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This paper seeks to advance the study of knowledge boundary spanning by approaching spanning as a process that involves four spanning mechanisms.

Building on the insights from practice‐based view of knowledge and knowledge management literature more generally, the authors formalize and articulate two spanning mechanisms (boundary practice and boundary discourse), in addition to two other previously established spanning mechanisms (boundary object and boundary spanner).

The paper formalizes two further spanning mechanisms and suggests an integrative framework for examining the mutual and compounding effect between the four spanning mechanisms. Building on the suggested framework, the process of spanning is analysed as a time‐based combination of various mechanisms which evolve over time. The framework opens new windows to look at the projective and emergent mode of spanning mechanisms as a duality, rather than a dualism.

Researchers are freed to explore the deployment order of the spanning mechanisms and the conflicting or synergistic effects. Practitioners would benefit from tracing successful spanning processes for replicating in similar contexts to advance collaboration efforts.

Boundary practice and boundary discourse are introduced as well as synthesizing the mechanisms into a coherent framework. Viewing boundary spanning as a process that includes dynamic combination of four spanning mechanisms is a particularly novel insight that can stimulate future research avenues.

This paper aims to uncover the combinations of knowledge sharing mechanisms that organizations in a science and technology park in Brazil use to share managerial and technical knowledge.

This research adopts a qualitative approach that uses a fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis to analyze data that are gathered from 51 managers of organizations in a science and technology park.

The results show that knowledge sharing happens regardless of the type of knowledge. There are more alternative paths that lead to knowledge sharing than to its absence. Regarding the type of knowledge shared, there are more alternative configurations that lead to managerial knowledge sharing than to technical knowledge sharing. Only the older organizations in the science and technology park abstain from knowledge sharing.

Due to the qualitative nature of the study, no generalization is possible. Additionally, the study’s limitation is that it involves organizations from a single science and technology park.

The results offer managers of organizations in science and technology parks to choose from alternative combinations of mechanisms to either boost their knowledge sharing or to promote knowledge protection.

The paper provides an original contribution by identifying the combinations of mechanisms that organizations in a science and technology park use that leads to the sharing of specific knowledge types. The findings also identify the combination of mechanisms that older organizations use that prevents them from sharing knowledge.

The role of inter-organizational knowledge mechanisms (IOKMs) in learning networks is increasing so that the competition of business networks in providing innovations is highly dependent on the effective selection and application of these mechanisms. This study aims to argue that recognizing the classification of IOKMs and understanding their impact on networking capability (NC) makes the selection of mechanisms more effective.

With a systematic review of literature, a comprehensive list of IOKMs, their main characteristics and NCs have been extracted. The authors have used a focus group for data gathering and a hybrid multi-layer decision-making approach for data analysis. Finally, the impact of IOKMs on NC was determined.

By implementing a multi-layer decision-making approach, four categories of IOKMs including person-to-person, co-creation, team-oriented and informational are illustrated and their effects of NC are determined. Therefore, the findings of this research provide latecomer firms (LCFs) managers with a clear framework for selecting IOKMs.

The literature review shows that the number of knowledge mechanisms, especially their inter-organizational types, is increasing. It has made it difficult for LCFs managers to select effective and efficient mechanisms. Most of these mechanisms are listed, and few studies have classified them. Besides, research shows that fewer studies have investigated how IOKMs relate to NC. Furthermore, most studies on IOKMs have been conducted in the context of leading firms and LCFs have been neglected.

This paper aims to empirically investigate how knowledge coordination is carried out within and across expert teams in the outsourcing service desk context from the standpoint of the information and communication technologies (ICT) provider.

The authors draw on an embedded case study to unravel the mechanisms used by expert teams to achieve knowledge coordination. Data collection included semi-structured interviews and document analysis over eight months.

