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This research paper is concerned with the problem of making “knowledge flow” practical for a wide variety of companies. The paper discusses the need for a practical solution to knowledge transfer and demonstrates how the challenges of knowledge transfer were overcome in a cross‐functional environment using the principles of object technology. The proposed concept, by offering a structured approach to knowledge transfer, allows organisations to create systems based on simple but effective knowledge transfer processes, which will integrate with legacy computing systems.

Today’s business world is facing a plethora of managerial and technological changes which are beyond the capacity of any firm to control or absorb. Customer satisfaction, development of new products, and introduction of new technologies are well‐known driving forces, but their fast mutation and turmoil are making them unpredictable. Companies have to radically alter their strategic and process goals to keep up with this volatile market. In this turbulent environment, business process reengineering (BPR) has evolved as the most promising approach for designing organizations. It is extremely important for reengineers to understand the “driving” forces in this environment. One of the most important and fundamental drivers is understanding the goals (goal mapping) of the organization. Typically the goals of organizations are derived from the “voice of the customer”. In this paper we address a procedure by which optimum level of goal mapping can be considered in the preliminary stages of BPR. A cost optimization model for goal mapping is proposed using an example from the Space Shuttle Testing Facility at the SSC‐National Aeronautics and Space Administration.

Technological process innovation (TPI) is a distinctive organizational phenomenon characterized by a firm-internal locus and underlying components such as mutual adaptation of new technology and existing organization, technological change, organizational change, and systemic impact. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the management of these components at different stages of the innovation lifecycle (ILC) in large manufacturing companies.

The authors adopt an exploratory case-based research design and conduct a multiple case study of five large successful manufacturing companies operating in different industries in Germany. The authors build the study on 55 semi-structured interviews, which yielded 91.5 hours of recorded interview data. The authors apply cross-case synthesis and replication logic to identify patterns of how companies address process innovation components at different ILC stages.

The study uncovers the content of four central TPI components across the ILC and identifies differences between the development of core and non-core processes. Based on the findings the authors describe asymmetric adaptation as a theoretical construct and propose that companies seek different levels of process standardization depending on the type of process they develop, which in turn affects whether there is a greater extent of technological or organizational change.

Awareness of existing structures, processes, and technologies, as well as their value in relation to the company’s core and non-core operations is imperative to determining the adequate structure of mutual adaptation.

The authors provide detailed insight on the management of mutual adaptation, technological, and organizational change, as well as systemic impact at the different stages of the ILC. The authors extend prior research by adopting an ILC perspective for the investigation of these four TPI components and by proposing a construct of asymmetric adaptation to capture key mechanisms of process development and implementation.