Luis Adrian Rios

Research Program

Organizational Structure Learning Strategic Change

Assistant Professor of Management
Mitch Daniels School of Business · Purdue University
Editorial Boards: Strategic Management Journal · Organization Science
Journal of Organization Design

Luis Adrian Rios

I study why firms facing similar conditions organize differently, why those differences endure, and what they mean for learning and innovation. My research addresses two questions: How does organization emerge, persist, and change? How does organization shape learning and innovation? They are interdependent: inherited arrangements influence what a firm can learn, while the knowledge it develops and preserves conditions its capacity to change. I combine archival, computational, and formal research to distinguish the processes that produce organizational differences, their consequences for learning and innovation, and the conditions and information required to change them.

This program has produced seven published or forthcoming articles in Strategic Management Journal, Organization Science, and Management Science, including three since 2025.

1.

The Research Program

Question I

How does organization emerge, persist, and change?

My research connects formative conditions to enduring differences in knowledge sourcing and coordination. Acquisition opportunities during the transition to public ownership are associated with acquisition orientations that remain different twenty years later, and the divergence strengthens with age. Disaster exposure in a venture’s first year is associated with patterns consistent with early disruption preserving flexible coordination that maturation would otherwise displace.

Persistence also has sources other than formative conditions: collaboration that adjusts gradually and asymmetrically to changes in formal authority, learning that can restore a coherent incumbent code, and different requirements for initiating and reversing change. Together, this work implies that what it takes to change an organization depends on which of these processes is at work.

Papers 4, 1; 5, 2; 10, 12; 14–16. Related: 7, 13

Question II

How does organization shape learning and innovation?

My contribution to this question is to make the organization of research empirically observable across the firm and to connect it to knowledge sourcing and inventive outcomes. I examine formal R&D organization alongside whole intrafirm inventor networks, including the disconnected groups that a focus on the largest connected component overlooks. Apparent substitution between internal research and external technology acquisition is substantially weaker when R&D organization is taken into account, and greater internal network integration is associated with a higher share of follow-on citations from the originating firm.

Across this work, access to knowledge and its productive use remain distinct problems. Together, this work implies that the innovative value a firm derives from available knowledge depends on how authority and collaboration are arranged, not only on how much knowledge or connection it has.

Papers 6, 5, 3; 8; 2, 9, 11

Continuing the program

Extending both questions

My current work asks what information firms must retain to guide adjustment and experimentation. The persistence and memory manuscripts distinguish that information from the history embodied in organizational commitments.

Empirically, I am moving from the analysis of network positions to sequences of collaboration, examining when experience accumulated in one setting becomes useful in another without requiring permanent connections between all source groups. A dataset I developed links patent-level novelty to inventor collaboration histories within and across roughly 1,500 firms. These extensions examine both directions of the interdependence between my two questions.

Papers 10, 11, 12; 9

Paper numbers follow the CV and the list below. Many papers bear on both questions; the questions organize the program rather than partition it.

Featured Visualizations (Published Work)

Two intrafirm inventor network maps for the same firm under different R&D authority structures

FIG. 1.  Two of the intrafirm inventor networks constructed for Argyres, Rios & Silverman (2020): the same firm under different R&D authority structures. Using patent co-invention records, 7,623 of these network snapshots were constructed, one for each firm-year observation. Mathematically derived measures allowed replicable quantification of network structure across the sample and over time.

Two pie charts of patent assignment across corporate affiliates: a decentralized pattern at Johnson & Johnson and a centralized pattern at Abbott Laboratories

FIG. 2.  Patterns of patent assignment from Arora, Belenzon & Rios (2014), top 30 affiliates shown: a decentralized pattern (Johnson & Johnson, left) and a centralized one (Abbott Laboratories, right). The patent-assignment measure of R&D decentralization built from these data makes formal R&D organization observable across firms. Taking it into account substantially weakens the apparent substitution between internal research and external technology acquisition.

Two simulation panels showing learning histories after hiring: lucky jumps and tug of war

FIG. 3.  Two learning histories after a 'perfect' hire, from Pham, Rios & Workiewicz (2026): 'lucky jumps' (left) and 'tug of war' (right). Star markers are changes proposed by the new hire; round markers, changes resulting from voting rounds with incumbent employees. The inertia, unfreezing, and change phases of the right panel show why the value of hiring is realized dynamically rather than at the moment of acquisition.

