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Faculty Profile
Rolv Petter Storvik Amdam
Professor - Department of Strategy and Entrepreneurship
Biography
I am Professor of Business History from 1997. From 2006 to 2010 I was Associate Dean of BI's Executive Master of Management programmes, and from 2011 to 2014 I was the Dean of BI's executive programmes.
I received my Dr.Philos degree from the University of Oslo based on a study of the development of business education in Norway, a topic that I also have studied in a European perspective in a EU financed project (CEMP). In addtion to having written and edited several books on the history of the glass industry, pharmaceutical companies, the aluminium industry and business schools, I have published in various international journals in business history and management. My aim is to do research that is relevant both within the field of international business and business history. I teach courses in international business and management.
During the fall semester 2015 I was the Alfred D. Chandler Jr. International Scholar in Business History at Harvard Business School, and in 2017 (fall) visiting fellow at SCANCOR-Weatherhead Center of International Affaires, Harvard. I have also been visitor at Reading University, Toulouse University, ESSEC in Paris, and Nanyang Technological University, and ISM University of Management and Economics, Lithuania. I was member of the board of ISM University of Managament and Economics in Lithuania from 2011 to 2013.
My main research interests are:
• Business education and career development
• International development of executive education
* Internationalization procesess
* Globalization and industrial clusters, focusing on the maritime industry
This paper explores the implications of the collective identity of a regional cluster on firms’ internationalization. Prior research has established the value of cluster “insidership” through access to knowledge and resources. Through a longitudinal study, we find that cluster identity, through distinct identity claims, provides imperatives and shapes the motivation of firms to internationalize. These imperatives, we argue, stem from cluster identity seen as defined features of regional collectives, extending reference theory to encompass the role of social cues from similar firms located geographically close. The imperatives are particularly salient in the early stages of firms’ internationalization, adding the role of cluster identity to explain the differences between inexperienced and experienced firms in internationalization. Keywords: Cluster identity; Internationalization; Multinational enterprise; Longitudinal study.
Amdam, Rolv Petter Storvik (2020)
Creating the new executive: postwar executive education and socialization into the managerial elite
This article explores the development of executive education in the US from 1945 to around 1970. The participants were primarily men in management positions, and they were selected by their employers as a preparation for positions at a higher level in the corporate hierarchies. More than offering the participants analytical tools or new research-based knowledge, executive education was an arena where new executives were socialized into the norms of corporate leadership. This article analyses the development of executive education as a socialization process by using Pierre Bourdieu’s concepts of cultural, social, and symbolic capital. The value of cultural capital included the introduction to the language and manners of top executives. The value of symbolic capital was expressed by diplomas from prestigious universities but also by the signaling effect of being chosen by top management to participate. Increased socialization gained through executive education then translated into new forms of professional capital acquisition tied to the positioning and dominance of managerial authority in business organizations. As this article also shows, business schools actively involved the participants’ wives in the socialization process as another reinforcing mechanism in the executive development process. Social capital was most of all acquired when the participants created new social networks with other participants across corporate borders.
Amdam, Rolv Petter Storvik (2019)
The internationalization of Executive education
Da Silva Lopes, Teresa; Tworek, Heidi & Lubinski, Christina (red.). The Routledge Companion to the Makers of Global Business
Amdam, Rolv Petter Storvik; Fredona, Robert & Reinert, Sophus (2019)
Breaking Even: Political Economy and Private Enterprise in the Norwegian Glass Industry, 1739-1803
Using internal debates and surviving account books, this article traces the eighteenth-century history of the Norwegian glass industry, created to exploit Norway’s immense natural resource wealth, and of the chartered company that would later become Norway’s iconic Christiania Glasmagasin. The investors in the company, many of them among Norway’s “founding fathers,” were individually responsible for its losses and it operated, remarkably, at an annual loss for nearly five decades. The article asks why, beyond the anticipation of a royal import ban on foreign glass, private investors might have continued to accept such losses. It focuses on tensions between cameralist and liberal ideologies in the creation of an important national industry, and on older (and perhaps more sustainable) ways of thinking about profitability.
