The role of knowledge management strategies and task knowledge in stimulating service innovation

Are service firms that enact strategies to manage their new service development (NSD) knowledge able to generate a sustainable competitive advantage (SCA)? Based on analysis of data from a large survey of service companies, the answer is yes. We find that companies employing the knowledge management strategies of codification and personalization reflect higher levels of NSD knowledge. However, the two strategies vary in their individual performance outcomes, with codification promoting NSD proficiency (an ability to execute NSD activities) and personalization promoting greater NSD innovativeness (market perception of the company as novel and as an innovator). When used together, the two strategies magnify NSD knowledge, which when combined with NSD proficiency and NSD innovativeness, promote a SCA. Therefore, companies planning to invest in a knowledge management system should heed the outcomes desired from their NSD process. A system based on documentation exemplifies a codification strategy and will drive NSD proficiency; a system emphasizing interpersonal communication exemplifies a personalization strategy and will drive NSD innovativeness. A system that blends the two strategies appears the most advantageous for service companies’ NSD efforts aiming to build a long-term sustainable competitive advantage

Painting the Nation:Examining the Intersection Between Politics and the Visual Arts Market in Emerging Economies

Politics and art have throughout history, intersected in diverse and complex ways. Ideologies and political systems have used the arts to create a certain image and, depending on the form of government this has varied from clear-cut state propaganda, to patronage, to more indirect arms-length funding procedures. Therefore, artists working within the macro-level socio-political context cannot help but be influenced, inspired and sometimes restricted by these policies and political influences. This article examines the contemporary art markets of two emerging, Socialist economies to investigate the relationship between state pol-itics and the contemporary visual arts market. We argue that the respective governments and art worlds are trying to construct a brand narrative for their nations, but that these discourses are often at cross-purposes. In doing so, we illustrate that it is impos-sible to separate a consideration of the artwork from the macro-level context in which it is produced, distributed, and consumed

Family Businesses and Adaptation: A Dynamic Capabilities Approach

The main objective of this research was to propose a framework centred on the dynamic capabilities approach, and to be applied in the context of family businesses’ adaption to their changing business environment. Data were gathered through interviews with ten FBs operating in Western Australia. Based on the findings, the clusters of activities, sensing, seizing, and transforming emerged as key factors for firms’ adaptation, and were reinforced by firms’ open culture, signature processes, idiosyncratic knowledge, and valuable, rare, inimitable and non-substitutable attributes. Thus, the usefulness of the proposed framework was confirmed. Implications and future research opportunities are presented. © 2018, The Author(s)

Circular economy inspired imaginaries for sustainable innovations

In this chapter, Narayan and Tidström draw on the concept of imaginaries to show how Circular Economy (CE) can facilitate values that enable sustainable innovation. Innovation is key for sustainability, however, understanding and implementing sustainable innovation is challenging, and identifying the kind of actions that could direct sustainable innovations is important. The findings of this study indicate that CE-inspired imaginaries enable collaboration and by relating such imaginaries to common and shared social and cultural values, intermediaries could motivate actors into taking actions that contribute to sustainable innovation.fi=vertaisarvioitu|en=peerReviewed

Tapping a Foreign Subsidiarys Competence: An Empirical Test of Subsidiaries of Multinational Corporations in South Korea

This study examined the conditions under which a foreign subsidiary becomes the competence center within the multinational corporation (MNC)s network. We developed an integrated framework by investigating effects of both subsidiary-level factors and headquarter (HQ)-level factors on subsidiarys competence development. Survey data from 76 foreign subsidiaries of MNCs in South Korea largely supported our hypotheses. We found that subsidiaries with high management autonomy and high network embeddedness in the local market (South Korea) tend to build superior capabilities that would be useful throughout the entire MNC network. Concerning an MNCs management system, our results suggested that technological and managerial knowledge transfer from HQ to subsidiaries plays important roles in helping a subsidiary evolve into a competence center in the MNCs global network

CEO succession and the CEO’s commitment to the status quo

Chief executive officer (CEO) commitment to the status quo (CSQ) is expected to play an important role in any firm’s strategic adaptation. CSQ is used often as an explanation for strategic change occurring after CEO succession: new CEOs are expected to reveal a lower CSQ than established CEOs. Although widely accepted in the literature, this relationship remains imputed but unobserved. We address this research gap and analyze whether new CEOs reveal lower CSQ than established CEOs. By analyzing the letters to the shareholders of German HDAX firms, we find empirical support for our hypothesis of a lower CSQ of newly appointed CEOs compared to established CEOs. However, our detailed analyses provide a differentiated picture. We find support for a lower CSQ of successors after a forced CEO turnover compared to successors after a voluntary turnover, which indicates an influence of the mandate for change on the CEO’s CSQ. However, against the widespread assumption, we do not find support for a lower CSQ of outside successors compared to inside successors, which calls for deeper analyses of the insiderness of new CEOs. Further, our supplementary analyses propose a revised tenure effect: the widely assumed relationship of an increase in CSQ when CEO tenure increases might be driven mainly by the event of CEO succession and may not universally and continuously increase over time, pointing to a “window of opportunity” to initiate strategic change shortly after the succession event. By analyzing the relationship between CEO succession and CEO CSQ, our results contribute to the CSQ literature and provide fruitful impulses for the CEO succession literature