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Robert Demir

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070-511 74 84
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robert.demir@ratio.se
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Robert Demir is a Senior Associate Professor of Strategic Management. His research interests include strategy practices and processes in private and public organisations, digital transformation, open innovation practices and processes, business model innovation, unsanctioned innovation, bottom-up innovation, secrecy, and market making. Dr Demir uses qualitative research methods to study novel, poorly theorized phenomena and survey-based methods to test and explore new theoretical ideas and empirical phenomena.

He was awarded a PhD in Strategic Management from Stockholm Business School in 2010. He has been awarded several grants, including a post-doctoral grant from the Tore Browaldh and Jan Wallander Foundation and several other research grants from VINNOVA, Riksbankens Jubileumsfond, Marianne & Marcus Wallenberg Foundation, and Peter Wallenberg Foundation.

Dr Demir joined the Strategy and Organisation Group at the Department of Management and Engineering (Linköping University) in 2023. He has held positions and research affiliations at Stockholm Business School (Stockholm University), Lancaster University Management School, House of Innovation (Stockholm School of Economics), and the Ratio Institute. He has also served as the Deputy Vice President of Events at IFSAM—International Federation of Scholarly Associations of Management.

Related publications

    Article (with peer review)

    The Impact of Networking With Knowledge-Intensive Professional Service Firms on Speed to Market and Product Innovativeness

    Soetanto, D., & Demir, R.
    Download

    Publication year

    2024

    Published in

    IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management

    Abstract

    During the new product development (NPD) process, exploitation and exploration are important, especially for small manufacturing firms (SMFs). However, limited resources and a lack of internal knowledge capacity have forced SMFs to work with knowledge-intensive professional service firms (KIPSFs). This article investigates the impact of SMFs’ networks with KIPSFs on the performance of NPD. Using data from 164 SMFs in the northwest of England, this article reveals a linear relationship between firm’s product innovativeness and its network with KIPSFs for exploitation, and a curvilinear relationship between firm’s speed to market and its network with KIPSFs for exploration. A curvilinear relationship was also found between networks with KIPSFs for ambidexterity and firm’s product innovativeness and speed to market. These results lead to several practical implications for networking strategy as each network supports different innovation activities and produces different outcomes.

    Article (with peer review)

    A microfoundational view of the interplay between open innovation and a firm’s strategic agility

    Hutton, S., Demir, R., & Eldridge, S.
    Download

    Publication year

    2024

    Published in

    Long Range Planning

    Abstract

    Open innovation can support firms looking to deploy strategic agility through product innovations during periods of market and technological change. However, existing research lacks a comprehensive understanding of the microfoundations that underlie strategic agility in the context of open innovation. We address this gap using an in-depth analysis of a firm’s open innovation activities in support of new product development (NPD). Our analysis reveals that open innovation can help leverage NPD processes to drive technological innovations in response to changing market conditions. Under such circumstances, open innovation enables firms to deploy strategic agility by continually developing the product portfolio. Our study reveals six mechanisms that enable three mutually complementary practices of agility: knowledge-based agility at the firm-environment interface, behavioural agility in the firm’s decision-making process, and organisational agility in the internal NPD process. We theorise the interplay between the mechanisms that constitute each practice and, in doing so, shed light on how they contribute to firm-level strategic agility.

    Article (with peer review)

    Multidexterity: Combining competing business models in transforming economies

    Demir, R. & Angwin, D.

    Publication year

    2021

    Published in

    Management and Organization Review

    Abstract

    Transforming economies pose significant challenges to multinational corporations’ (MNCs) business models (e.g., Chan et al., 2016; Sánchez & Ricart, 2010). This is because they are characterized by uncertain, highly volatile, and changing institutional frameworks (Peng, Wang, & Jiang, 2008). For instance, China is distinguished by weaker regulatory regimes and industry standards (Tan, 2009; Tsai & Child, 1997). So, whilst business models contribute to rapid internationalization (Dunford, Palmer, & Benveniste, 2010) and local competition in transforming economies (Tallman, Luo, & Buckley, 2018), entering those economies incurs institutional and market challenges. These fundamentally threaten MNCs’ business model viability (Birkinshaw, Zimmermann, & Raisch, 2016b).

    Book chapter

    Reaping Value from Digitalization in Swedish Manufacturing Firms

    Mähring, M., Wennberg, K., & Demir, R.

    Publication year

    2018

    Published in

    P Andersson S Movin M Mähring R Teigland & K Wennberg (red.)