Amdam, Rolv Petter Storvik; Bjarnar, Ove & Wang, Jinmin (2018)
The dynamic role of small- and medium-sized multinationals in global production networks : Norwegian maritime firms in the Greater Shanghai Region in China
This article examines the role of small- and medium-sized multinational enterprises (MNEs) in the dynamic development of global production networks (GPNs) in the maritime industry. It studies the dynamism between subsidiaries of Norwegian maritime firms and regional actors and institutions in the Greater Shanghai Region of China from the perspectives of the subsidiaries. It argues that strategic coupling, recoupling and decoupling are partly the results of regional selection mechanisms. However, in the cases where the subsidiaries are embedded within the host region, the strategies and behaviour of MNEs are of decisive importance for the dynamic development of GPNs. Keywords: China, global production networks, maritime industry, multinational enterprises, Norway, PRC, strategic coupling, operation modes
Amdam, Rolv Petter Storvik (2017)
Det Romsdalske Practiske Landhuusholdnings-Sælskab og opplysningstida, 1773-1790
Årbok / Romsdalsmuseet, s. 40- 55.
Amdam, Rolv Petter Storvik (2016)
Executive Education and the Managerial Revolution: The Birth of Executive Education at Harvard Business School
This article explores how clusters have reacted to the recent process of globalization by comparing the development of two clusters that are located in the same region, the county of Møre og Romsdal in Norway. These are the furniture cluster and the maritime cluster on the west coast of Norway. When international competition increased, the first one declined while the other prospered and became more global. Structural differences explain only partly the different development paths of these clusters. In addition, firms’ strategic actions and the degree of collectively shared visions about international operations mattered for how the clusters developed.
Market transformations and organisational changes lead to new needs for managerial competence, and such changes are proposed to influence the institution of management education over time. However, in an examination of the educational backgrounds of Norwegian CEOs from 1936 to 2009, this paper finds that changes in the institution of management education cannot be interpreted as direct responses to the organisational and external changes that companies face. This study suggests that the institution of management education is modified rather than fundamentally changed. These modifications can largely be explained by the concepts of institutional solidarity (i.e. dominant agents define what management education is, and this understanding is difficult to change due to path dependencies in the recruitment of top managers) and institutional plasticity (i.e. the “stretching” of established institutional scripts to fit new contexts).
Amdam, Rolv Petter & Kvålshaugen, Ragnhild (2010)
Utdanning av norske næringslivstopper kontinuitet eller brudd?
Magma - Tidsskrift for økonomi og ledelse, 13(3), s. 37- 42.
Geoffrey Jones and Jonathan Zeitlin (eds), The Oxford Handbook in Business History
Amdam, Rolv Petter; Hansen, Marie Skogholt & Vasli, Karen Marie (2008)
Connecting People in Shanghai: The Norwegian Way
Lie, Lund, Hansen (red), Making it in China
Amdam, Rolv Petter & Djelic, Marie-Laure (2007)
Americanization in Comparative Perspective: The Managerial revolution in France and Norway, 1940-1970
Business History, 49(4), s. 483- 505.
Amdam, Rolv Petter & Lang, Reinhard (2007)
Management Research in East and West
Baltic Journal of Management, Special Issue(2), s. 121- 124.
Lervik, Jon Erland; Amdam, Rolv Petter, Hennestad, Bjørn, Lunnan, Randi & Nilsen, Sølvi M. (2005)
Implementing Human Resource Development Best Practice: Replication or Re-creation?
Human Resource Development International, 8(3), s. 345- 360.
Lunnan, Randi; Lervik, Jon Erland, Traavik, Laura E Mercer, Nilsen, Sølvi M., Amdam, Rolv Petter & Hennestad, Bjørn (2005)
Global transfer of management practices across nations and MNC subcultures
Academy of Management Executive, 19(2), s. 77- 80.