Featured Visualizations (Active Projects)

Continuing the Program

Two current streams continue the program. Empirically, I am moving from the analysis of network positions to sequences of collaboration: intertemporal brokerage examines when experience accumulated in one setting becomes useful in another without requiring permanent connections between all source groups. My formal work on hysteresis asks when inherited commitments remain reversible, when earlier conditions cease to influence the current configuration, and what information firms must retain to guide adjustment and experimentation. These extensions examine both directions of the interdependence between my two questions: how inherited arrangements influence what a firm can learn, and how the knowledge it develops and preserves conditions its capacity to change.

Intertemporal brokerage: spanning disconnected regions across time

A classic debate in innovation and network theory highlights the tradeoff between closure and brokerage. High-bandwidth, trust-based transfer thrives inside a dense group (Coleman). Yet access to non-redundant knowledge increases across structural holes (Burt). However, this tension has traditionally been argued in cross-sectional/static settings, with both sides assuming at least one path between every inventor through the network. Recent work in whole intrafirm inventor networks has shown that the second condition is generally not the case, as 40–60% of a large firm’s inventors sit in components with no collaborative path to the giant component or to one another (Argyres, Rios & Silverman 2020). In this project we examine the tension through intertemporal brokers: inventors embedded in one region at a point in time who are then observed in another region to which there is never a contemporaneous path. We argue that spanning the two sequentially rather than simultaneously allows for the ferrying of non-redundant knowledge (a la Burt), without actually bridging the separation that made it differentiated (a la Coleman).

In 800 large U.S.-patenting firms observed from 1985 through 2015, patents from teams that include a recent intertemporal broker are, on average, more novel than those from teams in stable positions. Disconnected groups are not superior sites of exploratory invention in place, yet entry from them, especially by inventors whose prior technological repertoires are distant from the receiving network’s, is associated with greater novelty inside the firm’s main network. This helps explain the puzzle surfaced in our earlier work (ARS 2020 and ARS 2025) of why disconnected groups are so prevalent despite being, on average, less exploratory. First-authored work with Argyres and Silverman, under review at Strategic Management Journal.

Giant component Isolated component Intertemporal broker Movement across time
Connectedness More connected Less connected
Period Movement

FIG. 4.  A dense giant component, the firm’s main network, sits between two disconnected inventor groups. Set connectedness to add or remove the ties between them. Three illustrative structures are shown: densely linked, one bridging tie (semi-decomposable), or no ties (isolated). When the clusters are disconnected, two switches appear: Period advances a single inventor from one observation window (T+0) to the next (T+1), moving them across the gap, and Movement sets whether that inventor is outbound (giant → isolate) or inbound (isolate → giant). The mover counts as an intertemporal broker only here, where no contemporaneous tie joins the regions; the red arc is the bridge across time.

Organizational hysteresis: how history shapes activities and commitments

Hysteresis provides a formal language for selective organizational memory. I model a portfolio of commitments (plants, programs, routines, products, market positions), each represented as an active or inactive component with a START threshold above its STOP threshold. Because a component can remain active under conditions that would not justify starting it anew, the same current condition can support different configurations depending on the path taken to reach it. Initiating and reversing a commitment have different requirements, which is why a return to earlier environmental conditions need not restore an earlier organization.

The agenda currently has three linked manuscripts. Strategic Persistence and Hysteresis (with Jena and McGrath) applies a two-threshold switching rule to boundary choices: a temporary change in opportunities can induce a switch that persists after opportunities return to earlier values, and archival evidence documents persistent acquisition, alliance, and divestiture orientations. The Memory of Persistence studies the write side: which events rewrite the portfolio, how new highs and new lows act differently, and how bounded feasible conditions make some commitments reversible, effectively permanent, or unreachable. On Exactitude in Organization studies the read side: when an exact aggregate count identifies the underlying configuration, when it pools strategically different states, and how much categorical detail restores sufficiency; a second result holds the configuration known and asks what experimental findings a record must retain to guide the next test.

Network evolution is one special case I intend to test empirically. A potential inventor tie can be treated as a component with a formation threshold and a lower dissolution threshold, so formal changes may build connections more readily than they unwind them. Earlier work provides a natural setting: centralization of R&D authority was followed by gradually increasing connectedness among inventors, with no comparable reverse pattern after decentralization (Argyres, Rios & Silverman 2020).

