V. K. Narayanan

Understanding software operations support expertise: a revealed causal mapping approach

This paper utilizes a qualitative methodology, revealed causal mapping (RCM), to investigate the phenomenon of software operations support expertise. Software operations support is a large portion of the IS work performed in organizations. While we as researchers have access to generalized theories and frameworks of expertise, very little is known about expertise in this critical area. To understand software operations support expertise, a mid-range theory is evoked from interviews with experts and the construction of RCMs from those interviews. The results of this study indicate that software operation support expertise is comprised of five major constructs: personal competencies, environmental factors, support personnel motivation, IS policies, and support personnel outcomes. Additionally, this study revealed that these constructs interact differently in contexts where software support is the main activity versus contexts where the focus is development. This study demonstrates that the use of the RCM methodology yields constructs of software operations support expertise that are not suggested by generalized theory. In addition, the use of RCM as an evocative, qualitative methodology reveals the interaction and linkages between these constructs. This paper also provides a history of and tutorial to the RCM methodology for use by the research community.

The Cognitive Perspective in Strategy: An Integrative Review

This article integrates the literature on strategic cognition (SC) within a framework that links the antecedents, structure, and process of SC with outcomes. Reviewing the literature from 1993 (two years prior to Walsh’s review of managerial and organizational cognition) until 2007, this article identifies three elements of SC structure (organizational identity, strategy frames, and organizational routines) and four SC processes (strategy formulation, strategy implementation, strategic change, and organizational learning). The literature portrays strategy formulation as a complex activity consisting of scanning, sensemaking, and decision making. Strategy implementation is composed of sensegiving, sensemaking, and issue selling. This review identifies five streams of empirical research with three well-developed themes (the antecedents and outcomes of strategy frames, determinants and consequences of strategy formulation, and cognitive construction of competitive/industry dynamics) and two emerging themes (the determinants and consequences of strategy implementation and the antecedents and outcomes of organizational identity). This review identifies several opportunities to extend the literature and outlines key methodological implications. Finally, the review addresses the need to build linkages to the ongoing theoretical conversations within strategic management literature.

Building Organizational and Scientific Platforms in the Pharmaceutical Industry: A Process Perspective on the Development of Dynamic Capabilities

In this paper, we examine the process of dynamic capability development in a large pharmaceutical firm. Using interviews with multiple managers at different organizational levels, we developed two narratives of the process of developing two separate dynamic capabilities in the same firm. We focus on three areas that prior research has shown to be critical in the early stages of the process of implementing new strategic initiatives: the cognitive orientations of key personnel, managerial action undertaken within the firm, and the firms internal and external contexts. We provide evidence that managers undertake specific initiatives based on their own particular cognitive orientations, and that senior managers play a major role in the development of capabilities by imprinting the organization with their specific cognitive orientation and then orchestrating the multilevel organizational routines necessary for actualization of a capability. These replicable actions by senior management during the early stages of capability development can lead to the development of a capability that is not initially in the cognitive frames of lower level employees. Finally, we will show that internal and external contingencies have a profound impact on the decision to develop a capability, and to discontinue its development. Our findings thus suggest that the process of developing new capabilities shares common elements with other strategic initiatives.

Validity of the Structural Properties of Text-Based Causal Maps: An Empirical Assessment

Recently, text-based causal maps (TBCMs) have generated enthusiasm as a methodological tool because they provide a way of accessing large, untapped sources of data generated by organizations. Although TBCMs have been used extensively in organizational behavior and strategic management research, studies assessing the psychometric properties of TBCM measures are virtually nonexistent. With the intention of facilitating large-sample substantive research using TBCMs, the authors examine the construct validity of two most frequently employed structural properties of TBCMs: complexity and centrality. In assessing construct validity, they examine the internal consistency, dimensionality, and predictive validity of the structural properties. The results suggest that complexity is not a general cognitive attribute. Rather, it is indicative of domain knowledge. On the other hand, centrality, which reflects the degree of hierarchy characterizing the TBCM, is related to cognitive ability and may reflect general information processing. Moreover, complexity and centrality, but not cognitive ability, predicted student performance.