The management practice we examine performance management (PM)-can be regarded as an extension of the traditional performance appraisal, linking individual performance to corporate strategy.1 Researchers separate calculative PM (focus on individual contributions and rewards) and collaborative PM (focus on creating a partnership culture between employer and employee, for example through competency development).2 In the United States, PM practices contain both calculative and collaborative elements, whereas in Scandinavia the calculative element is downplayed.3 Norwegian firms have had a long tradition of holding annual "planning and development talks." This is, however, a single, once a year event intended to promote good working relations more than a managerial system for evaluating, developing and compensating employees.' We suggest that when introducing a "foreign best practice" into this setting, national values present initial barriers, whereas organizational capabilities and systems are crucial for the final shape of the practice.
Amdam, Rolv Petter (2003)
Changement d'organisation dans deux sociétés norvégiennes de production d'aluminium: ÅSV et Alnor
Management qualifications and dissemination of knowledge in regional systems : the case of Norway, 1930s-1990s
Journal of Industrial History, 4(2), s. 75- 93.
Amdam, Rolv Petter (2000)
Industrikomiteen i New York 1943-1945: Ein kanal for kunnskapsoverføring frå USA til Norge
Historisk Tidsskrift (Norge), 79(1), s. 3- 21.
Kvålshaugen, Ragnhild & Amdam, Rolv Petter (2000)
Etablering og utvikling av ledelseskulturer: Norsk kenningisme
Nordiske organisasjonsstudier, 2, 1, s. 84- 106.
Artikkelen fokuserer på hvordan en ledelseskultur etableres og utvikles. Hovedvekten er lagt på å forklare hvilke faktorer som er viktige for lederes valg av ledelsesideer og årsakene til at disse ideene blir spredt utover flere bedrifter og over tid. Ledelseskulturen som bidrar til det empiriske grunnlaget for artikkelen er kenningisme - en ledelseskultur som utviklet seg blant norske bedriftsledere som brukte George Kenning (amerikansk ledelseskonsulent) og hans ledelsesprinsipper til å definere hva ledelse er, og som betraktet ham som en betydningsfull rådgiver. Studien viser at en ledelseskultur over tid kan utvikles til å bli en mote. Videre behøver ikke moten nødvendigvis å dø helt ut, men snarere gjenoppstå i en ny og mer moderne utgave. Funnene fra studien antyder også at man bør studere utviklingen av ledelseskulturer i et evolusjonært perspektiv, siden en slik kultur utvikles over tid og gjennomgår ulike utviklingsfaser. The paper focuses on how a management culture was established and developed. The emphasis is on explaining which factors that have major influence on managers' choices of management ideas and the reasons for the diffusion of these ideas among organizations and over time. The case used to exemplify these relationships is the diffu-sion of George Kenning's management philosophy in Norway. He was an American management consultant helping some Norwegian managers to define management and managerial roles. This study shows that a management culture develops over time and after a while even becomes a fashion. It also shows that a management fashion do not necessarily suddenly die. It might be revitalized and arise in new forms. The findings in the study, thus, suggest that applying an evolutionary perspective on the development of a management culture might enhance the understanding of this formation process.
Amdam, Rolv Petter (1999)
Utdanning, økonomi og ledelse: Fremveksten av den økonomisk-administrative utdanningen 1936-1986
Unipub forlag.
Amdam, Rolv Petter (1999)
Foreign Influence on the Education of Norwegian Business Managers before World War II
Management Education
Amdam, Rolv Petter & Bjarnar, Ove (1999)
Networks and the Diffusion of Knowledge: The Norwegian Industry Committee in New York during the Second World War
Business and Economic History On-Line, 28(1), s. 33- 43.
