Reflections on the 2013 Decade Award: 'Exploitation, Exploration, and Process Management: The Productivity Dilemma Revisited' Ten Years Later

Mary  Benner; Michael   Tushman

Article | Academy of Management Review

Reflections on the 2013 Decade Award: 'Exploitation, Exploration, and Process Management: The Productivity Dilemma Revisited' Ten Years Later

Abstract

This paper reflects on Benner and Tushman (2003): "Exploitation, Exploration, and Process Management: The Productivity Dilemma Revisited." Our paper received the Academy of Management Review's best paper award in 2003 and the decade award in 2013. We consider the context within which the paper was written with particular reference to the theoretical, empirical, and managerial problems salient at that time and comment on the likely reasons the paper has had a sustained influence in the field. Looking forward, we first ask whether the paradoxes and inconsistencies we discussed are still fundamental organizational challenges, and then go further to consider ways the domain of innovation itself has changed. We suggest that because of fundamental shifts in communication and information processing costs and the increasing modularity of products and services, the nature and locus of innovation has changed over the past decade. These secular trends have profound implications for our theories of innovation and organizations. Our extant theory and research is increasingly uncoupled from the phenomena. We would be well served to revisit the nature, locus, and basic processes of innovation.

Keywords: Organizations; Innovation and Invention;

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Citation:

Benner, Mary, and Michael Tushman. "Reflections on the 2013 Decade Award: 'Exploitation, Exploration, and Process Management: The Productivity Dilemma Revisited' Ten Years Later." Academy of Management Review 40, no. 4 (October 2015): 497–514.

Working Paper | HBS Working Paper Series | 2019

Managed Ecosystems and Translucent Institutional Logics: Engaging Communities

Elizabeth J. Altman, Frank Nagle and Michael Tushman

When organizations need input into their innovation or production process, they have traditionally faced the decision to make the input themselves or buy it through the market. However, rapidly decreasing information costs allow firms to harness external communities that are neither employees of the firm hierarchy, nor traditional contracted market participants such as supply chain partners. We introduce the managed ecosystem governance form in which a central organization engages external communities and also manages these communities by maintaining some degree of control over their activities. This model is evident in various organizational approaches including multi-sided platforms, crowdsourcing, and the gig economy. Building upon the knowledge-based view of the firm, we argue that these increasingly common governance models offer a wealth of opportunities but require organizations to adopt a translucent institutional logic that is in-between the traditional closed logic of the firm and the open logic of the market. To successfully employ this model, firms must learn to shepherd communities, leverage them without exploiting them, and share intellectual property rights.

Keywords: Managed Ecosystems; Open and User Innovation Strategy; Governance; Multi-Sided Platforms;

Citation:

Altman, Elizabeth J., Frank Nagle, and Michael Tushman. "Managed Ecosystems and Translucent Institutional Logics: Engaging Communities." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 19-096, February 2019. View Details

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Reflections on the 2013 Decade Award: 'Exploitation, Exploration, and Process Management: The Productivity Dilemma Revisited' Ten Years Later

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