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1 – 10 of over 12000Jeannette Harrison and Emily Boyle
The purpose of this paper is to examine how one firm – the British Shoe Corporation – eventually failed because, as a result of the strength of its predominant managerial mental…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to examine how one firm – the British Shoe Corporation – eventually failed because, as a result of the strength of its predominant managerial mental model it fell into a number of exploitative learning capability traps.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper uses a contemporary historical case study approach. This allows for a longitudinal study of the phenomenon. It examines the core concepts involved before moving on to consider the task environment in which the company operated, the origins and nature of its predominant managerial mental model, its performance over its lifetime and how and why it fell into the various capability learning traps.
Findings
The study found that the firm's predominant managerial mental model had a significant impact on its capability learning. It argues that to prevent other firms falling into these sorts of traps they should adopt scenario planning and seek out internal asymmetries.
Research limitations/implications
The study is limited in that it only considers one specific case. More studies of the same sort need to be carried out before the findings can be considered generalisable. Again much more research is needed into the process of seeking out internal asymmetries, a recently developed concept with very little written on it.
Practical implications
The paper provides advice on ways to prevent firms falling into the same sorts of learning traps as the British Shoe Corporation.
Originality/value
The paper is original in that it relates the problem of falling into capability learning traps to the predominant managerial mental model of the organisation. It provides a practical example of the phenomenon and discusses practical strategies that other firms can adopt to avoid suffering the same outcome.
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Sonal Minocha and George Stonehouse
This paper aims to highlight the nature of strategic learning in Bollywood, India's Hindi Film Industry. Film making is an art that requires continuous learning as a prerequisite…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to highlight the nature of strategic learning in Bollywood, India's Hindi Film Industry. Film making is an art that requires continuous learning as a prerequisite to creativity and innovation. Improved competitive performance goes beyond operational organisational learning into strategic learning. This research investigates the extent to which strategic learning, as opposed to operational learning, is taking place within film making organisations operating in the Bollywood setting.
Design/methodology/approach
The research was conducted through two descriptive case studies of production houses in Bollywood using semi‐structured observations and interviews with producers and directors in the case study sites. Data are analysed using techniques of interpretive “illuminative evaluation”.
Findings
The research suggests that the current frame of film making at Bollywood is stuck in a learning trap, in that organisational learning tends to be adaptive not generative and leads only to technical innovation. There has been no change in the paradigm of film making from one rooted in the past and the present, in terms of India's history, social and political context, to one looking to the future. For this paradigm shift to take place a future vision is proposed in the form of strategic learning and innovation, allowing Bollywood to go beyond the domestic Indian market and make a contribution to world cinema by breaking away from its current formulaic approach to film making. These findings also have implications for other management learning and practice contexts.
Research limitations/implications
Although this research is limited to Bollywood, it has implications which potentially go beyond it in the form of a new frame as described above, and also for the organisational learning literature which has tended to focus on learning in general, rather than differentiating between operational learning and strategic learning; whereas operational learning can improve production processes, strategic learning depends upon creativity and innovation as the basis of improved competitive performance.
Practical implications
The paper concludes that the research site is trapped within its current frame of learning and, in order to break away from it, it must embrace strategic learning to move beyond the traditional loops of organisational learning. The practical implications of the paper lie in furthering the understanding of the nature of strategic learning in a creative industry, which may, in turn, shed new light on strategic learning within similar contexts.
Originality/value
The originality of the research stems from the focus on strategic learning and a new site for its exploration in the form of the Bollywood setting. Furthermore it extends understanding of the organisational factors affecting the status of strategic learning in organisations.
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Examines how the British Shoe Corporation eventually failed because, as a result of the strength of its predominant managerial mental model, it fell into a number of exploitative…
Abstract
Purpose
Examines how the British Shoe Corporation eventually failed because, as a result of the strength of its predominant managerial mental model, it fell into a number of exploitative learning‐capability traps.
Design/methodology/approach
Considers the core concepts involved before moving on to examine how and why it fell into the various capability‐learning traps.