FIG. 5.  The Preisach plane. Each dot is a hysteron: a component of the portfolio, an organizational commitment with a START threshold α and a lower STOP threshold β. Filled dots are active; hollow dots are inactive. The red staircase separates the two states given the path of the input. The upper-left inset shows the switching rule for one representative component, also marked by the red-ringed dot on the plane.

Instructions:

Adjust input u and the red front sweeps the population: rising input activates components from the left, while falling input deactivates them from the top. The active portfolio therefore depends on the direction of travel, not only on the current value of u. The Input–Output panel traces the resulting path; the dashed outline is the major loop from a full sweep. Reverse course inside it and the trace forms nested minor loops that close on their own turning points, illustrating return-point memory. More hysterons smooth the curve; wider threshold spread fattens the loop; greater dispersion scatters component thresholds outward; and shifting the center produces a biased response. The dashed box marks the feasible input range [−1, 1]. Components with α > 1 cannot be activated within that range, while components with β < −1 cannot be deactivated once active, so the portfolio need not fully saturate or return to its initial state.

2.

Publications & Working Papers

Peer-Reviewed and Forthcoming

1.

Early Environmental Shocks and Organizational Reconfiguration in High-Growth Ventures

Dutta, S., Nahm, J., & Rios, L.A.  ·  Organization Science  ·  Forthcoming

Links 19,984 U.S. ventures that later received venture financing to major disaster declarations in their founding counties during their first year. Disaster exposure is associated with higher subsequent failure hazards and no general financing advantage, but with greater IPO responsiveness to favorable sector financing conditions and, among patenting ventures, more entry into technological classes outside their prior portfolios; personnel histories for a subsample provide descriptive evidence of role overlap and outside-industry expertise. The patterns are consistent with early disruption preserving flexible coordination that maturation would otherwise displace, without identifying that mechanism.

Forthcoming
2.

When Do Firms Learn By Hiring? How Complexity Moderates the Value of New Knowledge

Pham, D.N., Rios, L.A., & Workiewicz, M.  ·  Strategic Management Journal  ·  2026

A computational model of learning by hiring. Even when a recruit retains complete knowledge of the best solution, partial adoption can perform worse than the coherent incumbent code when choices are interdependent, so performance-guided learning can restore that code without political resistance or deliberate obstruction. Repeated attempts nevertheless change employees’ beliefs gradually and can permit rapid realignment. The coherence of incumbent knowledge therefore conditions the incorporation of a superior approach.

Winner, Best Paper Award, Behavioral Strategy Interest Group, and nominee, Best Conference Paper Award, SMS Annual Conference 2025.

SMJ
3.

On the Heels of Giants: Internal Network Structure and the Race to Build on Prior Innovation

Argyres, N., Rios, L.A., & Silverman, B.S.  ·  Strategic Management Journal  ·  2025

Examines the organizational foundations of generative appropriability (Ahuja, Lampert, and Novelli 2013): how the structure of internal inventor networks relates to a firm’s ability to build on its inventions relative to rivals. In patent data from 1,417 large U.S. corporations, greater internal network integration is associated with a higher share of follow-on patent-family citations from the originating firm, more so when the network is nearly decomposable, with stronger evidence for an internal development advantage than for delaying competitors’ invention.

SMJ
4.

On the Origin of Technological Acquisition Strategy: The Interaction Between Organizational Plasticity and Environmental Munificence

Rios, L.A.  ·  Strategic Management Journal  ·  2021  ·  Solo Authored

The formative period is the transition to public ownership rather than founding. Among 1,201 firms that went public between 1983 and 2007, acquisition opportunities during this period of heightened plasticity are associated with acquisition orientations that remain different twenty years later, and the divergence strengthens with age. Subsequent patent flows also differ in their balance of acquired and internally generated technology.

Solo
5.

Organizational Change and the Dynamics of Innovation: Formal R&D Structure and Intrafirm Inventor Networks

Argyres, N., Rios, L.A., & Silverman, B.S.  ·  Strategic Management Journal  ·  2020

Follows formal R&D budget authority, inventor collaboration, and innovative outcomes, using whole-network measures developed in this line of research. Centralization of R&D authority is followed by gradually increasing connectedness among inventors over several years, with no comparable reverse pattern after decentralization. Greater connectedness is associated with broader technological search and influence, and network change statistically accounts for part of the association between centralization and those outcomes.

SMJ
6.

