"CREATION, ADOPTION, and DIFFUSION of INNOVATIONS by SUBSIDIARIES of MULTINATIONAL CORPORATIONS" by Sumantra GHOSHAL*
"CREATION, ADOPTION, AND DIFFUSION OF INNOVATIONS BY SUBSIDIARIES OF MULTINATIONAL CORPORATIONS" by Sumantra GHOSHAL Christopher A. BARTLETT N° 88 / 31 Sumantra GHOSHAL, Assistant Professor of Business Policy, INSEAD, Fontainebleau, France Christopher A. BARTLETT, Associate Professor, Harvard Business School, Boston, USA Director of Publication : Charles WYPLOSZ, Associate Dean for Research and Development Printed at INSEAD, Fontainebleau, France CREATION, ADOPTION, AND DIFFUSION OF INNOVATIONS BY SUBSIDIARIES OF MULTINATIONAL CORPORATIONS Sumantra Ghoshal Christopher A. Bartlett Sumantra Ghoshal Assistant Professor INSEAD Boulevard de Constance Fontainebleau, France Telephone: (1) 60.72.40.00 Christopher A. Bartlett Associate Professor Harvard Business School Soldiers Field Boston, MA 02163, U.S.A. Telephone: (617)-495-6308 June 1988 Comments welcome. Please do not cite without authors permission. The authors are grateful to the Divisions of Research of the Harvard Business School and INSEAD for funding the research project of which this is a preliminary and partial report. Louis T. Wells, Howard Stevenson, Joseph Bower, Nitin Nohria, Dominique Beau, and Susan Schneider provided helpful comments and suggestions. CREATION, ADOPTION, AND DIFFUSION OF INNOVATIONS BY SUBSIDIARIES OF MULTINATIONAL CORPORATIONS Abstract This paper reports some of the findings of a multi-phased and multi- method study on the organizational attributes that facilitate creation, adoption, and diffusion of innovations by subsidiaries of multinational companies. Comparison of results obtained through case research in nine companies, multiple-respondent questionnaire surveys in three companies, and a single-respondent survey in 66 North American and European multinationals reveal unambiguous and positive impacts of normative integration through organizational socialization and dense intra- and inter-unit communication on an MNC subsidiarys ability to contribute to the different innovation tasks.
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