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• Working Paper | HBS Working Paper Series | 2020

  Iterative Coordination and Innovation

  Sourobh Ghosh and Andy Wu

  Agile management practices from the software industry continue to transform the way organizations innovate across industries, yet they remain understudied in the organizations literature. We investigate the widespread Agile practice of iterative coordination: frequent meetings to coordinate individuals on innovation-oriented organizational goals. While the assumed purpose of iterative coordination is to generate innovation, there is limited empirical evidence as to whether this practice actually makes organizations more innovative. With the leading technology firm Google, we embed a field experiment within a hackathon software development competition to identify the effect of iterative coordination on innovation. We find that iterative coordination’s influence on innovation is mixed: while iteratively coordinating firms develop more valuable products, these products are simultaneously less novel. This counterintuitive result highlights a paradox at the heart of iterative coordination—whereas it intends to promote innovation, applying it yields less novelty, a necessary component of innovation. Furthermore, by tracking software code, we find that iteratively coordinating firms favor integration at the cost of specialization to create new knowledge. A follow-on laboratory study documents that increasing the frequency and goal orientation of iterative coordination meetings reinforces value and integration, while reducing novelty and specialization. This article makes three key contributions: refining theoretical understanding of the relationship between goal coordination and innovation; introducing empirical methodology for generating data with hackathons and software code version-tracking; and responding to calls from the literature to study new methods of organizing and whether they offer new insights on organizational innovation.

  Keywords: innovation; organizations; goals; Integration; specialization; coordination; field experiment; software development;

  Citation:

  Ghosh, Sourobh, and Andy Wu. "Iterative Coordination and Innovation." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 20-121, January 2020.  View Details

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• Case | HBS Case Collection | April 2020

  Cisco Systems and OpenDNS: Strategic Integration (B)

  Andy Wu and David Wang

  With more than 72,000 employees and revenues approaching the $50B mark, Cisco Systems is one of the largest information technology and networking firms globally. As the company grew and expanded into different lines of businesses, Cisco consistently looked outwards for acquisition targets that could supplement its considerable size and reach. As a follow-up to its well-received $2.7B acquisition of SourceFire in 2013, which seamlessly integrated new cybersecurity offerings into the Security business group, Cisco began conversations with OpenDNS. OpenDNS was a fast-growing start-up with credibility in the cloud security space, but there were also concerns about how its Silicon Valley culture and flat organizational culture would mesh with Cisco’s more staid corporate environment. This case considers the dilemmas that two Cisco executives, Karen Ashley and Dianne Nakanishi, face as they make a final decision about whether and how to acquire and integrate OpenDNS.

  Keywords: Mergers and Acquisitions; Integration; Corporate Strategy; Change Management; Entrepreneurship; Organizational Culture; Information Technology Industry;

  Citation:

  Wu, Andy, and David Wang. "Cisco Systems and OpenDNS: Strategic Integration (B)." Harvard Business School Case 720-466, April 2020.  View Details

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• Case | HBS Case Collection | November 2019 (Revised April 2020)

  Microsoft Azure and the Cloud Wars

  Andy Wu and Cindy Na

  Citation:

  Wu, Andy, and Cindy Na. "Microsoft Azure and the Cloud Wars." Harvard Business School Case 720-409, November 2019. (Revised April 2020.)  View Details

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