No abstract

This article investigates knowledge integration in product development projects.While much previous literature draws attention to the need for clearly specified goals, extensive knowledge sharing and close face-to-face interaction for activity and knowledge integration, alternative explanations are offered. The findings highlight the integrative capacity of individuals' experience and tacit foreknowledge of the stacker artefact, as well as the complementary role of meetings and ad hoc problem solving. The article proposes an iterative model of the individual/collective dynamics involved and calls attention to its economizing potential. More generally, it provides an example of how the issue of knowledge integration may be reformulated into a dynamic perspective, recognizing the intergenerational learning benefits that accrue. The conclusions extend the argument of Zollo and Winter by showing how different task-related learning mechanisms may be combined and obtain their integrative capacity within an iterative process.In this article we take an empirical point of departure in an in-depth study of a project where the task was to develop a new stacker; that is, a kind of warehouse truck. The study lasted a year from the moment when the project entered the development phase until its completion. The project group comprised a project leader and 12 team members with different functional backgrounds. The project proved to be successful. The product that was developed exceeded the most optimistic sales expectations, and project members were very satisfied with the way in which project work had been carried out. In their view, it was the best project they had ever participated in.Our observations of how such successful activity and knowledge integration was brought about, however, contrasted sharply with the images of project work integration-as a matter of clearly specified goals, knowledge sharing and close teamwork-which are often encountered in project management and product Articles

No abstract

From Jim March we learned that organizational intelligence demands adaptation to the needs of a distant future as well as the efficient use of resources in the present. Commitment to new ideas that deviate from norm is necessary for long-term adaptation, but comes with great uncertainty as to if when or how success will come. This article uses a historical study of military aircraft manufacturer Saab to explore the transition from experimenting with physical models and dangerous test flights in the development of rather simple aircraft systems, to the development of complex integrated aircraft systems using virtual models that can be tested in a simulated world, thereby postponing choice and the need for commitment of resources in the physical world. We show how modeling techniques and tools were developed over five generations of aircraft to help developers represent and evaluate alternative ideas, in an increasingly realistic virtual reality, thereby reducing material and fatal consequences in aircraft development. We distinguish hybrid forms of evaluation and a transition that seems to be moving in the direction of “virtual online evaluation,” where empirically informed simulation models, based on real flight data reduces the fidelity gap between reality and representation. Drawing upon a selection of Jim March’s writings, we speculate what this transition implies for learning from experience and the possibility of foolishness without consequence.

No abstract