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Dynamic in-capabilities : the paradox of routines in the ecology of complex innovation

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Swan, Jacky, Robertson, Maxine and Newell, Susan (2016) Dynamic in-capabilities : the paradox of routines in the ecology of complex innovation. In: Howard-Grenville, Jennifer A. and Rerup, Claus and Langly, Ann and Tsoukas, Haridimos, (eds.) Organizational routines : how they are created, maintained, and changed. Perspectives on Process Organization Studies . Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780198759485

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Official URL: http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/918931545

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Abstract

In this chapter we identify the routines enacted in complex innovation processes, specifically during early phase drug development projects. We consider how routines performed locally are nested in, and entwined with, an organizational ecology constituted by multiple stakeholders and an innovation process characterized by ‘unknowability’. Drawing from an extensive study of eleven innovation projects in biotechnology firms, we identify strategic routines - protecting, evolving and resourcing the science - that are enacted across organizations in order to develop new therapeutics. These constitute the overarching capabilities that all biotechnology firms must develop if they are to survive in the ecology. We then identify three performative routines enacted within specific projects in these firms as hedging, compressing and reprioritizing. We characterize these routines as ‘guesswork’ and show how they entail a pragmatic response to the unknowability that has to be ‘managed’ in this setting. These performative routines reflect the influence and pressures generated by other organizations in the ecology – notably, investors and potential investors, who demand to see swift progress and positive outcomes, and regulatory authorities that prescribe drug development as a linear process. This fosters a regime whereby guesswork routines at the project level simultaneously acquiesce to institutional pressures within the project ecology to demonstrate progress, yet may practically hinder the innovation process.

Item Type: Book Item
Subjects: H Social Sciences > HD Industries. Land use. Labor
Divisions: Faculty of Social Sciences > Warwick Business School > Innovation, Knowledge & Organisational Networks Research Unit
Faculty of Social Sciences > Warwick Business School
Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH): Organizational learning
Series Name: Perspectives on Process Organization Studies
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Place of Publication: Oxford
ISBN: 9780198759485
Book Title: Organizational routines : how they are created, maintained, and changed
Editor: Howard-Grenville, Jennifer A. and Rerup, Claus and Langly, Ann and Tsoukas, Haridimos
Official Date: March 2016
Dates:
DateEvent
March 2016Published
Number of Pages: 304
Status: Peer Reviewed
Publication Status: Published
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