This article provides empirical tests of the hypothesis of ‘optimal cognitive distance’, proposed by Nooteboom (1999, 2000), in two distinct empirical settings. Variety of cognition, needed for learning, has two dimensions: the number of agents with different cognition, and differences in...

This paper analyses how organizational routines change. It focuses on the level of learning groups within organizations. The paper starts with a summary of the 'activity theory' of knowledge used. Next, the notion of scripts is used, to analyse organizational groups as 'systems of distributed...

This article connects theory of learning with theory of governance, in the context of inter-firm relations. It recognizes fundamental criticism of transaction cost economics (TCE), but preserves elements from that theory. Two kinds of relational risk are identified: hold-up and spillover risk....

Long view organizations have a technical core combining high levels of Woodwardian (1958) technological complexity and Thompsonian (1967) technological intensity. This significantly diminishes their capacity for operational flexibility and strategic adaptation. Little is known about how such...

Increasingly, it has been recognised that in their process of internationalisation multinationals may learn. They may take a strategy not only of exploitation, to leverage existing assets, competencies and products, built up in their home countries, but also, and perhaps even primarily, of...

In this study, we examine the prevalence of different KM practices and the organizational determinants of KM among SMEs by conducting a quantitative study of empirical data from nearly 500 Dutch SMEs. Our empirical results show that knowledge is managed in a people-based approach in SMEs. SMEs...

In an attempt at a systematic theory of entrepreneurship, this paper connects various literatures, from economics and business. In economics, there are many notions of entrepreneurship, some of which seem to contradict each other. For example, there are notions of entrepreneurship as an...

This chapter offers a theory and method for the analysis of the dynamics, i.e. the development, of clusters for innovation. It employs an analysis of three types of embedding: institutional embedding, which is often localized, structural embedding (network structure), and relational embedding...

In the midst of the turbulence wrought by the global economy, it has become common to see projects as an essential medium for achieving change. However, project based learning practices - as a subset of organizational learning practices- have not kept pace with this development. To explore this...