Electronic commerce (E-commerce) innovations: Internet-enabled commerce (I-commerce), mobile commerce (M-commerce) and ubiquitous commerce (U-commerce) have posed technological and organizational changes. This study develops an E-commerce innovation hypercube model to investigate these innovations and the impact of the innovations on the E-commerce stakeholders¡Ð E-businesses, providers, customers, and complementors. The results indicate that the innovation from I-commerce to M-commerce is architectural for customers and E-businesses, incremental for providers, but disruptive for complementors. The innovation from M-commerce to U-commerce is modular to customers, architectural to complementors, and disruptive to E-businesses and providers. Thereafter, several core dynamic capabilities that necessary for E-business transformation from I-commerce to M-commerce and from M-commerce to U-commerce and the practical indicators in developing these dynamic capabilities are suggested, respectively.

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Studien avser att ur ett ledningsperspektiv undersöka vilka faktorer som påverkar privata företag samt hur företagen arbetar för att vara flexibla och skapar förhållningssätt i relation till dessa. Vidare vill vi jämföra det empiriska materialet med det teoretiska resonemang som producerats i den vetenskapliga arenan för att bidra med insikter som kan utveckla forskning inom området. Det empiriska resultatet bygger på åtta kvalitativa intervjuer med representanter från HR-funktionen i företag inom privat sektor. Både resultat och vetenskaplig genomgång har visat på variationer av såväl påverkan som förhållningssätt. Företagens val av förhållningssätt eller strategi har gjorts med bakgrund av varierande orsaker och har lett till olika effekter beroende på verksamhetsspecifika förutsättningar. Detta medför svårigheter avseende definitionen av vad som påverkar, hur det påverkar samt hur företag bör förhålla sig. Vissa strategier visade sig fungera bra i en typ av verksamhet medan samma typ av strategi inte påstods vara möjlig i andra. Sammanfattningsvis kan vi konstatera att företagens möjlighet att förhålla sig till förändrade förutsättningar utgör deras överlevnads förmåga. Vidare har det visat sig att detta omfattar både företagets flexibilitet och dess förmåga att minska flexibilitetsbehovet.

Digital disruptions are changing the healthcare ecosystem, requiring organizations to rethink IT strategies and develop new IT competencies. This study focuses on the exploitation and exploration tension that managers face within an IT organization of a global pharmaceutical company, and their response to the related environmental exigencies in healthcare. Dynamic capability theory (DC) provides the overall framing, while ambidexterity provides an understanding of top management’s response to the exploit–explore tensions that arise. This engaged scholarship longitudinal case study takes a shifting stories methodological approach to elicit participants’ reflections and interpretations of significant events, including their own role in evolving the ambidextrous posture of the IT organization. Through rich description stories, process related decisions have been revealed, and have provided an understanding into organizational reconfiguration of IT resources. Subsequently, this resulted in a situated grounded model for understanding DC and OA for this case. Practical insights are offered on how dynamic capability theory could be applied for IT management to be smarter at becoming more ambidextrous.

Background: The deregulation of the airline and airport sectors has introduced airport managers to free market competition. Purpose: The purpose of this thesis is to identify dynamic capabilities in a regional airport, examine which of the predominant views they correlate to and whether dynamic capabilities concern different levels of strategy. Method: This study uses a qualitative method. Data are collected through a documentary review and interview. The documentary review concerns the features of and trends in the airport sector. The interviews were conducted with three managers of Jönköping Airport, experienced at managing regional airports in Sweden and Europe. Conclusion: The study identified several dynamic capabilities correlating in various degrees to the different predominant views. Some of dynamic capabilities found were of the kind that might be expected at most firms, such as strategic decision-making and product development. Others were more specific for the sector, such as the ability to build a highly adaptable work force. However, none were irrelevant across businesses. This is thought to be a result of the focus on higher management. The study also found that different dynamic capabilities concern different levels of strategy. Strategic decision-making concern corporate-level strategy, while product development is concerned with business-level strategizing. We suggest this is one way of approaching the proposition made by Winter (2003) that there are different levels of dynamic capabilities ad infinitum.

