The Information-Based View on Business Network Performance Defended on Thursday, 4 September 2014

In the last thirty years, global developments including advancements in ICT and process and product modularization have made the network form of organization more widespread than ever before. In many industries large vertically integrated organizations have been supplanted by flexible networks of independent organizations. In other industries and sectors, individual organizations continue to operate through the traditional organizational form of a business network. The proliferation of business networks presses the need to move theoretical development on processes and outcomes forward, beyond actor and dyadic level to the whole network level of analysis. Network performance studies however, have been scattered both across time and across management disciplines, and offer diverse concepts, measures and drivers, which slows down the theoretical build up. A related problem is that the conceptual issue of what constitutes performance on network level, has been left unaddressed. The main purpose of this dissertation is therefore to conceptualize and explain the performance of interorganizational networks. This is done by executing three studies: conceptualization research laboratory experiments and a field case study. Step by step an integrated framework is built in this dissertation that represents the information-based view on network performance and its theoretical mechanisms. This dissertation pushes the boundaries of knowledge on network performance, increases the understanding and ability of practitioners to manage their networks and sets the agenda for future network performance research.

Keywords

Network performance, interorganizational networks, business networks, network information architecture, network transparency, information-based view, institutional logics, conceptualization