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Lane & Lubatkin (1998) "Relative absorptive capacity and interorganizational learning

26 important questions on Lane & Lubatkin (1998) "Relative absorptive capacity and interorganizational learning

What is relative absorptive capacity?

A firm's ability to learn from another firm is argued to depend on the similarity of both firms'

knowledge bases
organization's structures and compensation policies
dominant logics

Competition is increasingly knowledge-based. Why?

Firms strive to learn and develop capabilities faster than their rivals

What has led to a shift from traditional resource or risk-sharing alliances to alliances with learning from partners as a primary goal?

The time between the identification of a problem and its arrival may not allow the firm to internally develop the knowledge and capabilities needed to respond effectively

What can firms do through learning alliances?

Speed capability development and minimize their exposure to technological uncertainties by acquiring and exploiting knowledge developed by others

Where does the importance of learning alliances to capability development place a premium on?

On a firm's ability to identify, assimilate, and utilize a partner's knowledge

How is absorptive capacity defined?

As a firm's ability to recognize the value of new, external knowledge, assimilate it, and apply it to commercial ends.

What does every industry have for success?

Its own industry recipe, the conventional wisdom on how a firm's resoruces, knowledge, and processes should be combined and utilized to cope with the environment

Which three methods are there for learning new external knowledge?

Passive
Active
Interactive

When does passive learning occur?

When firms acquire articulable knowledge about technical and managerial processes from sources such as journals, seminars, and consultants

What are more active forms of learning?

Bench-marking and competitors intelligence

Why can only the observable portion of another organization's experience be acquired?

Because this learning occurs at arm's length

What is the observable portion of anothers experience?

The who, what, when, and where

What does the fact that the knowledge they provide is articulable (observable) mean?

That it is no longer rare, imperfectly traded, or costly to imitate

What is interactive learning?

A student firm gets close enough to the teacher firm to understand not just the objective and observable components of the teacher's capabilities, but also the more tacit components: the how and why knowledge.

Why is this knowledge more unique, less imitable, and thus better able to create strategic value?

Because this knowledge is embedded in a firm's social context

What are the three industry wide effects where the incentives for investing in absorptive capacity are driven by?

Demand
Appropriability
Technological opportunity

Which two criteria must a firms scientific or technological knowledge meet in order for it to be relevant enough to facilitate understanding and valuing new external knowledge?

It must possess some amount of prior knowledge basic to the new knowledge
Some fraction of the teacher's knowledge must be fairly diverse to permit effective, creative utilization of the new knowledge be the student

What dus understanding of the relevant basic knowledge permits the student firm to?

To understand the assumptions that shape the teacher's knowledge and thereby be in a better position to evaluate the importance of the new knowledge for its own operations

When do student firms have the greatest potential to learn from teachers?

When they have similar basic knowledge but different specialized knowledge

What is often the motivation for establishing interorganizational collaborations?

The acquisition of new specialized knowledge

What does the similarity of two firms'compensation policies serve as?

As one proxy (volmacht) for the similarity of their knowledge-processing systems and norms.

What is the organizational structure?

The degree of formalization and centralization used by the firm when allocating tasks, responsibilities, authority, and decisions

Why is structure important to how firms process knowledge?

Because organization members interact not only as individuals but also as actors performing organizational roles

What does structure reflect and store knowledge about?

The organization's perception of the environment and influences an organization's communication processes.

What is a subtle but important difference between this dimension (commercialize) of relative absorptive capacity and the two prior dimensions?

The first dimension is the similarity of scientific, technical, or academic knowledge: the know-what portion of the student's and teacher's knowledge bases
The second dimension is the similartiy of the two firms' knowledge processing, the know-how portion of their knowledge bases
The last dimension focuses on the similarities in the student's and teacher's commercial objectives, the know-why portion of their knowledge

What does the dominant logic of a firm determine?

How it applies knowledge and has implications for the commercialization of new external knowledge

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