Outsourcing refers to contracting out the functions to a third party instead of conducting them in-house. The main contribution of this dissertation is to develop and test a model of successful outsourcing in the accomplishment of headquarters selling task. Specifically, it intends to (a) provide a theoretical framework for outsourcing partnership performance, (b) explore the potential complementarities construct in the context of a dyadic outsourcing relationship, (c) examine the role of learning dynamic capabilities in turning potential complementarities into outsourcing success, and (d) explicate the role of structural social capital as an antecedent to learning dynamic capability construct . The conceptual framework of the model is based on the resource-advantage theory which posits that resources, potential complementarities and dynamic capabilities are explicated as sub-constructs. The pool of respondents who are the practicing managers of outsourcing in the consumer packaged goods industry was used to test the hypothesized relationships. The findings showed that the learning dynamic capabilities construct is the most important factor affecting in the outsourcing partnership performance in the context of headquarters selling task. The task-related resources of the outsourcer had a significant positive effect on potential complementarities. However, the positive effect of the outsourcee’s task-related resources on potential complementarities was not significant. Likewise, the positive effect of the potential complementarities on the outsourcing partnership performance did not emerge as significant. The effect of structural social capital of the outsourcer had a significant but negative influence on learning dynamic capabilities. The positive effect of structural social capital of the outsourcee on learning dynamic capabilities and the moderating role of learning dynamic capabilities were found to be insignificant.

Enterprise risk management (ERM) is a widely studied management control process, representing an important advancement from the traditional methods by which firms control the risks they face. This study steps back from attempts to quantify the relationship between ERM and firm performance. Instead, it explores how non-financial institutions with significant time and resource commitments to ERM configure those resources to effectuate a downside-upside duality as ERM is adopted, using for the first time in ERM research the theoretical lens of ambidexterity as a dynamic capability. This duality is the simultaneous engagement in mitigating existing and emerging risks while pursuing new value contributions from risk management processes. Empirical evidence indicates that the downside-upside duality is asymmetric, and challenges exist in quantifying the upside. The upside value component is most closely associated with raising the level of the risk discourse in firms. This is accomplished structurally by establishing new ERM-focused organizational subunits, and contextually by stretching capabilities. Dynamic capabilities emerge as firms sense, seize and reconfigure resources in the operationalization of ERM to supplant core competencies associated with traditional modes of risk management. Practitioners will gain from this research a richer understanding of the fit, form and function of ERM informed by empirical data and extrinsic theory.

ABSTRACT This research is about identifying the characteristics or success profiles of professionals working in the turnaround industry. The turnaround industry possesses a number of dynamic capabilities in processes, positions, resources and paths that are unique to its industry. The firms that compete in the turnaround industry serve their clients, the dying organizations, by using a mix of these dynamic capabilities. While these dynamic capabilities are seen as the turnaround firms’ “secrets of success,” they have over time evolved into “best practices.” This commoditization of best practices in the turnaround industry has created a need for turnaround firms to search for a competitive advantage. Specifically, this advantage is identified in the literature as the skills, knowledge, and experience of the turnaround professional. These unique characteristics of the turnaround management professional (TMP), see appendix C for a complete definitions of terms, have been accounted for in the Turnaround Management Association (TMA) certification process called the Certified Turnaround Professional, or CTP. One of the TMA’s goals is to establish professional work standards and guidelines and to regulate the industry. While a noble effort, this focus takes the “competitive advantage” away from the turnaround organization and standardizes it into the “best practices” arena via “certified” professionals leaving these organizations to compete on size and location alone. Evidence from a focus group, case research interviews, and two different surveys, suggests that there is a profound difference in the effectiveness of TMPs beyond the knowledge, skill, and experience levels identified as one of the core components of dynamic capabilities theory. This evidence led to the investigation of psychometric profiling as a method to measure the distinct success profiles of these “highly successful” TMPs, or Most Valuable players (MVP). Measuring the thinking style (cognitive reasoning ability), work motivation, personality behaviors, and occupational interests of MVP s, has led to the discovery of a success composite. The findings of this research suggest that MVP s score higher on this composite than do other TMPs who were identified as “low performers”, or Least Valuable Players (LVP), as well as non-turnaround managers, executives, and business professionals in general. It is postulated that by using this composite score in hiring, training, and promoting turnaround professionals, a turnaround firm will obtain a competitive advantage in their industry and generate higher success for all stakeholders. Resultantly, the researchers have uncovered a critical gap in the dynamic capability theory surrounding the construct of human capital. Evidence suggests that psychometric profiling is an acceptable and, indeed, important measure of the value of human capital.