Amdam, Rolv Petter Storvik & Bjarnar, Ove (1998)
The regional dissemination of American productivity models in Norway in the 1950s and 1960s
Kipping, Matthias & Bjarnar, Ove (red.). The Americanisation of European Business: The Marshall Plan and the Transfer of US Management Models
Amdam, Rolv Petter (1998)
American Influence on Management Education in Norway, 1945-1970s: The Role of Intermediate Organisations
Norske toppledere og deres utdanningsbakgrunn i 2016
[Article in business/trade/industry journal]. Magma - Tidsskrift for økonomi og ledelse, 20(5), s. 64- 69.
Amdam, Rolv Petter Storvik (2017)
The US and the International Professionalization of Top-Managers
[Report]. Rockefeller Archive Center Research Reports.
Amdam, Rolv Petter Storvik (2017)
“Creating the new executive: Post-war executive education in a civilization perspective”
[Academic lecture]. Business History Conference Annual Conference.
Amdam, Rolv Petter Storvik (2017)
The Globalization of Executive Education: 1945-1970
[Academic lecture]. International Business and Civilization Seminar.
Amdam, Rolv Petter Storvik (2016)
Choices, changes and combinations of operation modes in China in the context of global production networks
[Academic lecture]. SAM Special Conference.
Amdam, Rolv Petter Storvik & Bjarnar, Ove (2016)
"Dynamic and flexible clusters as determinants for localization: The relationship between ocean-related industries on the west coast of Norway in the 19th and 20th century"
[Academic lecture]. World Business History and EBHA Conference.
Perception gaps in headquarter-subsidiary relationships: Comparing the role of subsidiary managers in China, Brazil and USA
[Academic lecture]. AIB Academy of International Business Conference.
Amdam, Rolv Petter Storvik (2016)
Entrepreneurs in business education: The international diffusion of executive education 1945-1980
[Academic lecture]. ABH/GUG Conference.
Amdam, Rolv Petter Storvik (2016)
Reintepretation of the role of business schools in the formation of the professional managers: The birth of executive education at Harvard Business School
[Academic lecture]. Business History Conference 2016.
Regional innovasjonspolitikk i et internasjonalt vakuum?
[Report]. Høgskolen i Molde.
Amdam, Rolv Petter Storvik; Brekke, R & Wahl, Ove (2010)
The integration of Norwegian firms in the maritime cluster in Singapore
[Academic lecture]. The International Maritime Conference on The Global Shipping Industry in the 21st Century: Dynamics and Transformative Capacity.
Amdam, Rolv Petter Storvik & Bjarnar, Ove (2010)
Globalization and the transformation of clusters: A comparative study of two clusters
[Academic lecture]. Regional Studies Association Annual International Conference 2010: Regional Responses and Global Shifts: Actors, Institutions and Organisations.
Amdam, Rolv Petter Storvik (2010)
Globalization and the dynamic development of clusters: A comparative study of two clusters
[Academic lecture]. 36TH EIBA Annual Conference.
Amdam, Rolv Petter Storvik & Bjarnar, Ove (2009)
Strategy, knowledge transfer in clusters, and external pressure
[Academic lecture]. MMRC conference.
Amdam, Rolv Petter Storvik & Bjarnar, Ove (2008)
Global pipelines and diverging patterns of knowledge sharing in regional clusters
[Academic lecture]. Regional Studies Association Annual International Conference: Regions - The Dilemmas of Integration and Competition.
Bjarnar, Ove & Amdam, Rolv Petter (2008)
Global pipelines and diverging patterns of knowledge sharing in regional clusters
[Academic lecture]. Regional Studies Association Annual International Conference : Regions - the Dilemmas of Integration and Competition?.
Amdam, Rolv Petter; Lunnan, Randi & Ramanauskas, Gediminas (2007)
FDI and the Transformation from Industry to Service Society in Emerging Economies: A Lithuanian - Nordic Perspective
[Article in business/trade/industry journal]. Engineering Economics, 51(1), s. 22- 28.