Amy L. Pablo

Reconceptualizing the Determinants of Risk Behavior

Past research has resulted in contradictory findings concerning the effect of risk on decision-making behavior in organizations. This article proposes a model that reconciles these unresolved contradictions by examining the usefulness of placing risk propensity and risk perception in a more central role than has been previously recognized. Based on this analysis, it is posited that risk propensity dominates both the actual and perceived characteristics of the situation as a determinant of risk behavior. Propositions derived from the conceptual model provide an agenda for future research on individual risk behavior in organizational settings.

Identifying, Enabling and Managing Dynamic Capabilities in the Public Sector

In this paper, we examine how a public sector organization developed a new strategic approach based on the identification and use of an internal dynamic capability (learning through experimenting). In response to the need for continual performance improvement in spite of reduced financial resources, this organization engaged in three overlapping phases as they shifted to this strategic approach. First, managers identified appropriate latent dynamic capabilities. Next, they used their leadership skills and built on established levels of trust to enable the use of these dynamic capabilities. Finally, they managed the tension between unrestricted development of local initiatives and organizational needs for guidance and control.

Acquisition Decision-Making Processes: The Central Role of Risk

This paper builds upon the work of organizational and strategic management scholars who have conceptualized acquisitions as decisionmaking processes, We suggest that behavioral concepts of risk, specifytally decision-maker risk perceptions andpropensities, are key to understanding the process by which acquisition candidates are selected, the characteristics of pre-acquisition evaluation and negotiations, and approaches to post-acquisition integration. By drawing upon past work concem~ng the efsects of these risk-related variables in other decisioneking contexts, we develop propositions that conceptualize their impact on acquisition decision processes. Incorporation of risk as a key variable in process theories of acquisitions provides a stronger theoretical grounding for these theories, and suggests some important practical implications for managers. Since the mid-1980’s, scholarly attention has increasingly focused on the process by which acquisitions are planned, negotiated, and integrated. While this work has varied in terms of its specific focus, a unifying thread can be seen in the conceptualization of acquisitions as strategic decision processes. In this paper, we attempt to increase our ~derst~ding of why acquisition decision processes unfold as they do, by theorizing about risk as a key variable that has been omitted from most existing work on the acquisition decision process. Finance and strategic management scholars have conducted most of the prior work that has addressed risk in relation to acquisitions. The central focus in most of these empirical studies has been on the risk/return relationship in which risk, operationalized as variation in post-acquisition performance, has been linked to acquisition type (i.e., related versus unrelated). This literature has relied almost exclusively upon ex post meusureS of risk (e.g., Montgomery & Singh, 1984).

Toward a communicative perspective of collaborating in research: the case of the researcher–decision-maker partnership

In the shift to a post-industrial order, the production and use of knowledge is gaining greater importance in a world beyond science. Particularly in the health sciences, research foundations are emphasising the importance of translating research results into practice and are experimenting with various strategies to achieve this outcome, including requiring practitioners to become part of funded research teams. In this paper, we present a case of a partnership between researchers and decision-makers in Canada who collaborated on an investigation of implementing change in health care organisations. Grounded in this case and recent empirical work, we propose that such research collaborations can be best understood from a communicative perspective and as involving four key elements: relational stance that researchers and decision-makers assume toward each other; purpose at hand that situates occasions for developing and using knowledge; knowledge-sharing practices for translating knowledge; and forums in which researchers and practitioners access knowledge. Our analyses suggest that partnerships are most effective when researchers see the value of contextualising their work and decision-makers see how this work can help them accomplish their purpose at hand.

Transforming New Ideas into Practice: An Activity Based Perspective on the Institutionalization of Practices

We develop an activity‐focused process model of how new ideas can be transformed into front line practice by reviving attention to the importance of habitualization as a key component of institutionalization. In contrast to established models that explain how ideas diffuse or spread from one organization to another, we employ a micro‐level perspective to study the subsequent intra‐organizational processes through which these ideas are transformed into new workplace practices. We followed efforts to transform the organizationally accepted idea of ‘interdisciplinary teamwork’ into new everyday practices in four cases over a six year time period. We contribute to the literature by focusing on de‐habitualizing and re‐habitualizing behaviours that connect micro‐level actions with organizational level theorizing. Our model illuminates three phases that we propose are essential to creating and sustaining this connection: micro‐level theorizing, encouraging trying the new practices, and facilitating collective meaning‐making.

Managerial risk interpretations: does industry make a difference?

Decision‐making studies incorporating risk have typically used risk measures that are generic across industries. Responding to calls for finer‐grained approaches, a recent study used a qualitative approach to discover how managers interpret risk in different industry contexts. Managers from the oil and gas (61), commercial banking (66), and software development (28) sectors were asked an open‐ended question about their conceptualizations of risk in the context of regularly encountered business situations. Resulting textual data were analyzed using QSR NUD*IST. Industry group membership and risk interpretations were found to be significantly related in that the different industry groups showed different distributions of attention to various aspects of risk. For researchers, these findings suggest the need to use differentiated risk measures. For practitioners, the findings suggest potential benefits from broadening cognitions relating to risk.

Reconciling predictions of decision making under risk

Reports on a study that examines a model of risk behaviour in which the effects of risk propensity and problem framing are jointly evaluated. Managers from 58 oil industry organizations were presented with hypothetical business decisions involving significant gains and losses, and asked to choose between action alternatives resulting in certain outcomes or probabilistic outcomes. Also evaluates the notion that tendencies towards risk taking are complex, reflecting personality traits, habits and experience. There was support for a historical basis for risk propensity, but risk preferences were not found to be influential. Further, although both risk propensity and problem framing were found to be significant predictors of risk behaviour, there was no support for prospect theory predictions. For researchers, suggests the need to incorporate individual differences into models of risk behaviour. For organizations, suggests the need for management attention to members’ risk experiences.

The case of post-acquisition integration design decisions

In a multi-method study that examined post-acquisition integration design decisions, managers were found to have poor insight into the values underlying their decision making. This lack of insight was not found to be moderated by increased levels of experience with acquisition decision making, and its effects were reflected in post-acquisition performance.

Using a Medical Model in the Management Classroom

Although the linkages between management and medical education may not be apparent at first blush, they become more obvious when we recognize that one approach to studying the object of interest, be it the organization or the human body, is a systems approach. In the process of designing a new master of business administration (MBA) program, we have drawn on this linkage to develop a curriculum that is integrated across disciplines and that is applied in its orientation. This approach was taken in an effort to overcome the fragmented curriculum delivery that is prevalent in most MBA programs and to provide students with the practical, hands-on experience the business community is seeking in management graduates (Learned, 1991; Porter & McKibben, 1988).