Qualitative Analysis - Unbundling the Structure of Inertia Resource Versus Routine Rigidity

Student:        Phan Minh Hai

Program:         MBA

Student ID: 17110018

QUALITATIVE ANALYSIT

Unbundling the structure of inertia resource versus routine rigidity

1. Was the paper “interesting”? In the other words, which theoretical gap did the paper fill?

The organization inertia is crucial on the dynamics and innovation industry like newspaper industry as the rise of digital media due to the fast pace of internet. Gilbert discovered the difficult of traditional literature to clarify the different between two very distinct types of inertia:

• Resource rigidity was described as the “failure to change resource investment pattern”;
• Routine rigidity was described as the “failure to change the organizational processes”.

These two types of inertia have an important interaction with threat perception, which were less paid attention by ordinary literature. With two clarify research questions: “How does threat perception affect incumbent inertia in the face of discontinuous change?” and “Is the effect of threat perception different for resource rigidity and routine rigidity?”, Gilbert help explaining the structure of inertia and its’ form interaction.  

1. How is the structure of the paper different compared to the typical structured paper?[pic 1]

Typical structured paper usually follows this organization: Main tittle, subtitle, affiliation and author’s name; Abstract; Introduction; Literature Review; Hypothesis and proposition, Methodology, Findings; Discussions; Conclusion; Implication, limitation and Future Research; Acknowledge; References and Appendix;

However, in this research, the Author did not follow the typical structured paper with little differences: after presenting about the theoretical background and Methodology, as usually “Finding” would be followed, the author discussed about the Hypothesis and propositions (like the graph).

This structure helped providing a clear understand the issue about inertia which was the main subject of this research.

1. What kind of information is presented in each section?

Introduction:

• Generation the main terms (“Inertia”, “Resource rigidity”, “Routine rigidity”) and mention some theoretical gaps;
• Summarize the brief about the research topic.

Theoretical background

• Literature review (other former research of related to the topic such as Christensen & Bower, 1996; Tushman, Smith, Wood, Westerman, & O’Reilly,
  2003; Miller & Friesen, 1980; Siggelkow, 2001; Teece, Pisano, & Shuen, 1997; Tushman & Anderson, 1986; …);
• Theoretical gaps and research questions

Methodology

• Research setting with embedded design that allowed a replication logic and reasons to choose this topic;
• Mention about the data resources: Interviews, Archival documents, Direct observations;
• Data analysis process.

Hypothesis and proportions

• At first, Gilbert discussed about the interaction among threat perception, resources rigidity and routine rigidity;
• Then he presented the intervening variables stemmed from the two rigidity types that response to discontinues change;

Discussion, Implication, Limitation, and Conclusion

• Gilbert described and depicted an Interpretive model of inertia that help his propositions;
• He also mentioned some implication and limitation about his research.
• Finally, he summarized the study process and re-confirm about the interaction between types and force of inertia.

References: list of references materials

1. What is the Author’s research paradigm?

After finish reading this article, I found that Gilbert’s research paradigm is positive as follow reasons:

Discovered the theoretical gap and generated research question before data collection:

• Reviewing literature on two types of inertia;
• Without being influenced or influencing the research field, Gilbert could fulfill the study’s object by setting the research’s questions before data collection

Used multiple data sources & analyses to adapt deductive approach:

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