Hostname: page-component-7dd5485656-bt4hw Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-10-29T21:44:45.281Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Whose Time Is It? Understanding Clock-time Pacing and Event-time Pacing in Complex Innovations

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 February 2015

Deborah Dougherty ,
Heidi Bertels ,
Ken Chung ,
Danielle D. Dunne  and
Justin Kraemer
Deborah Dougherty
Affiliation:
Rutgers University, USA
Heidi Bertels
Affiliation:
City University of New York (CUNY), USA
Ken Chung
Affiliation:
California State University, East Bay, USA
Danielle D. Dunne
Affiliation:
Fordham University, USA
Justin Kraemer
Affiliation:
Rutgers University, USA
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Time pacing, which refers to the regulation of intensity and direction of people's attention and effort, is central to innovation management. However, in a study of complex product innovation in pharmaceuticals, we find that time pacing is a major source of conflict between managers and scientists over innovation management. Our analysis of this tension reveals that two very different forms of time pacing operate in this complex innovation. Clock-time pacing, which gauges progress by the predictable passage of clock time, is used by strategic managers to reduce unnecessary exploration, focus on necessary questions, and speed up the execution of steps. Event-time pacing, which gauges progress by the unpredictable achievement of learning events, is used by the scientists to develop a deep understanding of how a drug might behave in the body against a disease, to focus on learning by asking many questions, and to integrate emergent results into plausible patterns. We identify four dimensions that differentiate clock-time pacing from event-time pacing, which drive the tension between the two. We summarize negative effects that this tension can have on innovation if left unaddressed, and then suggest ways to integrate clock-time pacing with event-time pacing. We also discuss implications for Chinese management.

Keywords

clock timecomplexityevent timeinnovationpharmaceuticalstime pacing钟表吋间复杂事件时间创新制药业时间节奏

Information

Type
Articles
Information
Management and Organization Review , Volume 9 , Issue 2 , July 2013 , pp. 233 - 263
Copyright
Copyright © International Association for Chinese Management Research 2013

