Abstrakt
Purpose
This paper aims to investigate the microfoundations—boundary-spanning employees activities and behaviors—of deepening and broadening customer knowledge during logistics innovation development.
Design/methodology/approach
A multiple case study approach (six case studies) was adopted to investigate the role of boundary-spanning employees in deepening and broadening customer knowledge while developing logistics service innovations.
Findings
The results show that boundary-spanning employees’ engage sequentially in deepening and broadening customer knowledge throughout the logistics innovation development process. In particular it shows that deepening customer knowledge tends to occur in one-to-one interactions. When boundary-spanning employees engage in broadening customer knowledge, they develop a rich understanding of current customer.
Research limitations/implications (if applicable)
In general, this paper contributes to the understanding of the individuals’ behaviors underlying organization-level phenomena, such as logistics service providers’ customer knowledge acquisition.
Practical implications (if applicable)
Our findings illustrate that boundary-spanning employees might be well advised to concentrate on one activity of acquiring customer knowledge during a single stage of the logistics innovation development process.
Original/value
By investigating firms’ customer knowledge acquisition at the individual level, calls in the literature for more research into the microfoundations of organizational constructs are addressed.
This paper aims to investigate the microfoundations—boundary-spanning employees activities and behaviors—of deepening and broadening customer knowledge during logistics innovation development.
Design/methodology/approach
A multiple case study approach (six case studies) was adopted to investigate the role of boundary-spanning employees in deepening and broadening customer knowledge while developing logistics service innovations.
Findings
The results show that boundary-spanning employees’ engage sequentially in deepening and broadening customer knowledge throughout the logistics innovation development process. In particular it shows that deepening customer knowledge tends to occur in one-to-one interactions. When boundary-spanning employees engage in broadening customer knowledge, they develop a rich understanding of current customer.
Research limitations/implications (if applicable)
In general, this paper contributes to the understanding of the individuals’ behaviors underlying organization-level phenomena, such as logistics service providers’ customer knowledge acquisition.
Practical implications (if applicable)
Our findings illustrate that boundary-spanning employees might be well advised to concentrate on one activity of acquiring customer knowledge during a single stage of the logistics innovation development process.
Original/value
By investigating firms’ customer knowledge acquisition at the individual level, calls in the literature for more research into the microfoundations of organizational constructs are addressed.
| Originalsprog | Engelsk |
|---|---|
| Titel | NOFOMA |
| Forlag | NOFOMA |
| Publikationsdato | 2014 |
| Status | Udgivet - 2014 |