Industrial Networks

Companies organize in a way that involves many activities that are external to the traditional organizational boundaries. This presents challenges to operations management and managing operations involves many issues and actions dealing with external networks. Taking a network perspective changes the focus of operations management from managing the own organization to continuously developing and managing a network of external and internal resources forming a production system. This perspective may be called managing an “extraprise” rather than an “enterprise.” It should be noted that “an industrial network” should not be seen as an organizational form but as a perspective that can be used to enrich one's understanding of organizations. The industrial network perspective has three basic building blocks: actors, resources, and activities. The three building blocks and their relations constitute the network.