Effects of Intellectual and Social Alignment on Organizational Agility: A Configurational Theory Approach

Literature has shown that business-information technology (IT) alignment can exert both positive and negative influences on organizational agility, giving rise to the IT alignment-agility paradox. To better understand this paradox at a more granular level, we conceptualize the sensing and responding dimensions of organizational agility as two independent constructs and suggest a nonlinear analytical approach. Based on configurational and contextual perspectives, this study investigates how intellectual and social alignment and organizational and environmental elements combine into multiple configurations to affect sensing and responding capabilities. Fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA) is used to analyze the survey data from 135 dyads of business and IT executives from the Chinese shipbuilding industry. Results show that different equifinal pathways can be used to achieve high sensing and responding capabilities, in which intellectual and social alignment play heterogeneous roles depending on the specific contexts. This study extends the IT-enabled agility literature by deepening our understanding of the effects of multidimensional IT alignment on multidimensional organizational agility and providing new insights into the IT alignment-agility paradox

Unbundling dynamic capabilities for inter-organizational collaboration

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to explore two distinct subsets of dynamic capabilities that need to be deployed when pursuing innovation through inter-organizational activities, respectively, in the contexts of broad networks and specific alliances. The authors draw distinctions and explore potential interdependencies between these two dynamic capability reservoirs, by integrating concepts from the theoretical perspectives they are derived from, but which have until now largely ignored each other – the social network perspective and the dynamic capabilities view. Design/methodology/approach The authors investigate nanotechnology-driven R&D activities in the 1995–2005 period for 76 publicly traded firms in the electronics and electrical equipment industry and in the chemicals and pharmaceuticals industry, that applied for 580 nanotechnology-related patents and engaged in 2,459 alliances during the observation period. The authors used zero-truncated Poisson regression as the estimation method. Findings The findings support conceptualizing dynamic capabilities as four distinct subsets, deployed for sensing or seizing purposes, and across the two different inter-organizational contexts. The findings also suggest potential synergies between these subsets of dynamic capabilities, with two subsets being more macro-oriented (i.e. sensing and seizing opportunities within networks) and the two other ones more micro-oriented (i.e. sensing and seizing opportunities within specific alliances). Practical implications The authors show that firms differ in their subsets of dynamic capabilities for pursuing different types of inter-organizational, boundary-spanning relationships (such as alliances vs broader network relationships), which ultimately affects their innovation performance. Originality/value The authors contribute to the growing body of work on dynamic capabilities and firm-specific advantages by unbundling the dynamic capability subsets, and investigating their complex interdependencies for managing different types of inter-organizational linkages. The main new insight is that the “linear model” of generating more innovations through higher inter-firm collaboration in an emerging field paints an erroneous picture of how high innovation performance is actually achieved

Semantic Remote Sensing Scenes Interpretation and Change Interpretation

A fundamental objective of remote sensing imagery is to spread out the knowledge about our environment and to facilitate the interpretation of different phenomena affecting the Earth’s surface. The main goal of this chapter is to understand and interpret possible changes in order to define subsequently strategies and adequate decision-making for a better soil management and protection. Consequently, the semantic interpretation of remote sensing data, which consists of extracting useful information from image date for attaching semantics to the observed phenomenon, allows easy understanding and interpretation of such occurring changes. However, performing change interpretation task is not only based on the perceptual information derived from data but also based on additional knowledge sources such as a prior and contextual. This knowledge needs to be encoded in an appropriate way for being used as a guide in the interpretation process. On the other hand, interpretation may take place at several levels of complexity from the simple recognition of objects on the analyzed scene to the inference of site conditions and to change interpretation. For each level, information elements such as data, information and knowledge need to be represented and characterized. This chapter highlights the importance of ontologies exploiting for encoding the domain knowledge and for using it as a guide in the semantic scene interpretation task