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

Adams, M. 2004. PDMA comparative performance assessment study. Chicago, IL: PDMA Foundation.Google Scholar
Anderson, P. 1999. Complexity theory and organization science. Organization Science, 10(3): 216–232.Google Scholar
Bailyn, L. 1977. Research as a cognitive process: Implications for data analysis. Quality and Quantity, 11(2): 97–117.Google Scholar
Barkenia, H., Baum, J., & Mannix, E. 2002. Management challenges in a new time. Academy of Management Journal, 45(5): 916–930.Google Scholar
Bluedorn, A. C. 2002. The human organization of time: Temporal realities and experience, Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.Google Scholar
Brown, S. L., & Eisenhardt, K. M. 1997. The art of continuous change: Linking complexity theory and time-paced evolution in relentlessly shifting organizations. Administrative Science Quarterly, 42(1): 1–34.Google Scholar
Burns, L. R. 2005. The business of healthcare innovation. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Clark, P. 1985. A review of the theories of time and structure for organizational sociology. Research in the Sociology of Organizations, 4: 35–79.Google Scholar
Collins, F. 2011. Reengineering translational science: The time is right. Science Translational Medicine, 3(90): 1–5.Google Scholar
Corbin, J., & Strauss, A. 1998. Basics of qualitative research: Techniques and procedures for developing grounded theory. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.Google Scholar
Dougherty, D. 1992. Interpretive barriers to successful product innovation in large firms. Organization Science, 3(2): 179–203.Google Scholar
Dougherty, D. 2001. Re-imagining the differentiation and integration of work for sustained product innovation. Organization Science, 12(5): 612–631.Google Scholar
Dougherty, D., Su, Y., & Chung, K. 2012. Qualitative research and data analysis. In Chen, X. P., Tsui, A. S., & Farh, J. L. (Eds.), Empirical methods in organization and management research (2nd ed.): 272–296. Beijing: Peking University Press.Google Scholar
Dubinskas, F. 1988. Janus organizations: Scientists and managers in genetic engineering firms. In Dubinskas, F. (Ed.), Making time: Ethnographies of high technology organizations: 170–232. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press.Google Scholar
Fleming, L., & Sorenson, O. 2004. Science as a map in technological search. Strategic Management Journal, 25(8-9): 909–928.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Garud, R., Gehman, J., & Kumaraswamy, A. 2011. Complexity arrangements for sustained innovation: Lessons from 3M corporation. Organization Studiess 32(6): 737–767.Google Scholar
Gavetti, G., & Levinthal, D. 2000. Looking forward and looking backward: Cognitive and experiential search. Administrative Sciences Quarterly, 45(1): 113–137.Google Scholar
Gersick, C. J. G. 1989. Marking time: Predictable transitions in task groups. Academy of Management Journal, 32(2): 274–309.Google Scholar
Gersick, C. J. G. 1994. Pacing strategic change: The case of a new venture. Academy of Management Journal, 37(1): 9–45.Google Scholar
Grandori, A. 2011. A rational heuristic model of economic decision making. Rationality and Society, 23: 477–504.Google Scholar
Grinnell, F. 2009. Everyday practice of science: Where intuition and passion meet objectivity and logic. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Herbig, P. A., & Palumbo, F. A. 1996. Innovation – Japanese style. Industrial Management and Data Systems, 96(5): 11–20.Google Scholar
Holland, T. 2013. China's first place for patents not quite the triumph it seems. China Business.Google Scholar
Jacques, E. 1982. The form of time. London: Heinemann.Google Scholar
Lohr, S. 2011. When innovation, too, is made in China. The New York Times. New York, NY.Google Scholar
Lynn, G. S., Morone, J. G., & Paulson, A. S. 1996. Marketing and discontinuous innovation: The probe and learn process. California Management Review, 38(3): 8–37.Google Scholar
Mitchell, C., Ray, R. L., & van Ark, B. 2012. The Conference Board CEO Challenge 2012: Risky business–Focusing on innovation and talent in a volatile world. Report No. R-1491-12-RR. New York, N.Y.: Conference Board.Google Scholar
Mok, A., & Morris, M. W. 2010. Asian-Americans' creative styles in Asian and American situations: Assimilative and contrastive responses as a function of bicultural identity integration. Management and Organization Review, 6(3): 371–390.Google Scholar
Morris, M. W., & Leung, K. 2010. Creativity East and West: Perspectives and parallels. Management and Organization Review, 6(3): 313–327.Google Scholar
Ng, R. 2004. Drugs: From discovery to approval. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley & Sons.Google Scholar
Nightingale, P. 1998. A cognitive model of innovation. Research Policys 27(7): 689–709.Google Scholar
Orlikowski, W. J., & Yates, J. 2002. It's about time: Temporal structuring in organizations. Organization Science, 13(6): 684–700.Google Scholar
Pisano, G. P. 2006. Science business: The promise, the reality, and the future of biotech. Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Press.Google Scholar
Robertson, M. 2008. Time is money? Comtnodification, control, and colonization of time in biomedical innovation. Paper presented at the Academy of Management Annual Meeting, Anaheim, CA.Google Scholar
Simonton, D. K., & Ting, S.-S. 2010. Creativity in Eastern and Western civilizations: The lessons of historiometry. Management and Organiza Hon Review, 6(3): 329–350.Google Scholar
Singer, E. 2009. Interpreting the genome. MIT Technology Review, (January/February): 48–53.Google Scholar
Spradley, J. 1979. The ethnographic interview. New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston.Google Scholar
Strauss, A., & Corbin, J. 1994. Grounded theory methodology: An overview. In Denzin, N. K. & Lincoln, Y. S. (Eds.), Handbook of qualitative research (2nd ed.): 273–285. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.Google Scholar
Strauss, A. L. 1978. Negotiations: Varieties, contexts, processes, and social order. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.Google Scholar
Turner, S., Mitchell, W., & Bettis, R. 2012. Strategic momentum: How experience shapes temporal consistency of ongoing innovation. Working Paper: Moore School of Business, University of South Carolina.Google Scholar
Tushman, M., & O'Reilly, C. 1997. Winning through innovation, Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weick, K. 1995. Sensemaking in organizations. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications. West, W., & Nightingale, P. 2009. Organizing for innovation: Towards successful translational research. Trends in Biotechnology, 27(10): 558–561.Google Scholar
Zerubavel, E. 1976. Timetables and scheduling: On the social organization of time. Sociological Inquiry, 46(2): 87–94.Google Scholar
Zhou, J., & Su, Y. 2010. A missing piece of the puzzle: The organizational context in cultural patterns of creativity. Management and Organization Review, 6(3): 391–413.Google Scholar