What makes organizations so similar? We contend that the engine of rationalization and bureaucratization has moved from the competitive marketplace to the state and the professions. Once a set of organizations emerges as a field, a paradox arises: rational actors make their organizations increasingly similar as they try to change them. We describe three isomorphic processes-coercive, mimetic, and normative—leading to this outcome. We then specify hypotheses about the impact of resource centralization and dependency, goal ambiguity and technical uncertainty, and professionalization and structuration on isomorphic change. Finally, we suggest implications for theories of organizations and social change.

The iron cage revisited: Institutional isomorphism and collective rationality in organizational fields (Chinese Translation)

This study explores how organizational antecedents affect potential and realized absorptive capacity. Our study identifies differential effects for both components of absorptive capacity. Results indicate that organizational mechanisms associated with coordination capabilities (i.e. cross-functional interfaces, participation in decision-making, and job rotation) primarily enhance a unit's potential absorptive capacity. Organizational mechanisms associated with socialization capabilities (i.e. connectedness and socialization tactics) primarily increase a unit's realized absorptive capacity. Our findings reveal why units may have difficulties in managing levels of potential and realized absorptive capacity and vary in their ability to create value from their absorptive capacity.

Managing Potential and Realized Absorptive Capacity: How Do Organizational Antecedents Matter?

Exploring how organizational antecedents affect potential and realized absorptive capacity, this study identifies differing effects for both components of absorptive capacity. Results indicate that organizational mechanisms associated with coordination capabilities (cross-functional interfaces, participation in decision making, and job rotation) primarily enhance a unit's potential absorptive capacity. Organizational mechanisms associated with socialization capabilities (connectedness and socialization tactics) primarily increase a unit's realized absorptive capacity. Our findings reveal why units may have difficulty managing levels of potential and realized absorptive capacity and vary in their ability to create value from their absorptive capacity.

/pdf/managing-potential-and-realized-absorptive-capacity-how-do-27ex6figoc.pdf

Managing potential and realized absorptive capacity: how do organizational antecedents matter?

The assumption that ‘local search’ constrains the direction of corporate R&D is central in evolutionary perspectives on technological change and competition. In this paper, we propose a network-analytic approach for identifying the evolution of firms' technological positions. The approach (1) permits graphical and quantitative assessments of the extent to which firms' search behavior is locally bounded, and (2) enables firms to be positioned and grouped according to the similarities in their innovative capabilities. The utility of the proposed framework is demonstrated by an analysis of strategic partnering and the evolution of the technological positions of the 10 largest Japanese semiconductor producers from 1982 to 1992.

/pdf/local-search-and-the-evolution-of-technological-capabilities-29ju6bqg3k.pdf

Local search and the evolution of technological capabilities

Technology's contribution to economic growth and competitiveness has been the subject of vigorous debate in recent years. This book demonstrates the importance of a historical perspective in understanding the role of technological innovation in the economy. The authors examine key episodes and institutions in the development of the U.S. research system and in the development of the research systems of other industrial economies. They argue that the large potential contributions of economics to the understanding of technology and economic growth have been constrained by the narrow theoretical framework employed within neoclassical economies. A richer framework, they believe, will support a more fruitful dialogue among economists, policymakers, and managers on the organization of public and private institutions for innovation. David Mowery is Associate Professor of Business and Public Policy at the School of Business Administration, University of California, Berkeley. Nathan S. Rosenberg is Fairleigh Dickinson Professor of Economics at Stanford University. He is the author of Inside the Black Box: Technology and Economics (CUP, 1983).

Technology and the Pursuit of Economic Growth.

This paper attempts to extend information-processing theory so that it can be meaningfully applied to MNCs. A specific multidimensional framework is developed that can be used to measure the information-processing capacities of macro-level features of MNC organizational design. An applied example, transnationalism, is used to illustrate how to apply the framework and demonstrate that it can contribute meaningful new insight to this complex organizational problem.

https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdfplus/154913

Information-Processing Theory and the Multinational Enterprise

Using a sample of 95 German firms, the study finds general support for the traditional fits of international strategy-structure theory. Employing an information-processing perspective, the study conceptually and empirically extends existing theory (1) to address strategy-structure fit for various types of matrix structure, and (2) by adding two new elements of international strategy to the existing international strategy-structure model: the level of international transfers and level of foreign R&D.

A reexamination and extension of international strategy-structure theory

Using a sample of 95 German firms, the study finds general support for the traditional fits of international strategy–structure theory. Employing an information-processing perspective, the study conceptually and empirically extends existing theory (1) to address strategy–structure fit for various types of matrix structure, and (2) by adding two new elements of international strategy to the existing international strategy–structure model: the level of international transfers and level of foreign R&D. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/147614/1/manuskript_537.pdf

This article develops a contingency model for managing a variety of corporate crises. It views crisis management as an information-processing situation and organizations that must cope with crises as information-processing systems. Depending on whether a crisis originates in the more immediate or relevant environment of a firm or in its more remote environment and whether it involves technical failure or sociopolitical failure, the information-processing requirements confronting a firm will vary. The model attempts to fit appropriate information-processing mechanisms to different categories of crises. To facilitate future research and empirical testing of the model, specific propositions are deduced from the conceptual framework.

An Information-Processing Model of Crisis Management

Recent views of the MNC as some kind of differentiated network raise questions about the value of a parent HQ and hierarchical structure in today’s MNCs. This paper attempts to address such questions by identifying and describing three broad tasks where hierarchical structures with a parent HQ should outperform a network structure. The tasks are: developing and implementing tight coupling within MNCs, identifying and defining economies of scale and scope, and identifying and incorporating significant innovation into MNC strategy.


The paper uses an information processing perspective to conceptualize the important differences between hierarchical and network structures and to evaluate how well each structure fits the specific task situations. It concludes that hierarchical structures with a parent HQ are still required in today’s MNCs.

William G. Egelhoff

Papers

Information-Processing Theory and the Multinational Enterprise

A reexamination and extension of international strategy-structure theory

A reexamination and extension of international strategy-structure theory

An Information-Processing Model of Crisis Management

How the Parent Headquarters Adds Value to an MNC