Practical Implications of the Ambidexterity Concepts

Scientific publications treating the topic of ambidexterity have experienced a great increase in number since the last twenty years. However, the implications for managers to achieve ambidexterity in practice remain a largely neglected field of research. This thesis aims at bridging the rigor-relevance gap regarding the concept of ambidexterity by systematically reviewing findings from academic and practitioner literature in order to provide practical implications for managers to reconcile exploration and exploitation and to, thus, achieve ambidexterity in practice.Keywords: Ambidexterity, Practical implications, Exploitation, Rigor-relevance ga

Developing potential and realized ACAP: The role of market sensing and responsiveness

This study explores how firms develop potential and realized absorptive capacity. In doing so, we extend the associations between organizational antecedents (coordination, system, and socialization capabilities) and potential and realized absorptive capacity by integrating market sensing and responsiveness as prerequisite contextual variables. The analysis is conducted using multilevel data obtained from 205 managers of 24 banks. Our findings show that coordination capabilities are positively associated with potential absorptive capacity while system and socialization capabilities are positively associated with realized absorptive capacity. Market responsiveness significantly moderates the relationship between socialization capabilities and realized absorptive capacity, such that the positive effect becomes weaker as market responsiveness increases. Also, market responsiveness significantly moderates the relationship between system capabilities and realized absorptive capacity, such that the positive effect becomes weaker when market responsiveness both increases and to a less extent decreases. The findings provide implications for research and practice on developing potential and realized absorptive capacity

Information Technology and the Search for Organizational Agility: A Systematic Review with Future Research Possibilities

Organizations are increasingly turning to information technology (IT) to help them respond to unanticipated environmental threats and opportunities. In this paper, we introduce a systematic review of the literature on IT-enabled agility, helping to establish the boundary between what we know and what we don’t know. We base our review on a wide body of literature drawn from the AIS Basket of Eight IT journals, a cross-section of non-Basket journals, IT practitioner outlets, and premier international IS conferences. We review the use of different theoretical lenses used to investigate the relationship between IT and organizational agility and how the literature has conceptualized agility, its antecedents, and consequences. We also map the evolution of the literature through a series of stages that highlight how researchers have built on previous work. Lastly, we discuss opportunities for future research in an effort to close important gaps in our understanding

Investigation model of sensing, seizing and reconfiguring capabilities

In the 90’s the Resource-Based View became the most prolific framework for value creation. Over time, markets revealed increasing levels of available technology and innovation, and the RBV was criticized for being too static and disregarding market dynamism. The Dynamic Capabilities View came to life as an enhancement of the RBV and became the most prolific research stream of the resource-based approaches. With most critics pinpointing definitional issues, contradictory interpretations, and tautological assumptions as issues to solve before the view could become a theory. Having these shortcomings in mind, the research aim of this investigation is to identify sensing and seizing capabilities, knowledge repositories to yield these capabilities, capabilities reconfigured that can be considered dynamic capabilities and finally which of these capabilities evolved through exploitation and exploration processes. This dissertation lays the foundations in the creation of a model which has the fundamental constructs of sensing, seizing and reconfiguring capabilities complemented by exploration and exploitation concepts, organizational ambidexterity constructs. To assess the applicability of this model, through a qualitative approach method, a set of semi-structured interviews took place to Portuguese managers. On a more operational manner the outcome of these interviews defined a set of capabilities companies should attempt to have to properly sense, seize and reconfigure to develop dynamic capabilities. The main contribution to the field of strategy is the suggestion of a link between the two constructs of sensing and seizing, and exploration and exploitation, further research will potentially strengthen this understanding.Na década de 90, a Visão Baseada em Recursos tornou-se na estrutura mais prolífica na compreensão da criação de valor. Com o tempo, os mercados revelaram níveis crescentes de tecnologia e inovação e a RBV foi criticada por ser estática e desconsiderar o dinamismo do mercado. A Visão das Capacidades Dinâmicas ganhou vida como aprimoramento da RBV e tornou-se na corrente de investigação mais promissora das abordagens baseadas em recursos. Com a maioria dos críticos sugerindo problemas de definição, interpretações contraditórias e suposições tautológicas como questões a serem resolvidas até que a visão possa ser considerada uma teoria. Tendo estas lacunas em mente, o objetivo desta investigação é identificar capacidades de deteção e aproveitamento, repositórios de conhecimento para iterar estas capacidades, capacidades reconfiguradas consideradas capacidades dinâmicas e quais destas capacidades evoluíram através de processos de inovação e exploração. Esta dissertação lança as bases para a criação de um modelo que tem nos conceitos de capacidades de deteção, aproveitamento e reconfiguração o complemento dos conceitos de inovação e exploração, conceções de ambidestria organizacional. Para avaliar a aplicabilidade deste modelo, através de uma abordagem qualitativa, realizaram-se um conjunto de entrevistas semiestruturadas. Em termos operacionais, estas entrevistas definiram um conjunto de capacidades que as empresas deveriam possuir para detetar, aproveitar e reconfigurar adequadamente com o intuito de desenvolver capacidades dinâmicas. A principal contribuição para o campo da estratégia é a sugestão de uma ligação entre os dois conceitos de deteção e aproveitamento e inovação e exploração, investigações futuras irão potencialmente fortalecer este entendimento

