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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.

This chapter describes and discusses how the notion of network pictures would contribute to the literature on management cognition. Network pictures, as conceptualized in business-to-business marketing, refer to managers’ sensemaking of the context and put focus on the interconnectivity among firms, along with managers’ subjective idea about what parties would be relevant for the firm. A systematic literature review on network pictures shows that network picture research focuses on how managers may have difficulties comprehending parties beyond present business partners, while the theoretical conceptualization emphasizes interdependences and prioritization and reprioritization among relevant parts of the limitless network. These latter ideas add to current research on managerial cognition. They do so through introducing a different notion of the context – or environment – and thereby raising the awareness of its complexity. Albeit the network picture literature focuses on how managers’ network pictures affect their strategizing in the network, the core idea entails how reactions and partners strategizing in parallel describe an ever-changing context but not the less important for any manager to comprehend.

Companies inevitably interact and entrench in complex organic systems of business relationships with other. These business networks are not objectively defined, instead they are shaped by the subjective perception of actors. This inherent subjectivity is associated with the notion of network pictures, that is, a research tool that researchers or managers can use to grasp practitioner theories. In this chapter, we discuss how the importance of identifying these theories results mainly from underlying principles of sense-making theory, as well as from the idea around performativity. Drawing on these theoretical groundings, this chapter has two objectives: to explore how practitioners actually perceive their business surroundings and to assess the extent of overlapping between (IMP Group) academic theories and practitioner theories. To achieve these objectives, the researchers use a dimensional network pictures model previously developed in the literature to analyze the network pictures of 49 top-level managers across 17 companies from two very distinct contexts or networks: a product-based network and a project-based network. Among other practices, findings illustrate how practitioners tend to simplify what is going on in their complex surroundings, to personalize their relationships with those surroundings, and to think in a stereotyped way. Moreover, the juxtaposition between the captured practitioner theories and academic (IMP Group) theories show that these are not always overlapping, and are in some cases quite the opposite. This research contributes to the ongoing discussion of the importance of grasping actors’ views of the world, arguing that sense-making theory and the notion of performativity are the two main conceptual drivers justifying the urgency in making those views more visible. This research also adds to the research on the impact and suitability of IMP Group theories on managerial thinking and practice. Finally, this research reinforces the current call for further practice-based research in business network contexts.

Describes how the huge problems of managing a large telecommunications network have been addressed in the development of a proprietary system called NETWORKS. Discusses the user′s mental model. Describes a network object model. Presents examples of how object‐oriented graphics can be applied to network management tasks.

There has recently been an increase in interest in the notion of “network pictures” amongst researchers in the field of business‐to‐business marketing. Network pictures are managers' subjective mental representations of their relevant business environment. They are posited to work as “sense‐making” devices, and consequently shape managerial decisions, actions, and evaluations. However, while interest in this concept has been reported in a range of literature that is here identified and discussed, there has been no attempt to rigorously conceptualise the underlying dimensions of such pictures. This paper aims to address this issue.

Based on an extensive review of previous work, this study proposes a parsimonious set of interrelated dimensions, and initially tests this approach.

This article shows the model's face validity, but also argues that not all dimensions are perceived as being equally useful: utilisation of the different dimensions is determined more by what it is that managers wish to represent.

The implications of the concept of network pictures, as well as further research propositions, are discussed.

As researchers develop their interest in network pictures, so one needs to develop one's understanding of what their underlying dimensions are. A parsimonious set of such dimensions is developed and tested.

This paper aims to explore collective cognitive structures in business networks by analyzing the coherency of network pictures in a service development network.

The authors use the network pictures construct as a tool to analyze collective cognitive structures in a service development network. The studied case and unit of analysis is a focal network developing a consumer mobile TV service.

Based on the empirical evidence, the authors found that individuals’ cognitive structures vary extensively in the studied focal network. In addition, collective cognitive structures in intra- and inter-organizational settings differ, and thus should be distinguished.

The research findings are based on a single case study. This study is one of the first attempts to apply network pictures as a research device in industrial marketing. The concept of network conception is put forward, distinguishing intra- and inter-organizational levels of collective cognition.

The employed conceptual tool is proposed for application also when forming a business network, where it is important to make all actors’ (i.e. persons and companies) perspectives on the emerging focal business network visible.

To study the focal network-level collective cognitive structures further, the authors propose the concept of network conception to represent the phenomenon. The present study contributes to the research on collective cognitive structures in industrial marketing by extending understanding on individual- and organizational-level cognitions to a focal network-level collective cognition.

An earlier researcher, Wood, proposed that cinema is the most appropriate metaphor for interpretation of contemporary life and organizations. The paper adopts the enthusiasm for the cinema metaphor and explores the implications for industrial marketing and business networks, with particular reference to the Industrial Marketing and Purchasing (IMP) Group research.

