Scholars in various disciplines have considered the causes, nature, and effects of trust. Prior approaches to studying trust are considered, including characteristics of the trustor, the trustee, and the role of risk. A definition of trust and a model of its antecedents and outcomes are presented, which integrate research from multiple disciplines and differentiate trust from similar constructs. Several research propositions based on the model are presented.

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An Integrative Model Of Organizational Trust

Scholars of the theory of the firm have begun to emphasize the sources and conditions of what has been described as “the organizational advantage,” rather than focus on the causes and consequences of market failure. Typically, researchers see such organizational advantage as accruing from the particular capabilities organizations have for creating and sharing knowledge. In this article we seek to contribute to this body of work by developing the following arguments: (1) social capital facilitates the creation of new intellectual capital; (2) organizations, as institutional settings, are conducive to the development of high levels of social capital; and (3) it is because of their more dense social capital that firms, within certain limits, have an advantage over markets in creating and sharing intellectual capital. We present a model that incorporates this overall argument in the form of a series of hypothesized relationships between different dimensions of social capital and the main mechanisms and proces...

https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdfplus/259373.pdf

Social Capital, Intellectual Capital, and the Organizational Advantage

In this article we offer a view that suggests that a firm's critical resources may span firm boundaries and may be embedded in interfirm resources and routines. We argue that an increasingly important unit of analysis for understanding competitive advantage is the relationship between firms and identify four potential sources of interorganizational competitive advantage: (1) relation-specific assets, (2) knowledge-sharing routines, (3) complementary resources/capabilities, and (4) effective governance. We examine each of these potential sources of rent in detail, identifying key subprocesses, and also discuss the isolating mechanisms that serve to preserve relational rents. Finally, we discuss how the relational view may offer normative prescriptions for firm-level strategies that contradict the prescriptions offered by those with a resource-based view or industry structure view.

https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdfplus/259056.pdf

The Relational View: Cooperative Strategy and Sources of Interorganizational Competitive Advantage

Our task is to adopt a multidisciplinary view
of trust within and between firms, in an effort to
synthesize and give insight into a fundamental
construct of organizational science. We seek to
identify the shared understandings of trust
across disciplines, while recognizing that the
divergent meanings scholars bring to the study
of trust also can add value.

Not So Different After All: A Cross-Discipline View Of Trust

Researchers have used the absorptive capacity construct to explain various organizational phenomena. In this article we review the literature to identify key dimensions of absorptive capacity and offer a reconceptualization of this construct. Building upon the dynamic capabilities view of the firm, we distinguish between a firm's potential and realized capacity. We then advance a model outlining the conditions when the firm's potential and realized capacities can differentially influence the creation and sustenance of its competitive advantage.

https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=5629&context=lkcsb_research

Absorptive Capacity: A Review, Reconceptualization, and Extension

This article examines the developmental process of cooperative interorganizational relationships (IORs) that entail transaction-specific investments in deals that cannot be fully specified or controlled by the parties in advance of their execution. A process framework is introduced that focuses on formal, legal, and informal social-psychological processes by which organizational parties jointly negotiate, commit to. and execute their relationship in ways that achieve efficient and equitable outcomes and internal solutions to conflicts when they arise. The framework is elaborated with a set of propositions that explain how and why cooperative IORs emerge, evolve, and dissolve. The propositions have academic implications for enriching interorganizational relationships, transaction cost economics, agency theories, and practical implications for managing the relationship journey.

Developmental Processes of Cooperative Interorganizational Relationships

Alliances and similar cooperative efforts are receiving increased attention in the strategic management literature. These relationships differ in significant ways from those governed by markets or hierarchies, and pose very different issues for researchers and managers. In this paper we address alternative forms of governance in cases where multiple organizations repeatedly cooperate. We explore their characteristics and follow this with a discussion of criteria which we believe bear on the choice of governance: risk and reliance on trust. We offer propositions on relationships between these criteria and the choice of governance mechanisms. In the concluding section of the paper we explore the implications of our analysis for managers and scholars.

Structuring cooperative relationships between organizations

Research into network formation generally takes one of two approaches. Either it examines the outcomes of variations in the context and motives of the formation without examining the dynamics of the process, or it identifies the sequence of activities during the formation but does not examine variations within the formation. In this paper we complement both approaches by examining variations within the formation process and their consequences. We take an exploratory approach. Our analysis of survey data collected on the formation process of 53 R&D consortia reveals two distinct formation paths. The first involves emergent processes, developing from changes in the environment and a common interest and similar views among potential members. In the second, the process appears to be engineered—a triggering entity actively recruits potential members to join in the consortium. We conclude the paper with propositions on the importance of these formation types for the development of strategic networks. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdfplus/3094187.pdf

Formation processes of R&D consortia: which path to take? Where does it lead?

Management scholars have often argued that "trust" plays a key role in economic exchanges, particularly when one or another party is subject to the risk of opportunistic behavior and incomplete monitoring or when problems due to moral hazard or asymmetric information arise. These conditions are almost always present in the case of corporate alliances and joint ventures. However, one attribute of relationships—"relational quality"—is fundamental to the maintenance of good working conditions in two-party alliances where past experience and the shadow of the future play important roles. Relying on a growing body of theory and a number of case studies, the authors develop a framework for thinking about trust in dynamic and practical terms. They also provide recommendations for managing relational quality in alliances as a strategy for enhancing value.

/pdf/relational-quality-managing-trust-in-corporate-alliances-42rcgpn1kx.pdf

Relational Quality: Managing Trust in Corporate Alliances

Public and private sector strategic managers operate in different contexts that generate distinctive constraints on their behaviors and choices. Key constraints on public sector managers are identified in five propositions. Implications for the evaluation of public sector management and for the behavior of public managers are drawn. It is argued that application of private sector models to the public sector is problematic; that general models of strategic management are needed.

Peter Smith Ring

Papers

Developmental Processes of Cooperative Interorganizational Relationships

Structuring cooperative relationships between organizations

Formation processes of R&D consortia: which path to take? Where does it lead?

Relational Quality: Managing Trust in Corporate Alliances

Strategic Management in Public and Private Organizations: Implications of Distinctive Contexts and Constraints