Managing Knowledge Integration across Boundaries Fredrick Tell, Christian Berggren, Stefano Brusoni, and Andrew Van de Ven (eds) Oxford University Press, 2017, 305 pp., £55. ISBN: 9780198785972

• Author: Hang T. T. Nguyen
• Date: 01 November 2017
• Published date: 01 November 2017
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/irj.12197

Book Review

Managing Knowledge Integration across Boundaries

Fredrick Tell, Christian Berggren, Stefano Brusoni, and Andrew Van de Ven (eds)

Oxford University Press, 2017, 305 pp., £55. ISBN: 9780198785972

This is a well-compiled book on knowledge integration, one that posits an under-

standing of advanced and specialised knowledge across boundaries rather than

general knowledge. The central ideas of the book are presented in two distinct parts.

Part I (from Chapters 2 to 5) discusses the conceptual underpinnings of the two

themes: knowledge integration and boundaries. Part II (Chapters 6 to 15) presents

findings from empirical studies on knowledge integration across boundaries, such as

those between organisations, firms in countries at different levels of development,

industry and academia, professional communities and individuals and groups within

an organisation. This book is one of the products generated by the Knowledge

Integration and Innovation Transnational Enterprises (KITE) research programme.

The book begins with an introduction written by the editors (Chapter 1). Chapter 2

then provides an overview and typology of knowledge boundaries and the various

means recommended to manage knowledge integration across boundaries. By delin-

eating different types of knowledge boundary, Tell addresses the nature of knowledge

in terms of its ‘complexity, uncertainty, fallibility and incompleteness’(p. 38). The

highlight of Chapter 3 lies in its attempt to address ‘glitches’,defined by Hoopes and

Postrel (1999) as a class of potential alignment failures, utilising three rules: the black

box principle, the study information rule and the powerboat-sailboat rule. Chapter 4

presents fascinating analyses and comparisons between absorptive capacity (through

the concept of knowledge accumulation) and knowledge integration. In addition to

the current mechanisms, routines and rules, Berggren, Sydow and Tell have extended

the knowledge integration research agenda by including agents and activities in the

integration of qualitatively novel and different types of knowledge. Chapter 5 focuses

on the boundary spanning challenge of bridging the individual—organisation divide

and the relationship this has to the generation of organisational knowledge. The

outstanding feature of this conceptual chapter is when Lindkvist and Bengtsson

remodel and extend Nonaka’s original SECI model by identifying two additional

modes: objectification and elicitation. This extension means the original SECI

becomes an informed dual route model that incorporates the importance of individ-

ual-to-organisation into the knowledge integration process. Chapter 6 discusses open

innovation, identified as one of the hottest topics in recent time (Huizingh 2011). Based

on the results of empirical research, the authors show how knowledge flowing across

boundaries can be bridged using a combination of complementary knowledge integra-

tion practices. Chapter 7 investigates how technological and strategic factors affect

the implementation of outsourcing in a client–supplier relationship, and the ways in

which these factors influence knowledge specialisation and integration. Castellucci

and Carnabuci, in Chapter 8, found that different types of uncertainty have different

implications for the organisation’s propensity to adjust its boundaries to include or

Industrial Relations Journal 48:5-6, 518–520

ISSN 0019-8692

© 2018 Brian Towers (BRITOW) and John Wiley & Sons Ltd