Findings
Argues that the firm's predominant managerial mental model had a significant impact on its capability learning.
Practical implications
Provides advice on ways to prevent firms falling into the same sorts of learning traps as the British Shoe Corporation.
Originality/value
Discusses practical strategies that other firms can adopt to avoid suffering the same outcome.
Details
Keywords
Edwin A. Locke and Vinod K. Jain
Spurred by the globalization of competition, organizational learning and continuous improvement have attracted a great deal of research and managerial interest in recent years…
Abstract
Spurred by the globalization of competition, organizational learning and continuous improvement have attracted a great deal of research and managerial interest in recent years. Notwithstanding the growing literature on these topics, there is still considerable conceptual ambiguity about organizational learning and continuous improvement among researchers. The paper clarifies the underlying processes through which organizations “learn,” highlights the role of learning in continuous improvement programs, and shows how an organization may go about building a continuous improvement culture. Specific tools and techniques of organizational learning which may be used in continuous improvement programs are also discussed.
This paper aims to encourage greater clarity and stimulate further interest in thorough empirical research in the area of learning levels. The broader motivation here is to urge…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to encourage greater clarity and stimulate further interest in thorough empirical research in the area of learning levels. The broader motivation here is to urge researchers to not only theorize but also undertake elaborate and much needed empirical work.
Design/methodology/approach
Part I of the study rests on a reflection and review of the literature concerned with “N-loop learning”, that is, the different hierarchical levels and stages of organizational learning.
Findings
The study provides some views and classification schemes on how to reconcile and think about different levels of learning. Some learning archetypes are identified that guide further reflection and elaboration on learning stages and hierarchies.
Originality/value
“N-loop learning” is introduced to encapsulate and systematize a vast array of views, models and levels of organizational learning. From zero learning and single-loop learning to quadruple-loop learning, a series of learning archetypes are presented. The case for a proper and clear nomenclature of learning levels is singled out. Finally, a strong case for empirical testing in this area is advocated.
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Lei Wang, Jun Li and Shaoqing Huang
The purpose of this paper is to develop and empirically test a theoretical framework examining how local network ties and global network ties affect firms’ innovation performance…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to develop and empirically test a theoretical framework examining how local network ties and global network ties affect firms’ innovation performance via their absorptive capacities.
Design/methodology/approach
The conceptual framework is empirically tested in a field study with multi-source data collected from a sample of 297 manufacturing firms located in four. Manufacturing clusters in the south-eastern Yangtze River Delta of China. Hypotheses were tested with the use of path analysis with maximum likelihood robust estimates through the structural equation modelling approach.
Findings
The asymmetry between local network ties (LNT) and global network ties (GNT) in terms of influences on firms’ innovation performance is confirmed by empirical tests. LNT not only significantly and positively contribute to firms’ innovation performance directly but also enhance it indirectly via absorptive capability, whereas GNT exhibit only marginal influence on innovation performance. GNT are shown to boost innovation performance (IP) only indirectly via firms’ absorptive capacities. Knowledge heterogeneity and the difference between domestic and multinational firms’ institutional environment are considered to be the main causes of the asymmetric effects.
Originality/value
While the previous literature either focused on the mediating role of firms’ knowledge absorptive capacities or investigated the effects of social networks separately, this study incorporates both mechanisms into a single analytical framework to better account for the interactions between network effects and absorptive capacities. The results challenge some previous studies positing that GNT are stronger determinants than LNT in shaping a local firm’s innovation capacity in emerging economies, and the findings emphasize the importance of absorptive capacity in helping local enterprises to leverage external linkages to enhance firm’s innovation performance.
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This study aims to examine the role of exploitative learning in entrepreneurial opportunity recognition at the time of war and peace.
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to examine the role of exploitative learning in entrepreneurial opportunity recognition at the time of war and peace.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper utilises some unique longitudinal oral history narratives collected from informants from a family business.
Findings
At the time of war and conflict, risk and physical immobility restricted exploitation within a narrowly confined geographical and knowledge contexts.
