Insegnamento a.a. 2013-2014

Go to class group/s: 22

EMIT (10 credits - II sem. - OB  |  5 credits SECS-P/06  |  5 credits SECS-P/08)

Course Director:
ALFONSO GAMBARDELLA

Course Objectives

In recent years, firm theory has grown into one of the most dynamic and fast changing fields of strategic, organizational, cognitive and economic research. Apparently naive questions such as "What is a firm?", How are firms created?, "What do firms do?", What does explain firm’s success?, "What does explain firms' boundaries?", "What do managers really do?" have received enormous attention in disciplines as different as strategy, innovation management, economic history, economics, organizational theory. All these developments build upon very practical concerns: what role is left to firms in the globalized knowledge economy? Do they still have a role to play or will they be superseded by the emergence of networks of specialized companies? How do firms coordinate and control increasingly dispersed networks of suppliers? How to access, leverage, and manage communities and crowds of innovators outside firm boundaries? How to develop and bring to the market entrepreneurial ideas in a globalized world? How does digitization and the Internet impact innovation, the role of incumbent firms, and opportunities for entrepreneurs? This course aims at providing the students with the intellectual tools and the analytical skills to understand recent developments in firm theory across multiple disciplines. The course focuses on developments in the resource based view of the firm, transaction cost economics, knowledge-based theories, network approaches, dynamic capabilities, resource dependence theories, theories on sources of innovation, digital economy etc. This course offers both traditional lectures, interactive sessions, cases, and exercises related to real business problems to allow students to understand both the theoretical underpinnings and the practical implications of the concepts they are introduced to.

Course Content Summary

Part I - The main building blocks

Economic theories of the firm

• Corporate governance
• Incomplete contracts
• Principal-Agent approaches
• Transaction Cost Economics

Managerial theories of the firm

• Dynamic capabilities
• Resource-based View
• Resource dependence theory

Behavioural and cognitive approaches

• Evolutionary firm theory
• Cognitive approaches
• Configurational approaches

Part II - Do we still need a theory of the firm?

• Open and distributed innovation
• Markets for technologies
• Digital economy

Part III - Entrepreneurial strategies

• The creation and development of entrepreneurial opportunities
• Entry in new markets
• Entrepreneurial growth
• Organizational renewal and strategic change

Detailed Description of Assessment Methods

Attending Students
The final grade results from the sum of three partial exams, each partial exam being based on one of the three parts of the course.
Non Attending
StudentsWritten exam

Textbooks

A selection of relevant research articles, readings, and business cases is made available to the students at the beginning of the course.

Exam textbooks & Online Articles (check availability at the Library)

Last change 15/05/2013 09:25