Abstract
This dissertation aims to unpack the “capability rigidity paradox” within the dynamic capability view. Consequently, the author tackles one of the core challenges in strategic management of the past decades. Providing a novel and thorough literature review on dynamic capabilities from the point of this paradox, the author discusses the current state of the literature to derive the core shortcommings meticulously. A case study of capability evolution in the German Armed Forces is interpreted against the backdrop of a strategy as process and practice lens, thus, allowing to propose the concept of meso-level dynamic capabilities without falling prey to the capability rigidity paradox.
“An original idea. That can’t be too hard. The library must be full of them.”
– Stephen Fry in The Liar (2010: 54)
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Notes
- 1.
VUCA is an acronym introduced by the United States military in the late 1980s to early 1990s. It stands for V = volatility, U = uncertainty, C = complexity, and A = ambiguity. According to the U.S. Army Heritage & Education Center (http://usawc.libanswers.com/faq/84869) the acronym was intended to introduce a new framework for strategic leadership education in a world changing from a bipolar to a multipolar structure in face of the ending Cold War. You may want to keep this period in mind, as it represents the exact starting point for the longitudinal case study on the German Federal Armed Forces (FAF) this study is centered around. In fact, the radical changes unfolding from the end of the Cold War onwards and the organizational response of the FAF (with regard to intercultural capabilities) is used as the empirical phenomenon to investigate dynamic capabilities.
- 2.
During a plenary session with David Teece and John D. Roberts at the Strategic Management Society Special Conference in Banff Canada in 2017 before handing an actual empty bag to David Teece.
- 3.
This adaptation is directed toward a specific domain, i.e., the emergence and continuous evolution of the culture capability. I am well aware that the FAF failed quite spectacularly in other areas as testified by the plethora of reports and media coverage regarding different armaments projects. However, these challenges do not impact this study, as it it quite possible to cultivate a dynamic capability at different organizational functions or divisions (Eisenhardt and Martin, 2000; Teece, 2007).
- 4.
This study emerged within the confines of a research project mandated by the German Ministry of Defense (Grant Number: PL30PD053U). In this research project my supervisor Professor Hans Ulrich Koller, my research colleagues Benjamin Schulte and André Kreutzman and I investigated communities of practice within the armed forces. For the sake of transparency I would like to point out that different publications and presentations originated during this project: Andresen et al. (2016), Schulte et al. (2016), Schulte, Andresen, and Koller (2017), Andresen, Schulte, and Koller (2019), and Schulte, Andresen, and Koller (2019). This dissertation informed some of these studies and evolved simultaneously with them.
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Andresen, F. (2021). Introduction. In: Exploring Meso-Level Dynamic Capabilities to Address the Capability Rigidity Paradox. Forschungs-/Entwicklungs-/Innovations-Management. Springer Gabler, Wiesbaden. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-32006-5_1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-32006-5_1
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