From Sensor to Observation Web with Environmental Enablers in the Future Internet

This paper outlines the grand challenges in global sustainability research and the objectives of the FP7 Future Internet PPP program within the Digital Agenda for Europe. Large user communities are generating significant amounts of valuable environmental observations at local and regional scales using the devices and services of the Future Internet. These communities’ environmental observations represent a wealth of information which is currently hardly used or used only in isolation and therefore in need of integration with other information sources. Indeed, this very integration will lead to a paradigm shift from a mere Sensor Web to an Observation Web with semantically enriched content emanating from sensors, environmental simulations and citizens. The paper also describes the research challenges to realize the Observation Web and the associated environmental enablers for the Future Internet. Such an environmental enabler could for instance be an electronic sensing device, a web-service application, or even a social networking group affording or facilitating the capability of the Future Internet applications to consume, produce, and use environmental observations in cross-domain applications. The term ?envirofied? Future Internet is coined to describe this overall target that forms a cornerstone of work in the Environmental Usage Area within the Future Internet PPP program. Relevant trends described in the paper are the usage of ubiquitous sensors (anywhere), the provision and generation of information by citizens, and the convergence of real and virtual realities to convey understanding of environmental observations. The paper addresses the technical challenges in the Environmental Usage Area and the need for designing multi-style service oriented architecture. Key topics are the mapping of requirements to capabilities, providing scalability and robustness with implementing context aware information retrieval. Another essential research topic is handling data fusion and model based computation, and the related propagation of information uncertainty. Approaches to security, standardization and harmonization, all essential for sustainable solutions, are summarized from the perspective of the Environmental Usage Area. The paper concludes with an overview of emerging, high impact applications in the environmental areas concerning land ecosystems (biodiversity), air quality (atmospheric conditions) and water ecosystems (marine asset management)

Diverse perceptions of smart spaces

This is the era of smart technology and of ‘smart’ as a meme, so we have run three workshops to examine the ‘smart’ meme and the exploitation of smart environments. The literature relating to smart spaces focuses primarily on technologies and their capabilities. Our three workshops demonstrated that we require a stronger user focus if we are advantageously to exploit spaces ascribed as smart: we examined the concept of smartness from a variety of perspectives, in collaboration with a broad range of contributors. We have prepared this monograph mainly to report on the third workshop, held at Bournemouth University in April 2012, but do also consider the lessons learned from all three. We conclude with a roadmap for a fourth (and final) workshop, which is intended to emphasise the overarching importance of the humans using the spac

Context-based Information Fusion: A survey and discussion

This survey aims to provide a comprehensive status of recent and current research on context-based Information Fusion (IF) systems, tracing back the roots of the original thinking behind the development of the concept of \u201ccontext\u201d. It shows how its fortune in the distributed computing world eventually permeated in the world of IF, discussing the current strategies and techniques, and hinting possible future trends. IF processes can represent context at different levels (structural and physical constraints of the scenario, a priori known operational rules between entities and environment, dynamic relationships modelled to interpret the system output, etc.). In addition to the survey, several novel context exploitation dynamics and architectural aspects peculiar to the fusion domain are presented and discussed