Re-conceptualizing absorptive capacity: The importance of teams as a meso-level context

Abstract

Absorptive capacity has received considerable scholarly attention due to its ability to explain heterogeneous degrees of learning from complex and dynamic knowledge environments. Extant absorptive capacity frameworks and models unmistakably take firms as the focal unit and level of analysis. Mounting empirical evidence, in contrast, shows the growing importance of teams in acquiring and utilizing external knowledge. Teams are not just scale models of firms; they have unique attributes and function as an active context of organizational learning. However, previous research does not consider such idiosyncrasies when conceptualizing absorptive capacity. We focus on absorptive capacity within the meso-level context of teams and problematize several entrenched assumptions behind existing models. We then propose a re-conceptualization of absorptive capacity with four new dimensions that collectively address these assumptions and pay systematic attention to the distinctive characteristics of teams as active learning contexts.