The “Interacted” actor in platformed networks: theorizing practices of managerial experience value co-creation

Abstract

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to conceptualize the “interacted” actor and connect it with practices of managerial value creation in an interactive business world. In doing so, it accounts for the interactive agency of actors via dynamics of the creational process across increasing technological “platformization” of interactions of heterogeneous (human and non-human) sociomaterial entities.Design/methodology/approachThe study discusses a foundational theoretical framework of a co-creation paradigm (CCP) while connecting it with recent industrial marketing and purchasing (IMP) literature on mixed network and system ontology. It then elaborates on conceptual research contributions and key business management implications in advancing IMP studies through CCP.FindingsThe framing of interactional flows across interactive system environments in business networks is related to both stability and developmental change in the enactment of creation via interactive agencies-structures in the ongoing pursuits of both business efficiency and innovation of value creational opportunities.Practical implicationsBy effectively configuring platformed networked interactions of experience value creation in their business contexts, managers (and stakeholding individuals in general) can better cope with the complexity of interactivity and interdependencies.Originality/valueManagerial experience value co-creation through CCP builds on the IMP tradition by explicitly recognizing actors, in addition to activities and resources as being interactively defined. Because the relational logics are applicable at varying levels of scale across system-environment boundaries, it can be applied at both the individual and company levels or more generally at any level of agglomeration.