Die Arbeit geht der Frage nach inwiefern die Capability Based View (CBV) einen Erklärungsbeitrag für die Verwaltungsforschung leisten kann. Dazu unterzieht sie die CBV einer kritischen Betrachtung und benennt die wichtigsten Merkmale dieses – nach wie vor unscharfen – Konzepts mit Bezug zum öffentlichen Sektor. Sie zeigt Parallelen von Ansätzen und Ergebnissen der Verwaltungsforschung zur CBV auf und stellt ihre generelle Verwendbarkeit in diesem Kontext fest. Ebenso diagnostiziert sie jedoch signifikanten Verbesserungsbedarf hinsichtlich der Klarheit des Konzepts. Eine Fokussierung auf den öffentlichen Sektor verspricht eher eine Konsolidierung und Weiterentwicklung der CBV als deren Erforschung im Privatsektor, da das multidimensionale und mehrstufige Verständnis von Performance im öffentlichen Sektor deutlich besser zur Wirkungslogik der CBV passt. Die Arbeit schließt mit einer Forschungsagenda, welche die wichtigsten Fragen zur Weiterentwicklung aufzeigt, und dem Appell für mehr qualitative empirische Forschung in diesem neuen Feld des Public Managements. / The paper explores the explanatory potential of the Capability Based View (CBV) for research on public administrations. It does so by re-examining the – up till now – rather vague concept and sharpening it with a focus on the public sector. Parallels are drawn between the central propositions of the CBV and findings in public administration research. The focus lies on the link between capabilities and performance. Here, special attention is paid to the nexus between capabilities and performance, which originally fueled the interest in the CBV. It is concluded that the CBV is generally a fruitful approach for public administration research, yet with significant shortcomings in respect to its consolidation and clarity. The explanatory power of the CBV could actually be enhanced by applying it to the public sector: the multidimensional and -level understanding of performance in public sector organizations seems to match the propositions of the CBV far better than the one commonly used to evaluate performance in the private sector. The paper concludes with a research agenda summarizing the most important questions and a call for more qualitative empirical research in this emerging field within public management.

ABSTRACT Small and Medium Size Enterprise (SMEs) have long been recognised as the major drivers of economic activities due to their entrepreneurial traits of being innovative which lead to job creation, sustaining economic growth, export expansion, and efficient allocation of resources in line with their competitive goals and their respective country’s objectives. In their pursuit as major economic drivers in their respective economies, SMEs are barely exposed to hostile environments triggering fierce competition from Multinational Corporations. This has entailed that SMEs need to enhance their capabilities in such environments to sustain their competitive advantage by reconfiguring their internal and external competences and resources in response to changing environments. Surprisingly, literature on how SMEs develop dynamic capabilities in such markets is limited and inconsistent. Therefore, this thesis explores how SMEs develop dynamic capabilities in emerging markets specifically in African markets.   The central purpose of the study is to explore how SMEs in emerging markets such as Africa develop dynamic capabilities to compete alongside MNCs. Building on prior researches which conceptually suggested that market orientation, learning orientation, and entrepreneurial orientation in separate cases, enables SMEs to build dynamic capabilities in dynamic environments, this study explored this viewpoint through a qualitative case study data. Comparative multiple case studies are developed in order to have a holistic understanding of how SMEs across sectors develop dynamic capabilities. The study employs empirical data collected through the use of semi-structured interviews in which samples are purposively selected from 10 firms from separate industries in Africa, in which five were drawn from Cameroon and other five drawn from Zambia. The study follows a qualitative-deductive approach.   Findings indicate that SMEs develop dynamic capabilities in emerging market principally through the lenses of market orientation and learning orientation. While entrepreneurial orientation is found lacking the potential to enable SMEs build-up the required dynamic capabilities due to the fact that it places huge demand on SMEs who are short of adequate financial resources to meet up with the contingencies of being fully entrepreneurial. That is to say, market orientation and learning orientation other than entrepreneurial orientation are the enablers of dynamic capabilities in emerging market. The findings contribute to existing literature by building an empirically-grounded synthesis of the constructs of market orientation, learning orientation and entrepreneurial orientation involved in the development of dynamic capabilities which validates earlier claims on the development of dynamic capabilities in dynamic environment. Second, the results contribute to theory by advancing an original model which brings together all standalone models in the field of dynamic capabilities development into one, thereby harmonising the polarisation of facts. Furthermore, the findings bear potential for researchers and entrepreneurs intending to invest in emerging markets such as Africa.   To improve on this study, we suggest undertaking a related cross-comparative case study on similar grounds which takes into account homogeneity and age parameters at industry level from two or more countries. We believe this might provide an additional explanation on how SMEs in emerging markets develop dynamic capability and may also shed more light on whether age of a firm has an effect on the build-up of dynamic capabilities.