Tapping the power of local knowledge: A local-global interactive perspective Article

Li, S, Easterby-Smith, M, Lyles, MA et al. (2016). Tapping the power of local knowledge: A local-global interactive perspective . JOURNAL OF WORLD BUSINESS, 51(4), 641-653. 10.1016/j.jwb.2016.04.001

cited authors

  • Li, S; Easterby-Smith, M; Lyles, MA; Clark, T

authors

abstract

  • Existing theories of international business and strategy do not fully explain how local knowledge disadvantage faced by foreign investors can be mitigated. We conducted an in-depth qualitative study into four MNCs to investigate the micro-processes of how they generated value from their dispersed sources of local knowledge in China. The results suggest an interactive model: that MNCs employed management processes encompassing three strategically interconnected efforts-global knowledge penetration, local-global knowledge blending, and local-global knowledge integration. The model highlights the interplay between global and local knowledge and challenges extant research that solely focuses on the transfer of either home-based or local knowledge.

publication date

  • June 1, 2016

published in

Digital Object Identifier (DOI)

start page

  • 641

end page

  • 653

volume

  • 51

issue

  • 4