Kjell Arne Røvik - A Translation Theory of Knowledge Transfer: Learning Across Organizational Borders

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Kjell Arne Rvik 2023

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DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198832362.001.0001

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An obvious but often downplayed point in the research literature is that the antecedent of innovations in organizations is the capacity to imitate and learn from other organizations. So, what is the content of this capacity? Why do some organizations often succeed while others often fail to transfer and exploit knowledge from other organizations? These are the key questions that will be highlighted and answered throughout this book. During the last four decades, much empirical research and theorizing efforts have been undertaken to improve our understanding of these knowledge transfer puzzles. This book develops a fresh reframing and a new theory of the subject. It is a theory that has the potential to help us better understand and explain variations in knowledge transfer successes across organizational borders. The theory conceptualizes knowledge transfer between organizations as acts of translations, resembling the translation of language and texts.

I have attempted to make transparent in the book the step-by-step processes through which this new theory has been generatedfrom the first step, which is a review of the extensive existing literature on the subject, via the introduction and use of metaphors and insights extracted from two external domains of translation studies, and to the generation of an inventory of more precise arguments and propositions that constitute the translation theory of knowledge transfer.

The theory that is outlined should be conceived of as a ceiling that I do hope can serve as a floor for other researchers. It should be interpreted, criticized, inspire empirical research, be tested and refinedand become the source to new insights.

I am grateful for comments on the book proposal from three anonymous OUP reviewers and for comments on earlier drafts from Hege Andersen, Bjrn Tore Blindheim, Joep Cornelissen, Barbara Czarniawska, Hanne Gabrielsen, Gunnar Gjelstrup, Hanne Foss Hansen, Tor Hernes, Frank Holen, Erik Juel, Hanne Kathrine Krogstrup, Dag yvind Madsen, Sren Obed Madsen, Turid Moldens, Nanna Mller Mortensen, Tor Paulson, Hilde Marie Pettersen, Trish Reay, David Strang, and Eleanor Westney. Their comments have clearly added to the quality of this work. I offer a special thanks to James Morrison for providing me with his excellent editing service. Finally, I express my admiration and thanks to the two most important girls in my lifemy wife Heidi and my daughter, Reginefor still providing me with discussions, ideas, caring, and love.

This book zooms in on the challenges of transferring and sharing knowledge across organizational borders. Knowledge transfer refers to the processes through which actors and units exchange, receive, and are influenced by the experience and knowledge of others, and it can manifest itself through changes in the knowledge bases or performance of recipients (Argote et al., 2000; van Wijk et al., 2008). Three observations and one main ambition have inspired this book. The first observation is the increased importance of effective knowledge transfer for a wide range of critical organizational success variables. The second is the observation (actually, a number of observations) that effective knowledge transfer is very challenging; such processes sometimes succeed, but they frequently fail. The third observation is that despite extensive research efforts, we still lack theories with high explanatory power to account for the huge variations in knowledge transfer successes, as well as research-based means to guide actors involved in knowledge transfer processes.

Partly in response to these observations, the aim of this book is to outline a new theory that (re)conceptualizes knowledge transfer between organizations as acts of translation, resembling the translation of language and texts. This theory has the potential to improve our understanding of why knowledge transfer processes sometimes succeed and sometimes fail, and also has the potential to inform practitioners involved in knowledge transfers about appropriate actions. The theory points towards translation competence as the key organizational capacity required in knowledge transfers.

Let us first take a closer look at the three above-mentioned observations.

The capacity of an organization to transfer and exploit knowledge from other organizations is a key to its competitiveness, progress, and survival. This insight sheds light on the complex relation between imitation and innovation (Strang and Meyer, 1993). Although society celebrates the innovating organization (the lone genius) and its inventions (Sevn, 1996; Perry-Smith et al., 2015), newness and an organizations capacity to innovate are, in fact, often linked directly to its capacity to imitate and learn from other organizations practices and ideas.

Knowledge transfer capacity affects a number of critical organizational performance variables. Many studies have found that the capacity to identify, transfer, and exploit knowledge from other organizations is an antecedent and key input for a focal organizations capacity to innovate and improve performances (Cohen and Levinthal, 1990; Song et al., 2018). For example, it has been shown that knowledge search and transfer capacity has been a prerequisite for focal organizations development of new technology (Santoro et al., 2017; Flor et al., 2018), new products (Alexander and Childe, 2013), new patents (Zeng et al., 2019), and has led to improved overall organizational performance, such as increased returns on investments (Patel, et al., 2015) and sales growth (Kohtamki et al., 2019). The connection between knowledge transfer and competitiveness is often illustrated with reference to the expansion of large multinational corporations, a phenomenon that largely reflects how knowledge can be transferred relatively smoothly across borders