Showing papers by "Frans van den Bosch published in 2008"

Structural Differentiation and Ambidexterity: The Mediating Role of Integration Mechanisms

Abstract: textPrior studies have emphasized that structural attributes are crucial to simultaneously pursuing exploration and exploitation, yet our understanding of antecedents of ambidexterity is still limited. Structural differentiation can help ambidextrous organizations to maintain multiple inconsistent and conflicting demands; however, differentiated exploratory and exploitative activities need to mobilized, coordinated, integrated, and applied. Based on this idea, we delineate formal and informal senior team integration mechanisms (i.e. contingency rewards and social integration) and formal and informal organizational integration mechanisms (i.e. cross-functional interfaces and connectedness) and examine how they mediate the relationship between structural differentiation and ambidexterity. Overall, our findings suggest that the previously asserted direct effect of structural differentiation on ambidexterity operates through informal senior team (i.e. senior team social integration) and formal organizational (i.e. cross-functional interfaces) integration mechanisms. Through this richer explanation and empirical assessment, we contribute to a greater clarity and better understanding of how organizations may effectively pursue exploration and exploitation simultaneously to achieve ambidexterity.

Senior Team Attributes and Organizational Ambidexterity: The Moderating Role of Transformational Leadership

Abstract: Organizations capable of pursuing exploration and exploitation simultaneously have been suggested to obtain superior performance. Combining both types of activities and achieving organizational ambidexterity, however, leads to the presence of multiple and often conflicting goals, and poses considerable challenges to senior teams in ambidextrous organizations. This study explores the role of senior team attributes and leadership behaviour in reconciling conflicting interests among senior team members and achieving organizational ambidexterity. Findings indicate that a senior team shared vision and contingency rewards are associated with a firm's ability to combine high levels of exploratory and exploitative innovations. In addition, our study shows that an executive director's transformational leadership increases the effectiveness of senior team attributes in ambidextrous organizations and moderates the effectiveness of senior team social integration and contingency rewards. Hence, our study clarifies how senior executives reconcile conflicting demands and facilitate the balancing of seemingly contradictory forces in ambidextrous organizations. Implications for literatures on senior team attributes, transformational leadership and organizational ambidexterity are discussed.

Top Management Team Advice Seeking and Exploratory Innovation: The Moderating Role of TMT Heterogeneity

Abstract: This study examines the top management team's internal and external advice seeking behavior in affecting exploratory innovation, i.e. innovation aimed at new markets or based on radically new technologies. Additionally, hypotheses are developed in which the impact of TMT advice seeking on exploratory innovation is moderated by the team's functional and background heterogeneity. For heterogeneous top management teams the potential for realizing exploratory innovation lies within the team rather than as a result of external advice seeking. The use of internal advice however, is positively moderated by the TMT heterogeneity and can further boost the exploratory innovation of the firm.

Coevolutionary Competence in the Realm of Corporate Longevity: How Long-lived Firms Strategically Renew Themselves

Abstract: Understanding the phenomena of corporate longevity and self-renewing organizations has become an important topic in recent management literature. However, the majority of the research contributions focus on internal determinants of longevity and self-renewal. Using a coevolutionary framework, the purpose of this chapter is to address the dynamic interaction between organizations and environments in the realm of sustained strategic renewal, i.e. corporate longevity. To this end, we will focus on the competence of long-lived firms to coevolve due to the joint effect of managerial intentionality and environmental selection pressures. Building on coevolutionary framework, we develop a conceptual framework that highlights an organization's coevolutionary competence. Two longitudinal case studies are presented illustrating the arguments.

The impact of corporate venturing on a firm's competence modes

Abstract: In this conceptual paper we investigate how corporate venturing influences an organization's competences. The impact of various types of corporate ventures on the portfolio of strategic options of a firm's competence modes (Sanchez, 2004a; Sanchez & Heene, 2002) will be assessed by distinguishing two fundamentally different dimensions of corporate venturing: technology and product (Block & MacMillan, 1993). We argue that the level of product and factor market dynamism mediates the effect of corporate venturing on a firm's competence modes. Corporate ventures that significantly increase the level of product or factor market dynamics will increase the flexibility in all five competence modes. These ventures have a direct effect on the lower-order competence modes and an indirect, lagged effect on higher-order competence modes through feedback loops. The developed framework and the propositions contribute to managing the ability of a firm to change its coordination, resource, and operating flexibility in order to sustain value creation.

Why new business development projects fail : coping with the differences of technological versus market knowledge

Abstract: Managing through projects has become important for generating new knowledge to cope with technological and market discontinuities. This paper examines how the fit between the creation of technological and market knowledge and important project management characteristics, i.e. project autonomy and completion criteria, influences the success of new business development (NBD) projects. In-depth longitudinal case research on NBD projects commercialised from 1993 to 2003 in the consumer electronics industry highlights that project management characteristics focusing only on the creation of technological knowledge contributed to the failure of those NBD projects that required new market knowledge as well. The findings indicate that senior management support and engaging in an alliance with partners possessing complementary market knowledge can offset this misalignment of the organisation of NBD projects.

De adviserende rol van commissarissen in het licht van de code Tabaksblat: Minder overlappende commissariaten meer interne verantwoordelijkheden

Abstract: textVan oudsher bestaan de hoofdverantwoordelijkheden van de raad van commissarissen uit het houden van toezicht op het beleid van de raad van bestuur en het bijstaan van de raad van bestuur door het geven van advies en het dienen als klankbord. Op het eerste gezicht lijken deze beide hoofdverantwoordelijkhedenmet elkaar te conflicteren: voor toezicht is namelijk onafhankelijkheid noodzakelijk, terwijl voor advisering een zekere mate van betrokkenheid noodzakelijk is (VanManen enVan der Reijden, 2005;Huse, 2007). In de praktijk worstelen commissarissen dan ookmet dit vraagstuk. Temeer doordat het wettelijk raamwerk in Nederland geen duidelijke oplossing aandraagt.