Four groups of coordination mechanisms were found according to their nature and role in helping MESA achieve its organizational goals. The authors also identified how this set of mechanisms responds to the task-resource dependency and how it evolves over time to provide reliable ICT services. Furthermore, the analysis of four knowledge coordination dimensions inside each group uncovers the complexity of coordination in the studied context, with the “who” dimension being predominant across the groups. The analysis further reveals that the content (what) and mode of coordination (how) of each group respond to elements in the knowledge coordination process relevant for the different stages of the ICT service delivery process.

The case study addresses how people in outsourced services coordinate their knowledge to manage the interdependencies among the involved organizations and thus, achieving their goals. This study extends previous research that had analyzed the consequences of knowledge coordination for providers and customers by delving into the mechanisms used in this process from the provider’s point of view.

The paper aims to incorporate the social identity theory perspectives to the knowledge-based view in order to suggest how certain organizational characteristics can be leveraged as knowledge governance mechanisms for interpersonal knowledge transfer within the multinational enterprise (MNE).

This paper is a conceptual discussion on interpersonal knowledge governance mechanisms.

The paper proposes a new set of governance mechanisms which may be leveraged to govern interpersonal knowledge transfer. These mechanisms utilize organizational identity of individuals to govern individual level knowledge transfer behavior with the MNE. The paper also illustrates how subsidiary power, one of such mechanisms, influences interpersonal knowledge transfer within the MNE through organizational identification.

As the paper is conceptual, the proposed mechanisms have not been substantiated empirically. It calls for empirically testing the suggested mechanisms across countries.

The paper provides insights to managers for leveraging on organizational identity to manage interpersonal level knowledge transfer within the MNE.

The paper adds organizational identity-based knowledge governance mechanisms to the knowledge governance approach. It highlights how certain organizational characteristics (e.g. subsidiary power), even though these are not knowledge governance mechanisms per se, can be utilized to govern interpersonal knowledge transfer with the MNE.

The purpose of this paper is to study knowledge integration (KI) when diffusing a systemic innovation. The objectives are to understand what mechanisms are used and when and what their effects are in terms of knowledge development.

The method comprised a longitudinal case study which followed a firm’s attempts to develop and diffuse a timber multi-storey building system (the systemic innovation) over a number of projects.

The findings emphasize actual projects as the most crucial activity for KI and when and why soft personalization mechanisms and codified knowledge should be mixed. Furthermore, it shows how different types of knowledge are built-up including construction process effects over a series of projects.

The research contributes with knowledge about mechanisms for the diffusion of a specific systemic innovation type and provides input regarding mechanisms to use. The introduction of the concepts “domain-specific,” “procedural” and “general knowledge” into construction has increased understanding of innovation diffusion and knowledge flows and where and how they are integrated.

The research shows how knowledge develops and through which mechanisms, and where problems occur. Construction organizations can learn from this to avoid mistakes and potentially better understand how to manage knowledge to diffuse a systemic innovation.

The research provides insight into systemic innovation diffusion over a series of projects and focuses on both projects and the construction process.

The experience of successful firms has proven that one of the most important ways to promote co-learning and create successful networked innovations is the proper application of inter-organizational knowledge mechanisms. This study aims to use a resource-action-performance framework to open the black box on the relationship between networking capability and innovation performance. The research population embraces companies in the Iranian automotive industry.

Due to the latent nature of the variables studied, the required data are collected through a web-based cross-sectional survey. First, the content validity of the measurement tool is evaluated by experts. Then, a pre-test is conducted to assess the reliability of the measurement tool. All data are gathered by the Iranian Vehicle Manufacturers Association (IVMA) and Iranian Auto Parts Manufacturers Association (IAPMA) samples. The power analysis method and G*Power software are used to determine the sample size. Moreover, SmartPLS 3 and IBM SPSS 25 software are used for data analysis of the conceptual model and relating hypotheses.

The results of this study indicated that the relationships between networking capability, inter-organizational knowledge mechanisms and inter-organizational learning result in a self-reinforcing loop, with a marked impact on firm innovation performance.

