Knowledge Worker Mobility in Context: Pushing the Boundaries of Theory and Methods

• Author: Mike Wright,Kenneth G. Huang,Janet Bercovitz,Valentina Tartari,Francesco Di Lorenzo
• Published date: 01 January 2018
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/joms.12316
• Date: 01 January 2018

Knowledge Worker Mobility in Context: Pushing the

Boundaries of Theory and Methods

Mike Wright

a,b

, Valentina Tartari

c

, Kenneth G. Huang

d

,

Francesco Di Lorenzo

c

and Janet Bercovitz

e

a

Imperial College Business School;

b

ETH Zurich;

c

Copenhagen Business School;

d

National University of

Singapore;

e

University of Colorado - Boulder

ABSTRACT Scholars are paying more attention to knowledge workers (KW) as they gain

importance in the knowledge-based economy. Knowledge worker mobility (KWM) can

involve various forms of employee and entrepreneurial movements: the transfer of employees

from one organization to another either through locational movement or through a change in

ownership, the transfer of employees within the same organization but in different units and/

or geographies, and the spinning off by employees into new ventures. KWM spans a variety

of different contexts which have rarely been explored in prior research. We focus on

advancing our understanding of KWM in context, pushing the boundaries of theory and

methods by developing a framework focusing on five main contextual dimensions:

organizational context and roles, geographical and spatial context, social context and teams,

institutional and cultural norms, and temporal dynamics. We summarize the papers presented

in the special issue and also identify an agenda for further research.

Keywords: employee mobility, entrepreneurial mobility, knowledge workers, organizational

mobility, regional mobility

INTRODUCTION

According to the knowledge-based view, knowledge is embedded in individuals (Grant,

1996) and is socially combined through organizational routines to generate innovative

activities (Kogut and Zander, 1992; Nelson and Winter, 1982). In particular, the tacit

component of knowledge, which is highly embedded in individuals, is a key source of

competitive advantage. Building on the idea that human capital has implications for

Address for reprints: Mike Wright, Imperial College Business School, Exhibition Road, London SW7 2AZ,

UK (mike.wright@imperial.ac.uk).

Authors are listed in reverse alphabetical order. All contributed equally to this paper and to editing the

special issue.

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C2017 John Wiley & Sons Ltd and Society for the Advancement of Management Studies

Journal of Management Studies 55:1 January 2018

doi: 10.1111/joms.12316

firms’ competitiveness (Coff, 1997), organization scholars have paid a great deal of

attention to the mobility of talented employees and the strategic implications of such

mobility for firm performance (Aime et al., 2010; Campbell et al., 2012; Corredoira

and Rosenkopf, 2010; Somaya et al., 2008). The main focus of this literature has been

on mobility as an important mechanism to transfer valuable knowledge from one firm

to another (Rosenkopf and Almeida, 2003; Song et al., 2003) so as to generate firm

learning (Singh and Agrawal, 2011).

Building on the pioneering works of Arrow (1962) and Levin and colleagues (1987), a

large body of research has also been developed using numerous theoretical frameworks,

empirical contexts and methodologies to examine the links between labour mobility and

knowledge spillovers. This research has tried to explain several aspects of inter-

organizational mobility: the antecedents of mobility (Carnahan et al., 2012; Di Lorenzo

and Almeida, 2017; Gambardella et al., 2009; Hoisl, 2007; Palomeras and Melero, 2010),

the environmental and organizational conditions that affect the rate of mobility (Marx,

2011; Marx et al., 2009), the direction of mobility (Campbell et al., 2012; Carnahan et al.,

2012; Ganco et al., 2015; Lu et al., 2014; Roach and Sauermann) and the performance

implications for firms and individuals (Agarwal et al., 2009; Groysberg et al., 2008; Huang

and Ertug, 2014; Mawdsley and Somaya, 2016; Singh and Agrawal, 2011).

Increasingly, scholars have been paying more attention to individuals and, in particu-

lar, knowledge workers (KW) as they gain importance in this knowledge-based econ-

omy. We focus on advancing our understanding of knowledge worker mobility (KWM),

pushing the boundaries of theory and methods. According to the above-mentioned

extant research, KWM can involve various forms of employee and entrepreneurial

movements: the transfer of employees from one organization to another either through

locational movement or through a change in ownership, the transfer of employees

within the same organization but in different units and/or geographies, the spinning off

by employees into new ventures and virtual mobility facilitated by digitalization.

While research into KWM spans a variety of different contexts, contextual differen-

ces, even if acknowledged, are rarely sufficiently developed and explored. This is poten-

tially problematic as linking questions to context is crucial for theory building (Whetten,

1989). In addition, contextual influences provide boundary conditions and highlight

contingency factors that are essential for insightful and informative empirical testing.

Addressing the omission of attention to context opens up the potential for major devel-

opments in the research agenda on knowledge worker mobility.

This special issue aims at integrating different aspects of contextual influences on

employees’ mobility. In particular, we focus on five main contextual dimensions: organiza-

tional context and roles, geographical and spatial context, social context and teams, institu-

tional and cultural norms, and temporal dynamics. This focus allows us to delve deeper

into the phenomenon of knowledge worker mobility to better understand and differentiate

general truths from context-driven special cases. Observed mobility events may have differ-

entimplicationsgiventhecontextthatcatalysesandsurroundsthem.Careermobilitycan

indeed be an active decision (for example moving to capture a better job opportunity) but

it can also be a passive experience, as in the case of redundancy or change of ownership

of the employing firm or even involuntary or ‘forced’ due to external shocks like natural

disasters or firm closure. In many cases, mobility has a “physical” component, either

2 M. Wright et al.

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C2017 John Wiley & Sons Ltd and Society for the Advancement of Management Studies