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Lookup NU author(s): Professor Roy Suddaby, Professor Charles Harvey
This is the authors' accepted manuscript of an article that has been published in its final definitive form by Wiley, 2019.
For re-use rights please refer to the publisher's terms and conditions.
Abstract Research Summary: The capacity to manage history is an important but undertheorized component of dynamic capabilities. We argue that the capacity to manage the interpretation of the past, in the present for the future, is a critical ability that informs a firm’s ability to successfully enact changes needed to adapt to disruptive technology. We identify and elaborate three specific cognitive interpretations of history – history as objective fact, history as interpretive rhetoric and history as imaginative future-perfect thinking – and demonstrate how these different views of history can be mobilized by managers to sense, seize and reconfigure around opportunities made available by understanding the invisible thread of technology. Managerial Summary: History is typically understood to be a constraint on a manager’s ability to effect change. A firm’s past is assumed to create inertia in routines and structures that compromise a firm’s ability to change. We show how acquiring a broader understanding of the role of history can improve a manager’s ability to enact organizational change. Studying the evolution of technology over time and across products allows managers to sense opportunities created by technological change. Using different narrations of the past as continuous or disruptive can improve a manager’s ability to motivate or resist change. Using the past to construct convincing scenarios of the future, managers can enrol key stakeholders in the industry to support a strategic direction that advances the firm’s strategic goals.
Author(s): Suddaby R, Coraiola D, Harvey C, Foster W
Publication type: Article
Publication status: Published
Journal: Strategic Management Journal
Year: 2019
Volume: 41
Issue: 3
Pages: 530-556
Online publication date: 15/07/2019
Acceptance date: 29/04/2019
Date deposited: 30/04/2019
ISSN (print): 0143-2095
ISSN (electronic): 1097-0266
Publisher: Wiley
URL: https://doi.org/10.1002/smj.3058
DOI: 10.1002/smj.3058
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