Market, Hierarchy, and Community as Organizing Principles in Knowledge-Intensive Work: An Empirical Analysis of New Product Development Activities in Japanese Firms

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Norio Tokumaru
2017 ◽  
Vol 21 (5) ◽  
pp. 1035-1052 ◽  
Author(s):  
David T. Rosell ◽  
Nicolette Lakemond ◽  
Lisa Melander

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to explore and characterize knowledge integration approaches for integrating external knowledge of suppliers into new product development projects. Design/methodology/approach This paper is based on a multiple, in-depth case study of six product development projects at three knowledge-intensive manufacturing firms. Findings Firms make purposeful choices to devise knowledge integration approaches when working in collaborative buyer – supplier projects. The knowledge characteristics of the supplier input guide the choice of either coupling knowledge sharing and combining across firms or decoupling knowledge sharing (across firms) and knowledge combining (within firms). Research limitations/implications This study relies on a limited number of case studies and considers only one supplier relationship in each project. Further studies could examine the challenge of knowledge integration in buyer – supplier relationships in different contexts, i.e. in relation to innovation complexity and uncertainty. Practical implications Managers need to make choices when designing knowledge integration approaches in collaborative product development projects. The use of coupled and decoupled approaches can help balance requirements in terms of joint problem-solving across firms, the efficiency of knowledge integration and the risks of knowledge leakage. Originality/value The conceptualization of knowledge integration as knowledge sharing and knowledge combining extends existing perspectives on knowledge integration as either a transfer of knowledge or as revealing the presence of pertinent knowledge without entirely transmitting it. The findings point to the complexity of knowledge integration as a process influenced by knowledge characteristics, perspectives on knowledge, openness of firm boundaries and elements of knowledge sharing and combining.


Author(s):  
Maria Manuel Mendes ◽  
Jorge F.S. Gomes ◽  
Bernardo Batiz-Lazo

This chapter uses key concepts in the knowledge management literature to analyse the procedures and practices used by a team during a new product development project. More precisely, the knowledge process or knowledge cycle is used as a means to examine issues relating to knowledge identification, creation, storage, dissemination, and application in new product development. Results from the case study also suggest that the knowledge process may be valuable in assessing the structural elements of knowledge management, but fails to provide a more comprehensive explanation of the dynamics and complexities involved. This suggests that more elaborate models are needed to explain how knowledge is created, shared and used in knowledge-intensive processes.


1997 ◽  
Vol 34 (1) ◽  
pp. 64-76 ◽  
Author(s):  
X. Michael Song ◽  
Mark E. Parry

The authors report the results from a three-year study of new product development practices in Japanese firms. They develop a causal model of factors correlated with new product success. They test the model using data collected on 788 new products developed and commercialized by Japanese firms in the past four years. The “best practices” identified in this study suggest that Japanese new product success is positively influenced by the level of cross-functional integration and information sharing, the firm's marketing and technical resources and skills, the proficiency of the new product development activities undertaken, and the nature of market conditions. Cross-functional integration and product competitive advantage are two key determinants of new product success. The authors also discuss managerial and research implications.


Author(s):  
Antonio Caforio ◽  
Angelo Corallo ◽  
Angelo Dimartino

In today’s context of strong competition among organizations and rapid changes in business surroundings, the organizations really need to start thinking about improving their performance, especially in knowledge intensive processes such as New Product Development. Business Process Management and Knowledge Management can represent organization’s strategic resources to the extent in which they are viewed as a base of success or failure, but they need to be supported by synergic systems that allow shaping the context in which knowledge is created and where knowledge can be re-used. Managing the explicit definition of the NPD processes and its resources allows the regulation of reusable “process knowledge,” the achievement of standardization, the improvement of best practice reuse, the improvement of time/cost efficiency, and the support of workers in the retrieval of knowledge resources suitable to conduct the product development activities. Thus, the aim of the chapter is to study how to best support companies in the collection and organization of process knowledge in the domain of their new product development, and to present an NPD process knowledge management framework which, starting from BPM approaches and its related technologies, allows the building of the required knowledge for the product development process more effectively for users and stakeholders.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document