Celeste P. M. Wilderom

Purpose: Despite the importance of dynamic capabilities (DCs) within organizations, our knowledge of how such capabilities emerge is still relatively limited. This paper aims to advance the microfoundations of DCs theory by exploring how deploying Lean practices can gradually develop into organizational routines and then, together, form a continuous improvement (CI) dynamic capability (DC). Design/methodology/approach: We conducted a four-year retrospective process study in which we compared two Dutch university-based hospitals that had both started implementing Lean. Abductive cross-case analysis was undertaken based on the transcripts of 48 interviews, 13 frontline meeting observations, hospital documents and archival key performance data. Findings: We identified how a staged process engaged top and cross-functional hospital leaders (including middle managers and frontline leaders) in capability development. This process gradually developed routines, which established four interconnected capabilities that, together, formed a hospital-wide CI DC: (1) a coherent improvement system, (2) hospital-wide collaborative synergy, (3) integrated accountability, linking strategy with daily operations, and (4) learning-to-learn among employees and teams. Originality/value: A conceptual framework for developing strategic DCs is proposed. It enriches the microfoundations of DCs theory by explaining how evolving organizational routines may fuse, fostered by leaders across all hierarchical levels, which then can form a CI DC within the organization. The findings offer valuable insights for managers of large, knowledge-intensive organizations seeking to implement organization-wide improvement.

Purpose: Many groups in organisations are unsuccessful in problem solving. However, the principle of continuous improvement necessitates that organisations refine their employees’ problem-solving skills. In this mixed-method, field-based lab experiment, we explored the impact of a treatment to enhance the quality of group problem-solving processes.Design/methodology/approach: We focused on the structured problem-solving process in Kaizen Events by differentiating six consecutive phases. About 16 Kaizen Event groups (101 members) participated in a field-based lab experiment that used a lean simulation game to establish a group problem-solving context. Data were collected via video, surveys and group interviews. We examined if a high-quality process is strengthened through group members’ elevated awareness of problem-solving preferences. About 11 groups received a treatment of tailor-made individual feedback to increase awareness of their problem-solving preferences. Additionally, we repeated the experiment in five control groups, where member preferences were not shared.Findings: In the treatment groups, where problem-solving preferences had been shared, we observed a clear improvement in Kaizen Event process quality and higher problem-solving self-efficacy levels. Moreover, their self-reported Kaizen Event behaviour had changed. Within the control groups, the participants also reported that their problem-solving self-efficacy had improved, but this did not have a positive impact on the quality of the objectively measured Kaizen Event process.Originality/value: By combining insights from operations management and organisational behaviour, we demonstrate that the structured Kaizen Event problem-solving process improves when group members’ individual problem-solving preferences are shared. We thus add an individual-level variable to the extant models of Kaizen Event success factors. Our results provide fresh insights into how to improve the continuous improvement process within organisations. Kaizen Event stakeholders and their facilitators are offered guidance on how to increase one’s awareness of own and others’ problem-solving preferences in group-based problem-solving events.

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to test the role of familiness-related team forces induced by the CEO of family firms. In particular, we report on the effects of the transformational leadership style of CEOs on their respective top-management team (TMT) and firm performance when viewed through a familiness lens.Design/methodology/approach: Survey measures were taken from a snowballed sample of 72 CEOs of German family firms as well as from 245 members of their TMTs. We tested the aggregated firm-level data with objective performance indicators of the firms they led.Findings: Support was obtained for the three hypothesized team-force mediations and the four-path mediation model. The relationship between CEO’s transformational style and high family-firm performance is found to be serially mediated by TMT cohesion, behavioral integration and efficacy. Together, these three types of collective forces are assumed to be the familiness effect of a family-member CEO with a transformational leadership style.Originality/value: With our model, we quantitatively tested familiness-type forces vis-à-vis firm performance. Theoretical and practical implications of these findings are discussed.

Research on job flourishing is still in its infancy, relies on a plethora of different theories, and shows inconsistent results, but has already shown numerous beneficial effects on various organizational outcomes. In this state-of-the-art review, we identify the theoretical frameworks used to examine (the dynamics of) job flourishing, including its predictors and outcomes, and offer an integrated approach that is, thus far, missing. We selected and analyzed 40 empirical studies and derived from them a comprehensive multilevel conceptual model with matching propositions. This review extends our current knowledge of organizational psychology literature by suggesting how to combine the evidence obtained so far on how job flourishing arises and unfolds in organizational work contexts and its effects (e.g., on job performance, turnover intention, etc.). Rooted therein, we provide both directions for impactful future research and recommendations for managers on how to foster this desirable mental-health state at work.

Purpose: Why are some lean workfloor teams able to improve their already high performance, over time, and others not? By studying teams' and leaders' behaviour-value patterns, this abductive field study uncovers a dynamic capability at the team level.Design/methodology/approach: Various methods were employed over three consecutive years to thoroughly examine five initially high-performing lean workfloor teams, including their leaders. These methods encompassed micro-behavioural coding of 59 h of film footage, surveys, individual and group interviews, participant observation and archival data, involving objective and perceptual team-performance indicators. Two of the five teams continued to improve and perform highly.Findings: Continuously improving high lean team performance is found to be associated with (1) team behaviours such as frequent performance monitoring, information sharing, peer support and process improvement; (2) team leaders who balance, over time, task- and relations-oriented behaviours; (3) higher-level leaders who keep offering the team face-to-face support, strategic clarity and tangible resources; (4) these three actors' endorsement of self-transcendence and openness-to-change work values and alignment, over time, with their behaviours; and (5) coactive vicarious learning-by-doing as a “stable collective activity pattern” among team, team leader, and higher-level leadership.Originality/value: Since lean has been undertheorised, the authors invoked insights from organisational behaviour and management theories, in combination with various fine- and coarse-grained data, over time. The authors uncovered actors' behaviour-value patterns and a collective learning-by-doing pattern that may explain continuous lean team performance improvement. Four theory-enriching propositions were developed and visualised in a refined model which may already benefit lean practitioners.