    Abstract

    Excerpt: In this chapter, we take a fresh look at what is actually happening in the area of digitalization, with a particular focus on the Swedish manufacturing sector. […] We particularly focus upon patterns in the ways in which they seek to develop innovations and explore new business models from their activities related to product sensors and wireless data, cloud-based data warehouses, computer-aided manufacturing and 3D printing, big data technologies, and application programming interfaces (APIs). Our findings suggest that while many Swedish industrial firms have developed a strong edge through a combination of high-quality products, international presence, and decentralization, the latter in particular poses challenges when it comes to digital transformation. Digitalization may necessitate large investments across business segments, standardisation, and knowledge sharing regarding both customers and digital solutions in order to create new customer offerings. Points for reflection are then discussed, along with recommendations for scholars that are seeking to develop new and relevant knowledge by studying the transformation of Swedish industry, as well as for managers seeking to benchmark their digitalization activities to others.

    Article (with peer review)

    The Strategic Management of High-Growth Firms: A Review and Theoretical Conceptualization

    Demir, R., Wennberg, K., & McKelvie, A.

    Publication year

    2017

    Published in

    Long Range Planning

    Abstract

    Scholars’ knowledge of the factors behind high-growth firms remains fragmented. This paper provides a systematic review of the empirical literature concerning high-growth firms with a focus on the strategic aspects contributing to growth. Based on our review of 39 articles, we identify five drivers of high growth: human capital, strategy, human resource management, innovation, and capabilities. These drivers are combined to develop a conceptual model of high-growth firms that includes potential contingency factors among the five drivers. We also propose a research agenda to deepen the study of high-growth firms in strategic management.
    Related content: Working paper No. 273

    Working paper

    Working paper No. 273: The Strategic Management of High-Growth Firms: A Review and Theoretical Conceptualization

    Demir, R, Wennberg, K, McKelvie, A
    Download

    Publication year

    2016

    Published in

    Ratio Working Paper

    Abstract

    Scholars’ knowledge of the factors behind high-growth firms remains fragmented. This paper provides a systematic review of the empirical literature concerning high-growth firms with a focus on the strategic aspects contributing to growth. Based on our review of 39 articles, we identify five drivers of high growth: human capital, strategy, human resource management, innovation, and capabilities. These drivers are combined to develop a conceptual model of high-growth firms that includes potential contingency factors among the five drivers. We also propose a research agenda to deepen the study of high-growth firms in strategic management.
    Related content: The Strategic Management of High-Growth Firms: A Review and Theoretical Conceptualization

    Article (with peer review)

    Strategic sponsoring in professional sport: A review and conceptualization

    Demir, R. & Söderman, S.

    Publication year

    2015

    Published in

    European Sport Management Quarterly

    Abstract

    Research question: While the literature on sponsorship of sport has gained interest among scholars in diverse fields such as management, marketing, and psychology in recent years, scant attention has been paid to the extent in which sponsoring may serve as a strategic lever that is mutually beneficial for sponsors and sponsees. We, therefore, ask: What constitutes strategic sponsoring in professional sport?
    Research methods: In addressing our research question, we selectively review the literature on sport sponsoring, link it to the basic tenets of the resource-based view, and conceptualize this literature into a framework for strategic sponsoring in professional sport.

    Results and Findings: In developing our framework, we consider the concept of regime as the key defining working principle of strategic sponsorship activities. We then elicit six different regimes: the cause regime, loyalty regime, appropriability regime, value-differential regime, heuristics-based regime, and associational regime. Each one of these regime types is further related to the six sponsorship activities identified in our literature review.

    Implications: In proposing how various regimes serve as generative mechanisms for altering the resource and knowledge-bases of sponsors and sponsees, we provide a conceptually rigorous framework of strategic sponsoring that expands the limits of extant views of sport sponsorship. Hence, our multi-level framework advances sponsorship theory through a more rigorous framing, and it provides practitioners clues for rethinking their sponsorship programs.

    Article (with peer review)

    Mangling the process: A meta-theoretical account of process theorizing

    Demir, R. & Lychnell, L-O.

    Publication year

    2015

    Published in

    Qualitative Research 15

    Abstract

    Process approaches are increasingly applied in qualitative studies in many fields within social sciences. Yet, few studies have seriously elaborated on the ontological premises of process theorizing. This study addresses this void by suggesting a process philosophical framework. The framework is ontologically grounded with the concepts of causality, spatiality, and temporality in process theorizing. We use these tenets for developing three process theorizing techniques – articulating, relating, and conjugating. Articulating denotes to effectively expressing the potential identifying and generative properties of the process. Relating is the technique by which one maintains continuous connections within and between reified properties of a process. Conjugating is the technique by which a process’ identifying and generative properties are pulled together from various temporal and spatial sites in order to form a novel nexus. Each of these techniques builds on process philosophy and process theory and is illustrated through examples from prior process studies.

    Article (with peer review)

    Strategic Activity as Bundled Affordances

    Demir, R.