How top management steers fast cycle teams to success

Every merger and acquisition deal presents a different goal and a different mix of critical issues to manage. Making, consummating, and integrating a deal puts pressure on chief executives to play multiple leadership roles and switch quickly from one role to another throughout the merger process. The roles employed vary dramatically with the type of deal and how ambitious the strategy. As the rationales for transactions have changed, new challenges have evolved, especially for those leading the deals: leaders must establish and communicate the strategic vision for the merger ‐‐ they need to explain the top four or five sources of value in the deal and what the core values and culture of the new organization should be; leaders must cheer on the stakeholders to generate enthusiasm for the merger or acquisition, and to confront fear and uncertainty in its various forms; leaders must close the deal; leaders captain change by managing the integration of the two entities; and leaders crusade for the new entity. These five roles are essential to all transactions, but leaders need to employ each at different times. The strategic rationale behind the deal, and the inherent risks and opportunities that it presents, determines which roles a leader needs to play and when.

Team mental model characteristics and performance in a simulation experiment

Purpose This paper aims to examine the relationship between the characteristics of strategic decision-making team’s mental model and its performance. The authors propose that the relationship between mental models and performance is two-way, rather than one-way. Thus, performance feedback should, in turn, influence strategic behavior and future performance by either triggering or hindering the learning process. Design/methodology/approach The authors conduct the research in the setting of a simulation experiment. A longitudinal data set was collected from 36 teams functioning as strategic decision makers over three periods. Findings This study provides support for the positive impacts of both the complexity and centrality of a team’s mental model on its performance. The authors also find that positive performance feedback reduces changes in complexity and centrality of team mental models due to cognitive inertia. Originality/value The study contributes to the literature by investigating the specific mechanisms that underlie mental model evolution. Different from the existing studies on team mental models that mainly focus on similarity of these shared cognitive structures, this study examines another two characteristics of team mental model, complexity and centrality, that are more relevant to the strategic decision-making process but has not been extensively studied in the team literature. In addition, this study reveals that performance feedback has different effects on team mental models depending on the referents – past performance or social comparison – which advances the understanding of the learning effects of performance feedback.

Customer-focused IT: a process of continuous value innovation

Purpose – Transition to a digital economy and the pervasiveness of IT in a firm’s operations together has brought the IT function in corporations to the threshold of a needed transformation: from an orientation that prizes technical excellence to one that achieves continuous innovation by finding new opportunities to provide value to customers. Design/methodology/approach – The author believes that companies need to adopt customer-focused IT, this requires a shift in organizational culture, from considering technical excellence as an end in itself, to respecting customers as the centrally important stakeholder of an organization. Findings – In many companies, rethinking the IT function to focus it on providing value to the customer presents an opportunity to empower frontline employees, to make innovations in the company value chain and to maintain and to enhance competitive advantage. Practical implications – Changing to a customer focus requires dedicated continuous innovation to enlist the full resourc...

Value opportunity webs: a new concept for anticipating potential marketplace breakthroughs

Purpose – The paper aims to examine how to devise ways to capture data in and around the marketplace that generates indicators of emerging and potential marketplace change which could lead to breakthrough customer offerings and how to do so long before the opportunities are manifestly visible.Design/methodology/approach – The paper describes a new methodology, the Value Opportunity Web (VOW), a process for collecting insights about the external environment and transforming and leveraging them into winning customer offerings. These data come from unique communities of individuals “close to the action” who can anticipate, for example, how a set of technologies might someday intersect.Findings – The paper shows cases where companies have used VOWs to identify unique data sources, have created sets of technological mechanisms or “platforms” to capture the relevant data and have managed these communities successfully.Research limitations/implications – The authors are leading consultants with access to cutting...

The Design of Organizational Form for the Early Stages of a Space Station Program: A Multi-Theoretic Perspective

This paper invokes three alternative theoretical perspectives — contingency theory, organizational politics and institutional theory— to examine key decision processes with respect to the organizational form in the early stages of the space station program at NASA. Causal mapping technique was used to map the thought patterns of the three groups of decision makers. There were major differences in the perceptions of the three groups regarding the relative influence of these perspectives in the decision making process. Results indicate that these perspectives exist simultaneously and compete with each other in the decision making process.