The paper outlines the Cartesian picture theory of the early Wittgenstein, the comparable “pictures agenda” within the IMP, then the post‐Cartesian “language gaming” approach adopted by the later Wittgenstein, and associates it with an agenda to introduce a more “cinematographic” approach, introducing issues within the “linguistic turn” to the study of business networks.

The transformation of the contemporary “post‐Cartesian” culture from “written” to “visual” was not fully appreciated until the invention and mass appeal of cinema and the concomitants of a visual culture became more apparent. In the notion of the “spectacle”, Debord was amongst the first to show that the postmodern visual culture was one where social relations are dominated by commodified images. The images that prevail, from this critical viewpoint, are “social opiates” masquerading as progress that control actors through addictive consumption and acquisition by spectator consumers. In this context, business to business relationships are about how these image‐based addictions are maintained within business cultures.

The adoption of a cinematographic metaphor would appear to be a pertinent development for understanding of business network relationships.

The advantage of a cinematographic metaphor over other, less visual, metaphors is that cinema is more visually sophisticated and entirely embedded in cultures dominated by commodified images. It is appropriate, therefore, that visual literacy, realities as increasingly “image‐dominated” and “virtual” business networks are better understood through the lens of a cinematographic metaphor.

This study aims to investigate how companies’ understanding of the business network influences the creation of value in business-to-business relationships. The authors do this by analysing dimensions in actors’ “network pictures” and illustrating how value perception and network understanding influence actors’ mutual effort to create value. Approaching relationship value from the point of actors’ cognitive understanding of their business network has so far been largely overlooked in relationship value research.

This study applies a qualitative case study methodology whereby dyadic data from a well-established business-to-business relationship is collected from 18 company representatives through personal interviews and group interviews supplemented by participant observations and company data.

The findings contribute with new insight into how companies’ understanding of their surrounding network influence (facilitates or limits) relationship value creation. The authors find that companies continuously reflect on changes in their networks and the related changes in partners’ value perceptions. Through value articulations, companies seek to explicitly express their value perception. Value reflections and value articulations create a dynamic process formed not only by the individual actor but also through their relationship and engagement in their network environment. This requires companies to develop their networking capabilities.

This paper presents findings, insights and contributions limited to a case study of a particular business relationship within an industrial setting. Although the findings and contributions are valid and in line with the criteria for rigorous qualitative research, the authors advocate and call for additional studies that investigate relationships value creation and address the interplay between actors’ network understanding and their actions and behaviour. One way to approach this would be to test the four propositions derived and presented as part of the present study.

The findings imply that management needs to be aware not only of the value created and delivered to a specific partner but also of how the partner’s understanding of the wider network will influence the value delivering and capturing process.

This study contributes to the growing literature on relationship value creation by outlining a dynamic process where relationship partners reflect upon and articulate value. Such activities are influenced by the partners’ network understanding and form the basis of the mutual relationship value creation effort. The findings also contribute to the network pictures literature by emphasizing insights into the formation of value perceptions through actors’ understanding of their surrounding networks.

The paper provides an overview of recent developments in the provision of networked moving image and sound resources for UK higher and further education, initiated by JISC (Joint Information Systems Committee). The outcomes of the Imagination/Universities Network Pilot Project based at the universities of Glamorgan and Glasgow are outlined, and details are given of the work of JISC’s Moving Pictures and Sound Working Group, including the setting up of two national services (a Managing Agent and an Advisory Service) for moving picture and sound resources. Information is also given on four major new projects in this area funded as part of JISC’s programme to develop the DNER (Distributed National Electronic Resource) for learning and teaching, and the technical opportunities and challenges presented by networked moving picture and sound development are discussed.

Networks and relationships are not stable. On the contrary, they change and are transformed by the actors who take part in them. Change and transformation result from the actions and reactions of these actors. However, a key issue is what makes the actors choose some actions and reactions while refraining from others. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

The authors argue that the actors’ expectations to the future of the network are formative for the actions and reactions and, furthermore, that the future expectations are formed by interaction among the actors that take part in the networks.

The authors depart from the existing foresight literature, but realign its ideas to fit with the core tenets of the IMP approach. Thereby, the purpose is twofold: to explore and conceptualize network foresight phenomena as well as to contribute to the practice of collective foresighting in business networks.

The authors suggest research into formations of expectations in networks with a specific view to the interactive and structural effects of networks. Furthermore, the authors suggest a framework for categorizing network episodes and linking these to the formation of recognized issues and solutions.

The authors provide a framework for analyzing the focus of business networks in terms of solutions and issues, and analytically breaking down the interaction among these.

The authors introduce the concept of business network foresight, both as a distinct concept that enables us to understand change and transformation in networks, but also as a procedure for supporting actors’ strategizing efforts in business networks.