Journal of Operations Management

doi: 10.1002/joom.1143pmid: N/A

Park, Woo‐Yong; Tangpong, Chanchai; Ro, Young K.; Kim, Namwoon

doi: 10.1002/joom.1168pmid: N/A

In this study, we investigate the performance impacts of design sourcing choices in addressing an architectural innovation from its originating market to subsequent markets. We maintain that the effects of design internalization and externalization on the technological performance of firms' products may vary across the originating and subsequent markets with different requisite technological demands due to the dynamics of knowledge spillovers and knowledge exchange hazards in those markets. We hypothesize that design internalization is likely to outperform design externalization when facing an architectural innovation in a subsequent upscale market with a higher technological performance requisite than in the originating market. The case is then reverse in a subsequent downscale market with a lower technological performance requisite. We test our hypotheses in the empirical contexts of the US bicycle markets in which the index gear‐shifting technology (i.e., an architectural innovation) originated in the road bicycle market in 1985 and subsequently traversed to the mountain bicycle market (i.e., an upscale market) in 1987 and the city bicycle market (i.e., a downscale market) in 1988. The results are largely in line with our hypotheses. The contributions of our study to the current literature as well as its managerial implications are also discussed.

Li, Huashan; Lam, Hugo K. S.; Ho, William; Yeung, Andy C. L.

doi: 10.1002/joom.1175pmid: N/A

To exercise risk control at the corporate level, firms often appoint Chief Risk Officers (CROs) to their top management team. By establishing CRO positions, firms can reduce firm risk and potential financial losses caused by operational disruptions. Yet, by inducing stringent control measures on risks, security, and compliance, CRO appointments might create unwieldy bureaucracies with operational hurdles and incur burdensome costs that offset efficiency. Using longitudinal secondary data collected from multiple sources, we analyze the impact of CRO appointments on firm risk and operational efficiency of 435 publicly listed firms in the United States from 2006 to 2016. Our results indicate that CRO appointments not only reduce risks, but also improve efficiency in operations. We delve into the power of CROs and find that more powerful CROs are more effective in enhancing the operational efficiency of firms. We further examine the contextual factors and reveal that firms operating under high industry litigation threats and industry dynamism improve operational efficiency to a greater extent after CRO appointments. Overall, CROs' appointments are more beneficial to firms when they have stronger power in the top management team and when the operating environments are uncertain and volatile.

Skowronski, Keith; Benton, W. C.; Handley, Sean

doi: 10.1002/joom.1178pmid: N/A

Globalization has added a layer of complexity to the challenge of mitigating opportunism in buyer–supplier relationships. When engaging with suppliers in different countries, buyers must manage relationships across various cultures. Prior empirical research has shown that inter‐firm power affects opportunism in exchange relationships, and conceptual studies suggest that national culture is a location characteristic that could influence inter‐firm power. However, no research has empirically examined the efficacy of inter‐firm power in controlling opportunism, or other exchange outcomes, across different cultural contexts. To study this relevant issue, we investigate how a supplier's national culture influences the effectiveness of two bases of inter‐firm power, coercive and expert power, on a form of opportunism that has been anecdotally observed in practice—supplier shirking. We utilize primary dyadic data on 109 outsourcing relationships and secondary data of supply chain location characteristics to examine this phenomenon. We find that the effects of inter‐firm power on shirking vary across suppliers in different cultures and that, in certain cultures, coercive power may reduce the effectiveness of expert power. Our results show that manufacturers must explicitly consider suppliers' national culture when managing a globally dispersed supply base or risk encountering supplier shirking.