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This research extends the problem-solving perspective of the knowledge-based view by examining the interdisciplinary publication outcomes of individual scientists in hybrid organizations. Whereas prior literature has focused on problem-solving activities in hierarchies (firms), hybrid organizations, including federally funded research programs involving interdisciplinary science, have emerged to address societal issues ranging from public health to climate change. To understand what might contribute to scientists’ performance in such hybrid settings, in this article, we theorize and empirically examine how scientists’ overall scientific reputation and their access to and familiarity with various disciplinary knowledge domains influence their publication output in interdisciplinary journals. We focus specifically on 169 researchers in the eight Nanomedicine Development Centers funded by the U.S. National Institutes of Health. Our analysis reveals that scientists’ scientific reputation is positively related to their subsequent number of publications in interdisciplinary journals. However, scientists’ disciplinary knowledge diversity has a more nuanced association with their number of interdisciplinary publications, contributing more when moderate than when high or low. These findings will help hybrid organizations such as universities and research institutes understand how individual attributes contribute to interdisciplinary research.

To purchase or authenticate to the full-text of this article, please visit this link: http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-5885.2006.00189.x Byline: Melissa M. Appleyard, Clair Brown, Linda Sattler Abstract: Using a unique survey of engineers in major semiconductor companies located in Japan, South Korea, and the United States, this article analyzes how a firm's human resource (HR) system (i.e., practices that structure work, develop skills, and reward performance) and knowledge system (i.e., information access, sharing and control) are related to the problem-solving performance of engineers. Because of the short product market life cycles in the semiconductor industry, expeditious problem solving is an important performance goal. Therefore, this article examines the performance of engineers in terms of the time it takes them to solve problems in the context of their firms' HR and knowledge systems. It was anticipated during this study that externally oriented organizational systems, which support individual career performance and mobility (an externally oriented HR system) and the use of private knowledge sources (an externally oriented knowledge system), would be associated with superior performance in terms of problem-solving speed. The findings support this hypothesis and demonstrate the importance of externally oriented HR systems and at the same time suggest the surprising insignificance of the orientation of the knowledge systems. These findings are applicable to engineers in the sample from the United States, whereas the findings for the Korean and Japanese engineers are inconclusive. International variation is found where the U.S. engineers work under the most externally oriented and the Japanese engineers under the least externally oriented systems, and the Korean engineers fall in between. The findings of this article suggest that when constructing a work environment for new product development, managers should take into account how the underlying components of their organizational systems contribute to an internal or external focus, and how this orientation may influence performance. Article note: Address correspondence to: Melissa M. Appleyard, School of Business Administration, Portland State University, P.O. Box 751, Portland, OR 97207-0751. Tel: (503) 725-9581. Fax: (503) 725-5850. E-mail: MelissaA@sba.pdx.edu.

The implementation of innovative concepts in supply chain management operations and significance of buyer-supplier relations on project management are analyzed by focusing on semiconductor industry.

What happens when a public university decides to construct a cross-disciplinary, cross-functional initiative to explore the future, build capacity to be more “future ready” and resilient, and serve as a resource for the university and broader community to help them do the same? This article presents a case study of a “Futures Collaboratory” launched at a Pacific Northwest public, urban university in the 2019 to 2020 academic year. The three intersecting goals of the effort were to: explore and cultivate interest and capacity among interested individuals across campus; develop institution-wide “foresightfulness” as a collective; and end the year in a position to make thoughtful, creative, and well-reasoned recommendations about being more future-facing as a university. The dual pandemics of Covid-19 and white supremacy proved to deepen the commitment to learn and practice futures thinking. A primary goal was to ensure that the university would benefit from efforts to democratize foresight activities while taking practical steps to navigate our own systemic volatility, uncertainty, ambiguity, and complexity. This article discusses the effort, early work, disruptions, and risks during the Collaboratory’s first year, as well as the emergent reflections, opportunities, and recommendations prepared for university leadership. Special attention is paid to the consideration of equity and social justice in the future of higher education and the tools and resources needed by the sector to build liberatory futures.

Byline: Jon Perr, Melissa M. Appleyard, Patrick Sullivan Open source software (OSS) has come of age, and a number of maturing business models allow OSS companies to make a profit even when their product is distributed for free. This article considers the dynamics of value creation fuelling the proliferation of OSS and examines the business model factors that enable value capture. After interviewing leaders from over 20 OSS firms and organisations through early 2006, we found that three factors were consistently important in defining a vendor's adoption of a given business model: software licence choice, which takes into account intellectual property ownership; management of developer communities; and the unique features of the markets and product categories in which the vendor participates. Considering these factors, we characterise seven business models. One striking finding is that it is rare to find business-model purity. The majority of firms in our sample are pursuing either blended business models or multiple models simultaneously.