Welcome to my website!

I am a research associate and PhD-student at University of Stuttgart in Germany. My research focuses on strategic management and organization theory, and here particularly on organizational routines. I work with qualitative methods such as observation and interviewing to explore how actors enact organizational routines and which role technology as well as agency plays in this process. My PhD-project explores how software development teams perform routines as part of the so called Scrum framework to organize complex software development processes.

On this website I provide the latest information about my research projects and publications. I would also be excited to get in contact with researchers and practitioners that work on similar topics or face similar challenges.

How Individuals Perform Customer Knowledge Absorption Practices – A Contextual Approach to Open Innovation

In this article co-authored with Martin Rost and Birgit Renzl we address research on open innovation. The purpose of the article is to sensitize scholars and practitioners to the argument that the open innovation paradigm includes a variety of different practices that are quite different from each other. Hence, scholars should be aware of these differences. We develop a framework which includes different practices and a variety of contextual factors that enable or constrain these practices. Subsequently, we apply the framework to a case study of a pharmaceutical packaging machines company. The article has been published in International Journal of Technology Management.

The article is available at Inderscience.

Entrepreneurial Initiatives as a Microfoundation of Dynamic Capabilities

In this article, co-authored with Birgit Renzl, we develop a model of how entrepreneurial initiatives change existing operational routines and, hence, serve as microfoundations of dynamic capabilities. We develop a conceptual model that strives to explain those dynamics. While we build on the capability perspective of organizational routines, this article provides a way to understand how individuals change those operative routines and capabilities. The article contributes to research that connects strategic management and entrepreneurship research as well as microfoundations research.

The article has been published in “Journal of Accounting and Organizational Change”. It is available on the journal website as well as in Opus.

Wie können Wissensmanagementsysteme nutzerorientiert gestaltet werden? Die Rolle organisationaler Routinen (German)

In this article co-authored with Michael Gabler we argue that organizational routines are a suitable means to design efficient knowledge management systems in organizations. This is due to the properties of routines that are conducive of knowledge sharing. We hope that our article inspires practitioners to consider rationales other than formal structures when designing and analyzing their knowledge management systems.

The article has been published in “HMD – Praxis der Wirtschaftsinformatik” and is available on the journal website. A pre-print is available here: Mahringer 2018 Wie können Wissensmanagementsysteme nutzerorientiert gestaltet werden HMD.

Scrum (German)

This short article gives a brief overview of the Scrum framework – Scrum events, rules and roles. It has been published in “WISU – Das Wirtschaftsstudium”. This article has been written for practitioners, students and researchers who would like to capture”Scrum in a nutshell”.

Agilität in wissensintensiven Organisationen: von der Produkt-zur Dienstleistungsorientierung (German)

In this article co-authored with Birgit Renzl and Michael Gabler we elaborate on how organizations might become agile. After defining what agility means, we identify three building blocks of how practitioners might increase their organization’s agility: Formally designing ambidextrous structures, fostering networks that bridge those structures and changing organizational culture to support knowledge exchange.

This article has been published in “IM+io” and is available in Opus.

Employer Branding 2.0 – Change Smart (German)

How do the recent developments in social media impact employer branding? In this article co-authored with Birgit Renzl we argue that there are profound changes that come about with the recent emergence of social media tools. For instance, consider platforms on which applicants document their experiences with application processes. Organizations, however, have to cope with those emergent challenges. We explain how organizations might change toward an employer branding 2.0 that uses the opportunities provided by social media and minimizes risks associated with social media.

The article has been published in “Austrian Management Review”. A preview is available on Google books.

Medicus Adaptabilis – Wenn Fachwissen alleine nicht mehr ausreichend ist (German)

In this article co-authored with Michael Gabler, Patrick Metzger, Birgit Renzl we plead for a shift in mind of physicians’ trainings. We argue that professional competencies are not sufficient anymore, but that doctors nowadays require profound social competencies. We also show how competency management might support these new requirements.

The article has been published in “Zeitschrift für Führung und Personalmanagement in der Gesundheitswirtschaft“ and is available on the journal website as well as in Opus.

Internationale Personalentsendungen als strategischer Erfolgsfaktor (German)

„Internationale Personalentsendungen als strategischer Erfolgsfaktor“ is a book chapter that strives to help practitioners to successfully perform expatriation processes. The chapter first explains the strategic relevance of expatriation processes and then identifies criteria that are vital for the successful performance of those processes.

The chapter has been published in the book “Urnik, S./Pfeil, W. (2015). Internationale Personalentsendungen. Chancen und Risiken aus Management- und Rechtsperspektive. Wien: Manz” and a pre-print is available in Opus.