Research limitations/implications
The author’s case illustrates that success under such condition is largely determined by whether one can efficiently exploit one’s existing capabilities under contextual and circumstantial constraints and to reconfigure one’s capabilities utilising local knowledge and resources. When peace returns, the findings indicate that whilst there is no obvious external barrier for radical exploration, exploitation success during war and conflict may result in competency trap, undermining an organisation’s transformation after war and conflict.
Originality/value
This is the first paper examining exploration and exploitation learning at the time of war and conflict.
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Cheng‐Yu Lee and Yen‐Chih Huang
This study aims to examine the relationships among knowledge stock, ambidextrous learning, and firm performance while considering the moderating effect of firm size.
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to examine the relationships among knowledge stock, ambidextrous learning, and firm performance while considering the moderating effect of firm size.
Design/methodology/approach
This study uses R&D scoreboard database to produce a sample of 312 firms which operate in technologically intensive industries. To test the research hypotheses, regression analysis is employed.
Findings
The major findings are: the positive performance implications of ambidextrous learning; knowledge stock as an antecedent of ambidextrous learning; the mediating role of ambidextrous learning; and firm size as a contingency factor that strengthens the influence of ambidextrous learning on firm performance.
Research limitations/implications
Owing to the scope of the research, only patent data were used to measure knowledge stock and ambidextrous learning. However, the measurement of these variables may have been influenced by the availability of patent information.
Practical implications
The findings suggest that realizing superior performance is dependent on a firm's accumulated knowledge stock and its ability to balance exploratory and exploitative learning. Large firms extract more value from ambidextrous learning than small firms.
Originality/value
This study is the first to identify the mediating role of ambidextrous learning in the relationship between knowledge stock and firm performance and to confirm that firm size moderates the relationship between ambidextrous learning and firm performance. The value of this study lies in developing a model of ambidextrous learning that includes both mediating and moderating variables.
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Zelong Wei, Yaqun Yi and Changhong Yuan
The purpose of this paper is to address the conflicting views on the role of bottom‐up learning; this research combines the information‐processing and organizational inertia views…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to address the conflicting views on the role of bottom‐up learning; this research combines the information‐processing and organizational inertia views to explore how bottom‐up learning affects both exploratory and exploitative innovations and if the effects are contingent on organizational formalization.
Design/methodology/approach
Data for this study are obtained through an interview survey instrument from 213 firms. The questionnaire is adopted from several previous studies on organizational learning, structure and innovation with minor translation adjust. A pilot test was conducted and necessary modifications were made to the questionnaire. Tests show that the sampling validity is not biased by non‐response bias and the measure reliability and validity are acceptable. Furthermore, Harman one‐factor and CFA tests show that the results should not be biased by common method bias. The multicollinearity is also tested and controlled during regression analysis.
Findings
The findings show that bottom‐up learning has accelerated positive effect on exploitative innovation while having an inverted U‐shaped effect on explorative innovation. Furthermore, the organizational formalization strengthens the positive effect of bottom‐up learning on exploitative innovation and the U‐shaped effect on exploratory innovation.
Originality/value
The paper contributes to organizational inertia and information‐processing theories by providing a complete picture on how firms built exploitative and exploratory innovations through bottom‐up learning aligned with appropriate organizational structure.
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Mie Augier and Sean F. X. Barrett
This paper honors the breadth of some of March’s key ideas on organizations by applying them to the development of amphibious operations in the United States. The development of…
Abstract
This paper honors the breadth of some of March’s key ideas on organizations by applying them to the development of amphibious operations in the United States. The development of amphibious operations highlights, in part, March’s appreciation for little ideas, the importance of ordinary actions as opposed to great men, and the larger societal trends in which evolutionary organizational change is nested. The persistence of ordinary men and a series of little ideas that accumulated for decades prior to the far more celebrated 1919–1939 interwar period established the intellectual and organizational foundation that made the interwar innovation period possible. We use this case not only as an example of how many of March’s ideas are relevant to a given case, but also to demonstrate how extending March’s ideas to different kinds of institutions and organizations might be useful for future scholars and for organizational scholarship.
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