Skip to Main Content
HBS Home
  • About
  • Academic Programs
  • Alumni
  • Faculty & Research
  • Baker Library
  • Giving
  • Harvard Business Review
  • Initiatives
  • News
  • Recruit
  • Map / Directions
Faculty & Research
  • Faculty
  • Research
  • Featured Topics
  • Academic Units
  • …→
  • Harvard Business School→
  • Faculty & Research→
Publications
Publications
  • 2020
  • Working Paper
  • HBS Working Paper Series

Team Learning and Superior Firm Performance: A Meso-Level Perspective on Dynamic Capabilities

By: Jean-François Harvey, Henrik Bresman, Amy C. Edmondson and Gary P. Pisano
  • Format:Print
  • | Language:English
  • | Pages:51
ShareBar

Abstract

This paper proposes a team-based, meso-level perspective on dynamic capabilities. We argue that team-learning routines constitute a critical link between managerial cognition and organization-level processes of sensing, seizing, and reconfiguring. We draw from the literature to develop four categories based on the orientation (exploration/exploitation) and locus (internal/external) of learning in teams: reflexive, experimental, contextual, and vicarious learning. We integrate these categories into the dynamic capabilities framework, propose that their relative importance differs along the sensing-seizing-reconfiguring pathway, and assess their impact on innovation and strategic change. Our framework contributes by adding a meso lens to research on dynamic capabilities, thereby offering an explanation for how senior managers’ cognitive abilities can produce superior firm performance, through learning in teams.

Keywords

Dynamic Capabilities; Innovation; Strategic Change; Teams; Team Learning; Groups and Teams; Learning; Innovation and Invention; Change; Performance

Citation

Harvey, Jean-François, Henrik Bresman, Amy C. Edmondson, and Gary P. Pisano. "Team Learning and Superior Firm Performance: A Meso-Level Perspective on Dynamic Capabilities." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 19-059, December 2018. (Revised January 2020.)
  • SSRN
  • Read Now

About The Authors

Amy C. Edmondson

Technology and Operations Management
→More Publications

Gary P. Pisano

Technology and Operations Management
→More Publications

More from the Authors

    • March 2023
    • Faculty Research

    Azenta Life Sciences: The Road to Transformation

    By: Gary P. Pisano and Catherine Piner
    • March 2023
    • Faculty Research

    Woven Planet - Designing Software for the Car of the Future

    By: Gary P. Pisano and Catherine Piner
    • 2023
    • Faculty Research

    Workplace Conditions

    By: Jill Maben, Jane Ball and Amy C. Edmondson
More from the Authors
  • Azenta Life Sciences: The Road to Transformation By: Gary P. Pisano and Catherine Piner
  • Woven Planet - Designing Software for the Car of the Future By: Gary P. Pisano and Catherine Piner
  • Workplace Conditions By: Jill Maben, Jane Ball and Amy C. Edmondson
ǁ
Campus Map
Harvard Business School
Soldiers Field
Boston, MA 02163
→Map & Directions
→More Contact Information
  • Make a Gift
  • Site Map
  • Jobs
  • Harvard University
  • Trademarks
  • Policies
  • Accessibility
  • Digital Accessibility
Copyright © President & Fellows of Harvard College