Toward a knowledge‐based theory of the firm
Strategic Management JournalPublished 1 December 1996
Robert M. Grant
Citations15,667
SJR quartileQ1
SJR score10.18
SNIP3.84
Generate an AI Snapshot to get a quick, structured summary of this paper.
Study Snapshot
ObjectiveStudy objective
MethodsResearch methodology
PopulationPopulation studied
Sample sizeSample sizes
OutcomesStudy outcomes here
ResultsStudy results comes here
LimitationsResearch study limitations comes here
A concise AI-generated summary of the paper will appear here once you click Generate AI Snapshot.
TL;DR
The primary contribution of the paper is in exploring the coordination mechanisms through which firms integrate the specialist knowledge of their members, which has implications for the basis of organizational capability, the principles of organization design, and the determinants of the horizontal and vertical boundaries of the firm.
Abstract
Abstract Given assumptions about the characteristics of knowledge and the knowledge requirements of production, the firm is conceptualized as an institution for integrating knowledge. The primary contribution of the paper is in exploring the coordination mechanisms through which firms integrate the specialist knowledge of their members. In contrast to earlier literature, knowledge is viewed as residing within the individual, and the primary role of the organization is knowledge application rather than knowledge creation. The resulting theory has implications for the basis of organizational capability, the principles of organization design (in particular, the analysis of hierarchy and the distribution of decision‐making authority), and the determinants of the horizontal and vertical boundaries of the firm. More generally, the knowledge‐based approach sheds new light upon current organizational innovations and trends and has far‐reaching implications for management practice.
Keywords
Business, Management and Accounting
Journal of Financial EconomicsTheory of the firm: Managerial behavior, agency costs and ownership structure
70,674 Citations1976Michael C. Jensen, William H. Meckling
Administrative Science QuarterlyAbsorptive Capacity: A New Perspective on Learning and Innovation
34,530 Citations1990Wesley M. Cohen, Daniel A. Levinthal
The Economic JournalAn Evolutionary Theory of Economic Change.
21,720 Citations1983Brian J. Loasby, Richard R. Nelson +1 more
Organization ScienceExploration and Exploitation in Organizational Learning
21,364 Citations1991James G. March
Organization ScienceA Dynamic Theory of Organizational Knowledge Creation
17,522 Citations1994Ikujiro Nonaka
The Knowledge-Creating Company
17,349 Citations1995Ikujiro Nonaka, Hirotaka Takeuchi
Organization ScienceKnowledge of the Firm, Combinative Capabilities, and the Replication of Technology
12,871 Citations1992Bruce Kogut, Udo Zander
Production, Information Costs and Economic Organization
9,751 Citations1996Armen A. Alchian, Harold Demsetz
Organization ScienceOrganizational Learning and Communities-of-Practice: Toward a Unified View of Working, Learning, and Innovation
8,351 Citations1991John Seely Brown, Paul Duguid
Administrative Science QuarterlyArchitectural Innovation: The Reconfiguration of Existing Product Technologies and the Failure of Established Firms
8,324 Citations1990Rebecca Henderson, Kim B. Clark
Organization ScienceOrganizational Learning: The Contributing Processes and the Literatures
8,008 Citations1991George P. Huber
Research PolicyProfiting from technological innovation: Implications for integration, collaboration, licensing and public policy
7,382 Citations1993DavidJ. Teece
An evolutionary theory of economic change
6,324 Citations1982Winter, G Sidney
Organization ScienceProspering in Dynamically-Competitive Environments: Organizational Capability as Knowledge Integration
5,622 Citations1996Robert M. Grant
Management ScienceStrategic Factor Markets: Expectations, Luck, and Business Strategy
5,535 Citations1986Jay B. Barney
SSRN Electronic JournalA Behavioral Theory of the Firm
4,905 Citations1963Richard M. Cyert, James G. March
Management ScienceA Conceptual Framework for the Design of Organizational Control Mechanisms
3,657 Citations1979William G. Ouchi
American Sociological ReviewA Framework for the Comparative Analysis of Organizations
2,507 Citations1967Charles Perrow
Reflections The SoL JournalBounded Rationality and Organizational Learning
2,027 Citations1999Herbert A. Simon
American Sociological ReviewDeterminants of Coordination Modes within Organizations
1,975 Citations1976Andrew H. Van de Ven, André L. Delbecq +1 more
Academy of Management ReviewBad for Practice: A Critique of the Transaction Cost Theory
1,948 Citations1996Sumantra Ghoshal, Peter Moran
Organizational Behavior and Human Decision ProcessesHabitual routines in task-performing groups
1,044 Citations1990Connie J. G. Gersick, J. Richard Hackman
The territory of habitual behavior in groups that perform work within organizations is reconnoiters and a definition of group habits is offered, to suggest how they develop and are maintained, and to identify the circumstances when they are likely to be altered or abandoned.
The Journal of Law Economics and OrganizationThe Theory of the Firm Revisited
985 Citations1988Harold Demsetz
Edward Elgar Publishing eBooksToward an Economic Model of the Japanese Firm
957 Citations2013Masahiko Aoki
Administrative Science QuarterlyOrganizational Routines as Grammars of Action
910 Citations1994Brian T. Pentland, Henry H. Rueter
Academy of Management ProceedingsA KNOWLEDGE-BASED THEORY OF INTER-FIRM COLLABORATION.
626 Citations1995Robert M. Grant, Charles Baden‐Fuller
Organization ScienceOrganizing Work by Adaptation
450 Citations1991Edwin Hutchins
This paper considers the response of the ship's navigation team to the changed task demands imposed by the lost equipment, and argues that while the participants may have represented and thus learned the solution after it came into being, the solution was clearly discovered by the organization itself before it was discovered by any of the participants.
Elsevier eBooksTHEORIES OF THE FIRM: MARGINALIST, BEHAVIORAL, MANAGERIAL
440 Citations1978Fritz Machlup
California Management ReviewRedundant, Overlapping Organization: A Japanese Approach to Managing the Innovation Process
394 Citations1990Ikujiro Nonaka
Research on the innovation process in Japanese organizations has shown that these information and knowledge-creating characteristics are a product of what can be termed "information redundancy".
Management ScienceTechnical Dialog as an Incentive for Vertical Integration in the Semiconductor Industry
362 Citations1995Kirk Monteverde
Journal of Accounting and EconomicsScience, specific knowledge, and total quality management
329 Citations1994Karen H. Wruck, Michael C. Jensen
Information and Economic Behavior
256 Citations1973Kenneth J. Arrow
The Theory of the Firm Revisited
196 Citations1991Harold Demsetz
Research PolicyIs your firm a creative destroyer? Competitive learning and knowledge flows in the technological strategies of firms
151 Citations1995Max Boisot
European Journal of Engineering EducationNo limits to learning
93 Citations1981Mahdi Elmandjra
History shows that in the past human learning has been largely successful: human learning processes viewed at an aggregate global level have been adequate to meet the challenges as they presented themselves.
The International ExecutiveLimits to learning from the west: How western management advice may prove limited in Eastern Europe
87 Citations1992J.‐C. Spender
Scandinavian Journal of ManagementStrategy, structure and market turbulence: The international oil majors, 1970–1991
39 Citations1996Robert M. Grant, Renato Cibin
National Bureau of Economic ResearchTransactions Costs and Internal Labor Markets
29 Citations1987Sherwin Rosen
Transactions Costs and Internal Labor Markets
8 Citations1991Sherwin Rosen