    Publication year

    2015

    Published in

    British Journal of Management

    Abstract

    This study addresses the question of how strategy actors instil strategic behaviour in everyday strategic activity despite their physical absence. To do this, I draw on ecological psychology and introduce the concept of bundled affordances, multiple spatiotemporally distinct yet co-performing action possibilities offered to strategists in single strategic events. Through an in-depth qualitative study of three affiliated banks, I illustrate that affordances can be usefully bundled when familiar features of material objects are placed in the everyday perceptual field of strategists. The study further suggests that when corporate interests and individual goals are effectively entangled into affordance bundles, they not only motivate individuals to behave strategically but also make those actions intuitive rather than open-ended action possibilities, instructive rather than interpretive, and readily identifiable in events rather than in information about the properties of material objects.

    Related content: Working Paper No. 243

    Working paper

    Ratio Working Paper no 251: Understanding Psychological Competencies: Conceptualization and Measurement of Psychological Capital at Various Levels

    Demir, R. & Trost, K.
    Download

    Publication year

    2014

    Published in

    Ratio Working Paper

    Abstract

    This study addresses the longstanding concern of how to identify and evaluate individuals’ psychological strengths. While much research has concerned itself with identifying psychological weaknesses of organizational employees, an emergent stream of literature in the human resource management literature has begun to pay attention to the psychological capital of human resources. Psychological capital and other competing views righteously build on positive psychology to address the developmental strengths of individuals. We elaborate further on the concept of psychological capital by conceptually proposing an alternative view. Our view is more elaborate and suggests a three dimensional approach to psychological strengths, taking into consideration the approach-belief subsystem of individuals, the monitoring-creating-executing subsystem, and the self-regulating subsystem. We confirm these three dimensions, which together contain 16 psychological competencies through a survey instrument in a Scandinavian manufacturing firm in China. The results are discussed and implications for future research are proposed.

    Working paper

    Ratio Working Paper No. 243: Strategic Activity as Bundled Affordances

    Demir, R.
    Download

    Publication year

    2014

    Published in

    Strategic Activity as Bundled Affordances

    Abstract

    This study addresses the question of how strategy actors instill strategic behavior in everyday strategic activity despite their physical absence. To do this, I draw on ecological psychology and introduce the concept of bundled affordances, multiple spatiotemporally distinct yet co-performing action possibilities offered to strategists in single strategic events. Through an in-depth qualitative study of three affiliated banks, I illustrate that affordances can be usefully bundled when familiar features of material objects are placed in the everyday perceptual field of strategists. The study further suggests that when corporate interests and individual goals are effectively entangled into affordance bundles, they not only motivate individuals to behave strategically but also make those actions intuitive rather than open-ended action possibilities, instructive rather than interpretive, and readily identifiable in events rather than in information about the properties of material objects.

    Related content: Strategic Activity as Bundled Affordances

    Working paper

    Ratio Working Paper No. 242: Uncovering Recruitment as a Strategic Lever for Various Forms of Organizational Capital

    Demir, R., Löwstedt, J. & Tienari, J.
    Download

    Publication year

    2014

    Published in

    Ratio Working Paper

    Abstract

    Whereas the structuring and growth of the firm have long been central to conceptual development in strategy research, the literature has largely ignored how a fundamental practice such as recruitment can be of strategic importance for the sustenance of the firm’s growth. The present study introduces recruitment as a strategic practice and elaborates on how this practice is crucial in creating and editing social and economic capital of the firm and how this interplays with its growth. It suggests three entrenchments – vertical, horizontal, and lateral – for striking a balance between the firm’s explorative (diversification) and exploitative (specialization) activities for creating and modifying its competence base through strategic recruitment.

    Article (with peer review)

    Managerial attention and antecedents of knowledge source exploitation in MNCs

    Kumar, N., & Demir, R.

    Publication year

    2013

    Published in

    -

    Abstract

    Purpose

    – The purpose of this paper is to address the limitations of prior views regarding knowledge source exploitation by proposing a phenomenological approach to managerial attention and the antecedents of exploiting knowledge sources within the multinational corporations (MNC) network.

    Design/methodology/approach
    – A phenomenological approach to attention is taken to explain the antecedents of managerial attention in knowledge source exploitation behavior. This approach provides an alternative way of conceiving of knowledge source remoteness and familiarity, on the one hand, and exclusion and inclusion on the other.

    Findings
    – Drawing on a phenomenological approach to attention, the merits and limits of prior studies of attention and knowledge seeking/exchange behavior are addressed and three modes of managerial attention are proposed – relative attention, mimetic attention, implicit attention – to explain the antecedents of managerial attention to MNC knowledge sources.

    Originality/value

    – This approach to knowledge source exploitation and attention provides a rich conceptualization of taken‐for‐granted assumptions in extant literature on managerial attention and knowledge‐seeking behavior. The framework offered here builds on a conceptually rigid foundation of attention that overcomes dualisms such as mind‐body, subject‐object, and thinking‐acting that are often embedded in other mainstream approaches to managerial attention.