Author: Simon Rodan
Title:
Resource Recombinations in the Firm: Knowledge Structures and the
Potential
for Schumpeterian Innovation
Date of Publication: 1998
"Building on the resource-based view
of the firm, this paper explores the notion of ‘resource recombinations’ within
the firm. We suggest such recombinations can occur when competencies
within the firm (which are interpreted as organized clusters of firm
resources)
either combine to synthesize novel competencies (synthesis-based recombinations)
or experience a reconfiguration or relinking with other competencies
(reconfiguration-based recombinations). Central to this paper is an
examination of the antecedents necessary
for such innovation to occur, and in particular the nature of knowledge
in the firm. We argue that several characteristics of knowledge (tacitness,
context specificity, dispersion) and its social organization (the way
competencies come to be formed and institutionalized) will have important
consequences
on the likelihoods of resource recombinations. Our paper develops a
model of resource recombination likelihoods and propositions."
Author: Simon
Rodan
Title: Innovation
and Heterogeneous Knowledge in Managerial Contact Networks
Date of Publication: 2002
"
Innovation, particularly in a dynamic environment, is crucial to a
firm’s competitiveness. We test the hypothesis that managers’ performance,
particularly their innovativeness, is related to the diversity of knowledge
to which they are exposed in their interactions with colleagues. In
a study of 106 managers in a high technology company, we find their
performance benefits from increasing diversity of knowledge among their
contacts. However, the effect of knowledge heterogeneity depends on
the presence
of sparse local networks. The joint influence of heterogeneit y and
sparse network structure is stronger for manageria l innovation than
for a more general measure of managerial performance. This suggests
that the link between knowledge heterogeneity and performance relies
on a process of knowledge synthesis involved in the generation of new
ideas, with sparse networks affording managers
the local autonomy needed for their development and implementation."
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