Learning-by-Moving: Can Reconfiguring Spatial Proximity Between Organizational Members Promote Individual-level Exploration?

Abstract

This research proposes that individual-level exploration can be promoted by reconfiguring the spatial proximity between organizational members’ workspaces. To test this idea, I exploit a natural experiment in an e-commerce company where the spatial distances between organizational members’ workspaces were reconfigured. Consistent with the theory I develop on learning, results suggest that individuals whose workspaces were moved closer to those of previously separated peers engaged in more individual-level exploration. This pattern was stronger for individuals who had higher prior organizational experience and those who did not have ties with previously separated peers. Finally, I found that the relocated individuals also achieved higher financial performance. Overall, this study highlights the importance of an underexamined organization design element—spatial design—and its implications for organizational learning, individual-level exploration, and firm performance. The online appendix is available at https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.2019.1291 .

Too small to do it all? A meta-analysis on the relative relationships of exploration, exploitation, and ambidexterity with SME performance

“…Further, employees' individual-level explorative, exploitative, and ambidextrous activities are particularly important because, as we argued before, SMEs have few formal systems and routines constraining employees' activities (Kiss et al, 2018;Vossen, 1998). Consequently, research on SMEs should examine whether fostering explorative, exploitative, and ambidextrous behavior in SME employees, for example, through supportive leadership (Kauppila & Tempelaar, 2016) or by adapting organizational structures (e.g., S. Lee, 2019), improves the performance of firm-level exploration, exploitation, and ambidexterity.…”

Organization design as a competitive choice: an application to the study of innovation

“…Organization design influences innovation along four dimensions, using Ahuja and his colleagues' (2008) categorization: (1) organizational structure and processes (e.g., Argyres and Silverman, 2004;Henderson and Clark, 1990;Szulanski, 1996;Tushman et al, 2010); (2) governance and incentives (e.g., Galbraith and Merrill, 1991;Graves, 1988;Zahra, 1996); (3) manager characteristics (e.g., Bantel and Jackson, 1989;Khan and Manopichetwattana, 1989;Wu et al, 2005); and (4) search processes (e.g., Ahuja and Katila, 2001;Paruchuri et al, 2006;Puranam et al, 2006). More recent research extends these lines of inquiry to novel mechanisms, such as attention structure (Joseph and Wilson, 2018), inventor networks (Argyres, Silverman, and Rios, 2019), microgeography (Lee, 2019), path-dependent routines (Theke, Polidoro, and Fredrickson, 2018) and reorganization (Karim and Kaul, 2015).…”

Bridging Temporal Divides: Temporal Brokerage in Global Teams and Its Impact on Individual Performance

“…With respect to spatial distance, a long research tradition has documented the rapid fall in communication frequency-in particular, spontaneous and informal communication-with increasing distance Mell, Jang, and Chai: Temporal Brokerage Organization Science, Articles in Advance, pp. 1-21, © 2020 The Author(s) between individuals' places of work (Sommer 1959, Allen 1977, Hoegl and Proserpio 2004, Fayard and Weeks 2007, Reagans 2011, Catalini 2018, Lee 2019. Notably, however, this research tradition primarily focuses on teams whose members are rather proximate to each other (i.e., often within walking distance), examining the impact of being separated in terms of meters, floors, or buildings.…”