Christoph Lechner

We examine an intriguing paradox regarding whether interdependencies in an organization's activity system enable or hinder strategic renewal, i.e., the incremental process through which an organization continuously adapts to the environment and explores opportunities to invoke change in its activity choices and outputs. One research stream, the "inertial view", argues that the pervasiveness of interdependencies among activities increases inertia, which inhibits strategic renewal. Another research stream, the "adaptive view", argues that the pervasiveness of interdependencies among activities allows for a rich flow of resources and information, which enables strategic renewal. In this paper, we argue that both views provide important insights but arrive at conflicting conclusions because they focus on different dimensions of interdependency. To resolve this paradox, we distinguish between an activity system's interdependency patterns and interdependency rules. We propose that the dimensions of the interdependency pattern set the context in which the dimensions of the interdependency rules guide the exchange of resources and information among interdependent activities. Integrating these two components of an activity system's interdependency design leads to a "dual understanding" of interdependency as both pattern and rule and helps explain how the inertial forces of interdependency patterns may be overcome by putting appropriate interdependency rules in place.

CEOs of large companies increasingly introduce corporate programs as a way to foster strategic renewal. Whether the goal is boosting profitability, improving business models or establishing new directions for growth, it's important to match the design of the program with the desired outcomes.

Decision speed has long been recognized as a critical determinant of firm performance, particularly in dynamic environments. Extending prior studies, which have largely focused on firm-level decision speed in small- and medium-sized organizations, this study explores how control mechanisms set by corporate headquarters in multibusiness firms influence decision speed at the strategic business unit (SBU) level. Using a multimethod approach, we first inductively derive six types of corporate control, before deductively examining their effects on SBU-level decision speed in five international multibusiness organizations. Our results suggest that three corporate control types enhance decision speed (goal setting, extrinsic incentives, and decision process control); two have no effect (negative incentives and conflict resolution); and one has a negative effect (strategy imposition). By integrating results from our qualitative and quantitative analyses, we are also able to identify transparency/alignment, outcome orientation, participation, trust, and timely feedback as the key mechanisms accounting for these effects.

This study examines relationships between group influence activities and the performance of strategic initiatives. Theory suggests that the strength of these relationships is contingent upon the degree of exploration inherent in an initiative's goals. An analysis of 96 initiatives in three large firms supports the moderating role of exploration for the use of formal authority and coalition building, demonstrating that these group influence activities are more important to performance in more exploratory initiatives. Although the direct relationship between rational justification and initiative performance is significant, there is no evidence of the moderating effect for this form of influence. The results show how groups associated with strategic initiatives use different forms of influence to reduce the investment and political uncertainties that limit initiative performance.