For many decades, management theorists have stressed the value of planned action. In contrast, emergent theories of organizational action have stressed the presence and even potential benefit of unplanned action in organizations. This research defines organizational improvisation as unplanned but deliberate organizational action, and explores its presence and impact on organizational performance during new product development and introduction activities. Grounded in a framework of organizational learning, the study seeks to go beyond popular admonitions urging managerial flexibility. Instead, it seeks to provide systematic insight into the weaknesses and potential of improvisation as a tool for escalating the speed of new product actions, increasing the short-term financial effectiveness of these actions, and permitting long-term organizational learning. The research develops theory regarding the role of various antecedent factors on the degree of organizational improvisation and the role of a number of moderating factors on whether organizational improvisation translates into the above noted performance outcomes. Analysis will involve careful collection of observational, self-report, and interview data on twenty new product development action phases (e.g., actions to fund the new product idea or actions to build and design a commercially relevant prototype) within product-development projects in four firms. The study also provides an empirical analysis of specific learning subprocesses. This type of work is fundamental to generate a solid empirical literature on organizational learning.
