Team Learning and Superior Firm Performance: A Meso-Level Perspective on Dynamic Capabilities
51 Pages Posted: 12 Dec 2018 Last revised: 29 Jan 2020
Date Written: January 25, 2020
Abstract
This paper proposes a team-based, meso-level perspective on dynamic capabilities. We argue that team-learning routines constitute a critical link between managerial cognition and organization-level processes of sensing, seizing, and reconfiguring. We draw from the literature to develop four categories based on the orientation (exploration/exploitation) and locus (internal/external) of learning in teams: reflexive, experimental, contextual, and vicarious learning. We integrate these categories into the dynamic capabilities framework, propose that their relative importance differs along the sensing-seizing-reconfiguring pathway, and assess their impact on innovation and strategic change. Our framework contributes by adding a meso lens to research on dynamic capabilities, thereby offering an explanation for how senior managers’ cognitive abilities can produce superior firm performance, through learning in teams.
Keywords: Dynamic capabilities, Innovation, Strategic change, Teams, Team learning
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