Since there is little understanding of the interdependencies of networking capability, inter-organizational knowledge mechanisms, co-learning and their effect on firm innovation performance, most previous research studies have focused on only one or two of the above-mentioned variables. Thus, their cumulative effect has not examined yet. Looking at inter-organizational relationships from a network perspective and knowledge-based view (KBV), and to consider the simultaneous effect of knowledge mechanisms and learning as intermediary actions alongside, to consider the performance effect of the capability-building process, are the main advantages of this research.

The purpose of this paper is to study the effects of relational mechanisms and market contracts on cross‐enterprise knowledge trading in supply chain and to examine the role of market contracts. Relational mechanism is categorized into indirect and direct relational mechanism in this paper. Cross‐enterprise knowledge trading is categorized into explicit and tacit knowledge trading. The indirect relational mechanism is mainly expressed by knowledge brokers, while the direct relational mechanism consists of shared goals and trust.

Multiple regression analysis was performed on questionnaire data from 256 Chinese manufacturing enterprises in supply chain in order to assess the relationships between relational mechanisms, market contracts and cross‐enterprise knowledge trading.

The results show that knowledge brokers and market contracts have significant and positive effects on explicit knowledge trading, but the effects on tacit knowledge trading are not significant. Shared goals and trust have significant and positive effects not only on explicit knowledge trading but also on tacit knowledge trading, while trust has a stronger positive effect on tacit knowledge trading than explicit knowledge trading. Finally, the moderating effects of market contracts are proven in the relationships between relational mechanisms and knowledge trading, excluding the relationship between knowledge brokers and tacit knowledge trading.

Previous studies about the cross‐enterprise knowledge trading in supply chain focused on theoretical research which did not match with reality, especially in China, where the relational mechanism in trading activities is strong. Based on relational exchange theory and transaction cost theory, a conceptual model for the effects of relational mechanisms and market contracts on cross‐enterprise knowledge trading in supply chain is proposed in this paper, and then empirically tested using the data collected from 256 Chinese manufacturing enterprises in supply chain with multiple regression models. The findings provide a theoretical basis for knowledge trading participants selecting an appropriate governance mechanism to promote knowledge trading, and these also guide the knowledge trading among members of supply chain in practice.

This study aims to contribute to fill the gap in the existing absorptive capacity (AC) literature relating to how organizational mechanisms applied both at the national and international level affect a firm’s AC.

A systematic literature review was carried out using analytical articles from two sources – Web of Science and Scopus – aiming to cover as many studies related to the AC research topic.

The results show that the majority of the studies do not include a specific analysis of an organizational mechanism’s role as mediator or moderator of a firm’s AC. The analysis of the reverse knowledge set of mechanisms will provide for international business scholars and practitioners a compilation of specific strategies that MNC apply to improve AC.

The study identifies four sets of organizational mechanisms: external search strategy; organizational knowledge management; reverse knowledge; and mechanisms not orientated to knowledge management; and it describes their specific relationships with AC.

High‐tech industries in Taiwan exist in an environment with diverse product requirements and intense cost reduction and information integration stress. They must develop new operational directions to increase industry competitiveness. Therefore, Taiwan’s high‐tech industries must continue R&D and creativity, establish knowledge sharing mechanisms and improve new product development (NPD) performance. This research analyzed and explored the influences of knowledge management (KM) and knowledge sharing mechanisms introduced by Taiwan’s high‐tech industries on new product development performance. The relationship between knowledge management capabilities and NPD performance is studied. This research considers the intervening industry and corporate position variables. Taiwan’s high‐tech industries have gradually entered the era of IT region integration and application with competitive advantage creation based upon core techniques. The in‐depth study of knowledge management and knowledge sharing introduced by the high‐tech industry revealed double meanings in academic and practical applications. The research results showed the following: (1) the stronger the knowledge management capabilities of Taiwan’s high‐tech industries, the more significant the NPD performance. (2) The better the knowledge sharing mechanism in Taiwan’s high‐tech industries, the more significant the NPD performance. (3) Corporate scale is not necessarily the critical factor in NPD success and the influence of corporate scale on NPD performance did not show significant differences. (4) The stronger the degree of leading corporate techniques, the more significant the NPD performance.