Why do standardized ISO 14001 environmental management systems lead to heterogeneous environmental outcomes?

Institutional theories and resource-based views have suggested that, although they appear similar externally, standardized management systems may be implemented very differently in different organizations. This variability in implementation may be responsible for the heterogeneous performance of these standardized management systems. The current literature on the environmental impacts of ISO 14001 certification has largely neglected this phenomenon. Drawing on our survey of all US 14001 certificate holders, this study finds that great variability does exist in facilities' implementation of ISO 14001 standards. This heterogeneity has a significant impact on the linkage between ISO 14001 certification and facilities' environmental performance. In particular, we find that facilities that integrate ISO 14001 standards into their daily operations are more likely to report improvements in environmental performance. Environmental improvements are also more likely to occur in facilities that include performance management elements in their ISO 14001 standards. Furthermore, both types of facility are more likely to report that ISO certification contributes to this improvement. Neglecting the heterogeneity in facilities' implementation of ISO 14001 standards may explain the instability of findings from the empirical literature investigating the impacts of ISO 14001 certification. Theoretically, this paper informs the understanding of heterogeneous organizational behavior under isomorphic pressures. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/64331/1/629_ftp.pd

Profiting from innovations: the role of new game strategies in the case of Lipitor of the US pharmaceutical industry

In exploring why innovators often do not profit from their innovations, researchers concentrate on innovators versus imitators and the extent to which owners of complementary assets capture profits from innovations. The literature provides scant attention to factors that sap profits from innovations. This paper argues that an innovator's positioning vis-à-vis customers, suppliers, complementors, and other co-opetitors plays a critical role in the innovator's profitability. The article explores how an innovator can use new game strategies to better positioning, thus capturing rents from innovations and enabling further innovations in the future. The study examines the case of Lipitor, one of the world's best-selling drug, to illustrate how positioning can play in a firm's ability to profit from its innovations.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/79168/1/j.1467-9310.2010.00597.x.pd

Competitive Groups as Cognitive Communities: The Case of Scottish Knitwear Manufacturers Revisited

In this paper we reflect on the contribution of our 1989 article ‘Competitive Groups as Cognitive Communities: The Case of Scottish Knitwear Manufacturers’. We begin by recalling our backgrounds and motivations as collaborators on the project, and then discuss recent developments in the Scottish Borders knitwear industry. Noting that the industry has suffered continual decline in the twenty years since we published our paper, we suggest that the case still raises issues that remain open questions in the field despite the significant efforts by management researchers in recent years to understand the sources of industrial decline and revitalization. We outline what we feel are gaps in the existing literature and then end with the suggestion that these gaps are likely to be addressed only through multidisciplinary research that integrates resource, power, and cognitive theories of industrial dynamics

Institutional barriers and industry dynamics

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/108084/1/smj2152.pd

Superluminal Recession Velocities

Hubble's Law, v=HD (recession velocity is proportional to distance), is a theoretical result derived from the Friedmann-Robertson-Walker metric. v=HD applies at least as far as the particle horizon and in principle for all distances. Thus, galaxies with distances greater than D=c/H are receding from us with velocities greater than the speed of light and superluminal recession is a fundamental part of the general relativistic description of the expanding universe. This apparent contradiction of special relativity (SR) is often mistakenly remedied by converting redshift to velocity using SR. Here we show that galaxies with recession velocities faster than the speed of light are observable and that in all viable cosmological models, galaxies above a redshift of three are receding superluminally.Comment: 4 pages, 2 figures, Cosmology and Particle Physics 2000 Conference Proceedings; reference adde

Determinants, causal connections and outcomes of corporate technology licensing : a systematic review and research agenda

Exchanges in markets for technology (MfT) have grown rapidly in recent years. MfT involve transactions for the use, diffusion and creation of technology. In this article we conduct a systematic review of the emerging market for technology literature and examine one of its most important aspects, corporate technology licensing. Using thematic analysis, we systematically review 78 papers published in 29 journals over 30 years covering the academic disciplines of technology/knowledge management, strategic management, entrepreneurship, innovation management and industrial economics. Based on this analysis, we present an organizing framework for the most prominent determinants, causal connections and outcomes of technology licensing research to date, and identify a research agenda highlighting important avenues for future research in this domai

Ability-based view in action: a software corporation study

This research investigates antecedents, developments and consequences of dynamic capabilities in an organization. It contributes by searching theoretical and empirical answers to the questions: (a) What are the antecedents which can provide an organization with dynamic and ordinary capabilities?; (b) How do these antecedents contribute to create capabilities in an organization?; (c) How do they affect an organization's competitive advantage?; (d) Can we assess and measure the antecedents and consequences to an organization? From a first (theoretical) perspective, this paper searches answers to the first, second and third questions by reviewing concepts of an ability-based view of organizations that involves the abilities of cognition, intelligence, autonomy, learning and knowledge management, and which contributes to explain the dynamic behavior of the firm in the pursuit of competitive advantage. From a second (empirical) perspective, this paper reinforces and delivers findings to the second, third and fourth questions by presenting a case study that evidences the ability-based view in action in a software corporation, where it contributes by investigating: (a) the development of organizational capabilities; (b) the effects of the new capabilities on the organization; and (c) the assessment and measurement of the abilities and consequences