Management of Emerging Technologies and the Learning Organization : Lessons from the Cloud and Serious Games Technology

This thesis takes learning as a starting point to investigate its associations with successful emerging technologies adoption as well as the act of adaptation to discontinuous change as captured by the phenomenon of organizational resilience. The first part of the thesis explores the micro-foundations of absorptive capacity as a driver for successful technology adoption as well as the behavioral, strategic and operational antecedents of organizational resilience. The second part explores the potential of a promising emerging technology, i.e. Serious Games, to enhance learning and training in an organizational setting. Serious Games have evolved vastly over traditional business simulations and other early game-based learning applications. They arguably provide with excellent opportunities for learning and training, however, the challenges embedded in the design and adoption of such solutions are immense. Following an integrative approach, the last two chapters of this thesis will highlight the interplay between design elements and human emotion and cognition and outline the potential advantages of game-based learning applications for organizations.