Managerial Meta-knowledge, Uncertainty, and Adaptation: Governance Choice when Firms do Not Know Their Capabilities

Henrik Jensen, Nicolai Juul Foss

    Research output: Contribution to conferencePaperResearchpeer-review

    Abstract

    "Managerial Meta-Knowledge, Uncertainty, and Adaptation: Governance Choice when Firms do not Know their Capabilities" Much research on economic organization (e.g., transaction cost economics) is based on an assumption that firms accurately know their own capabilities. In terms of what managers know about the resources of the firm (including employee knowledge) we argue that this amounts to an assumption of perfect managerial meta-knowledge. However, research streams on resource cognition, transaction memory and organizational self- knowledge suggests that this assumption is not in general warranted. We examine the implications for economic organization of less-than-perfect managerial meta-knowledge. Specifically, we show that imperfect managerial meta- knowledge is a cause of surprises in contractual relationships, affects the ability of coordinated adaptation, and an opportunism-independent driver of ex post transaction costs. We discuss implications for efficient governance choice of imperfect managerial meta-knowledge. Our study contributes to the ongoing cross-fertilization between the knowledge-based view and transaction cost economics.
    Original languageEnglish
    Publication date2014
    Number of pages44
    Publication statusPublished - 2014
    EventThe Academy of Management Annual Meeting 2014: The Power of Words - Philadelphia, United States
    Duration: 1 Aug 20145 Aug 2014
    Conference number: 74
    http://aom.org/annualmeeting/

    Conference

    ConferenceThe Academy of Management Annual Meeting 2014
    Number74
    Country/TerritoryUnited States
    CityPhiladelphia
    Period01/08/201405/08/2014
    Internet address

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