated focus on “how” ambidexterity can be implemented in organizations.

This study aims to investigate the implications of applying critical realism to the study of organizational learning. It considers critical realism as an alternate theoretical science foundation to the domains of empirical realism and social constructivism that characterize most of the field of organizational learning.

This study adopts the approach of a philosophical/conceptual discussion.

This study finds that the critical realist approach makes it possible for organizational learning researchers to apply a prescriptive change agenda. It requires researchers to study the context in which organizational learning occurs. These two features enable the researcher to propose what the world must be like for organizational learning to occur. Hence, a critical realist foundation moves organizational learning theory a step closer to its theoretical sibling, the learning organization.

This study reveals the potential in applying critical realism to the study of organizational learning and identifies its related strengths.