CONTINGENT CAPABILITIES AND THE PROCUREMENT OF COMPLEX PRODUCT SYSTEMS

This paper focuses on how organisations utilise external capabilities to procure high-technology products and services. It is argued that the conceptual frameworks developed in the context of organisations which manufacture such products need to be modified to explain the behaviour of organisations that buy them. The use of third-party consultants in the procurement process is explored and a new class of temporary capabilities, termed Contingent Capabilities, is proposed. This class of capabilities occupies the boundary between accepted notions of core and non-core, and play an essential role in the innovation process. The roles of two distinct categories of Contingent Capabilities, strategic and tactical, within the innovation process are explored. The paper concludes with an agenda for further work in this area.

[1]  Fiona McLean,et al.  The selection of management consultants: How are governments dealing with this difficult decision? An exploratory study , 1998 .

[2]  Gillian C. Hopkinson,et al.  Organizational buying behaviour , 1986 .

[3]  M. J. Earl,et al.  The Risks of Outsourcing IT , 1996 .

[4]  Aaron J. Shenhar,et al.  Toward a typological theory of project management , 1996 .

[5]  Michael Hobday,et al.  Technology management in complex product systems (CoPS) - ten questions answered , 1999 .

[6]  K. Pavitt,et al.  The technological competencies of the world''s largest firms , 1997 .

[7]  R. Grant,et al.  Environments: Organizational Capability as Knowledge Integration , 2022 .

[8]  M. Hobday.  Product complexity, innovation and industrial organisation , 1998 .

[9]  N. Venkatraman,et al.  Beyond business process redesign: redefining Baxter's business network. , 1992, Sloan management review.

[10]  Tim Brady,et al.  Through the Looking Glass: Exploring Buyer-Supplier Relationships in Complex High-Technology Projects , 2003 .

[11]  M. Weggeman.  Sensemaking in organisations , 1996 .

[12]  Don Tapscott,et al.  Paradigm shift: The new promise of information technology: Don Tapscott and Art Caston McGraw-Hill Inc., New York, 1993, 337 pp. £21.95 ISBN 0-07-062857-2 , 1992, J. Strateg. Inf. Syst..

[13]  G. Richardson,et al.  The Organisation of Industry , 1972 .

[14]  H. Simon,et al.  Observation of a Business Decision , 1956 .

[15]  D. Midgley,et al.  Involvement of technical consultants in high technology business markets , 1997 .

[16]  O. Granstrand,et al.  Multi-Technology Corporations: Why They Have “Distributed” Rather Than “Distinctive Core” Competencies , 1997 .

[17]  E. Penrose.  The theory of the growth of the firm twenty-five years after , 1960 .

[18]  Management Consultancy: What Next? , 2002 .

[19]  Daniel A. Levinthal,et al.  ABSORPTIVE CAPACITY: A NEW PERSPECTIVE ON LEARNING AND INNOVATION , 1990 .

[20]  R. Hirschheim,et al.  Information systems outsourcing : myths, metaphors, and realities , 1993 .

[21]  M. Hammer,et al.  Reengineering the Corporation , 1993 .

[22]  C. Prahalad,et al.  The Core Competence of the Corporation , 1990 .

[23]  R. Nolan,et al.  How to Manage an IT Outsourcing Alliance , 1995 .

[24]  F. Bass,et al.  A diffusion theory model of adoption and substitution for successive generations of high-technology products , 1987 .

[25]  D. Teece,et al.  The Dynamic Capabilities of Firms: an Introduction , 1994 .

[26]  M. Hobday.  The Project-Based Organisation: An ideal form for managing complex products and systems? , 2000 .

[27]  Michael Hammer,et al.  Reengineering Work: Don’t Automate, Obliterate , 1990 .

[28]  D. Teece,et al.  DYNAMIC CAPABILITIES AND STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT , 1997 .

[29]  John M. Smith.  Troubled IT Projects: Prevention and turnaround , 2001 .

[30]  L. Willcocks,et al.  Core IS Capabilities for Exploiting Information Technology , 1998 .

[31]  R. L. Huber.  How Continental Bank outsourced its "crown jewels.". , 1993, Harvard business review.

[32]  Yoram Wind,et al.  Organizational Buying Behavior , 1978 .

[33]  O. Granstrand,et al.  Managing innovation in multi-technology corporations☆ , 1990 .

[34]  D. Leonard-Barton,et al.  Wellsprings of Knowledge: Building and Sustaining the Sources of Innovation , 1995 .

[35]  Andrea Prencipe,et al.  Breadth and depth of technological capabilities in CoPS: the case of the aircraft engine control system , 2000 .

[36]  E. Hippel,et al.  Lead users: a source of novel product concepts , 1986 .

[37]  M. Porter,et al.  How Information Gives You Competitive Advantage , 1985 .

[38]  F. W. McFarlan,et al.  Portfolio approach to information systems , 1989 .

[39]  C. Prahalad,et al.  Competing for the Future , 1994 .

[40]  Ove Granstrand,et al.  Towards a theory of the technology-based firm 1 Paper originally presented at the workshop on `Techn , 1998 .