Coordination in organizations

Coordination in organizations is a longstanding issue. Firms can use different tools to coordinate internally and with partners. Yet, the ‘mix-and-match’ of those instruments might prove to be demanding. I am studying this issue in the context of innovation management.

In the setting of IP strategic management, I examine the combination of tools to coordinate the tasks’ structure with those to incentivize effort in the patents’ value chain. With Dennis Verhoeven (KU Leuven), we find that for a sample of 20 large organizations, coordination arises from three clusters of tools’ configurations. Each configuration highlights a distinct ‘mix-and-match’ in such a way as to enhance the qualities of paired tools and improve both the granting rate and speed for the patents portfolio. If you are interested in knowing more, read our working paper.

Another facet of coordination is the strategic management of partnerships. This issue is particularly relevant for innovation projects, where competences and capabilities may be not available in-house. With the outsourcing of tasks and processes, part of the responsibility for the products’ or services’ features shifts in the partners’ hands. That poses a natural challenge for the outsourcing organization, which loses full directionality and can maintain only partial supervision. How to take back control and insure a smooth coordination with the partners? With Dominique Demougin (TU Kaiserslrautern), we study how to solve this issue via the negotiation of indemnity clauses in outsourcing contracts with a formal model and an empirical analysis for the pharmaceutical industry.

Coordination is also crucial to alliances' survival. Trust building and maintenance enable strategic alliances to survive when allies are peers and the partnerships unstable. My co-authors and I research this relationship with a lab experiment and document the significance of ‘‘trust-building’’ in initial stages and ‘‘trust repair’’ in later stages of strategic alliances with competitors.

If you are also studying coordination in organizations and you have research ideas that you would feel sharing with me, I would be very happy to brainstorm with you.