Make, Buy, Organize: The Interplay Between Research, External Knowledge, and Firm Structure

Arora, A., Belenzon, S., & Rios, L.A.  ·  Strategic Management Journal  ·  2014  ·  342 Citations

Examines internal research, external knowledge sourcing, and R&D organization jointly, using a patent-assignment measure of decentralization for 1,014 corporations. Centralized firms conduct more internal research, acquire fewer and smaller targets, and more often absorb them; decentralized firms more often retain acquired units separately. Apparent substitution between internal research and external technology acquisition is substantially weaker when R&D organization is taken into account.

SMJ
7.

Capital Markets and Firm Organization: How Financial Development Shapes European Corporate Groups

Belenzon, S., Berkovitz, T., & Rios, L.A.  ·  Management Science  ·  2013  ·  178 Citations

Using firm-level data across 15 countries, relates corporate-group affiliation and formation to external financing conditions and industries’ dependence on external finance, consistent with a role for internal capital markets.

MS

Under Review and Working Papers

8.

Organization Design and Learning in the Remote Era

Pham, D.N., Rios, L.A., & Workiewicz, M.  ·  Strategic Management Journal  ·  Invited second-round revision

Communication structures with the same average number of contacts can generate different learning outcomes, so communication architecture cannot be reduced to contact count, and faster diffusion need not improve learning under every task condition. In the model, slower remote diffusion preserves useful differences in beliefs when there is time to learn and prevents timely exchange when there is not; the appropriate redesign depends on task interdependence, the learning horizon, and the structure already organizing communication.

R&R
9.

The Generative Archipelago: Intertemporal Brokerage and Exploratory Invention Across Intrafirm Collaboration Networks

Rios, L.A. (First Author), Argyres, N., & Silverman, B.S.  ·  Strategic Management Journal  ·  Under review

Knowledge associated with a group outside the firm’s main connected network may become useful through an inventor’s later collaborations elsewhere. Intertemporal brokerage concerns the sequence of an inventor’s collaborations rather than a position spanning both sides of a structural gap. In 800 large U.S.-patenting firms, disconnected groups’ patents are less novel in place, yet entry from those groups, especially by inventors whose prior repertoires are technologically distant from the receiving network’s, is associated with greater novelty inside the main network.

Under Review
10.

Strategic Persistence and Hysteresis: Boundary Choices in Changing Environments

Jena, D., McGrath, P., & Rios, L.A.  ·  Working paper

Distinguishes the attractiveness of an external opportunity from the prospective cost of changing the operating arrangement needed to pursue it. A two-threshold switching model shows how a temporary change in opportunities can leave a lasting difference in boundary choices without learning or increasing returns; archival evidence documents persistent acquisition, alliance, and divestiture orientations and their associations with valuation.

WP
11.

On Exactitude in Organization: Hysteresis, Experimental Memory, and Innovation Search

Rios, L.A.  ·  Working paper  ·  Solo Authored

An exact count of active commitments can describe configurations that respond differently to the same intervention. The paper establishes when a count identifies the configuration, when categorical reporting is required, and, once the configuration is known, what experimental findings a record must retain to guide the next test.

WP
12.

The Memory of Persistence: A Formal Model of Organizational Imprinting and Erasure

Rios, L.A.  ·  Working paper  ·  Solo Authored

Models a portfolio of inherited commitments, each with its own START and STOP thresholds, and derives which historical influences remain embodied in it, what subsequent conditions erase them, and when bounded feasible conditions make commitments reversible, effectively permanent, or unreachable.

WP
13.

Alliances and Acquisitions: Complements or Substitutes?

Nary, P. & Rios, L.A.  ·  Working paper

Relates existing alliance portfolios to the industrial direction of subsequent acquisitions: a target outside the firm’s core industry may complement capabilities accessible through its partners.

WP

Interdisciplinary & Formal Modeling Publications

My earlier work on organizational hysteresis, published in 2017–2018. These two peer-reviewed articles and one extended-abstract chapter provide an early foundation for the current persistence and memory manuscripts (papers 10–12).

14.

A Model of Hysteresis Arising from Social Interaction within a Firm

Rios, L.A. (First Author), Rachinskii, D., & Cross, R.  ·  Journal of Physics: Conference Series  ·  2017

Models how social interaction can generate history-dependent collective responses even when individuals’ isolated responses are memoryless.

Formal
15.

On the Rationale for Hysteresis in Economic Decisions

Rios, L.A. (First Author), Rachinskii, D., & Cross, R.  ·  Journal of Physics: Conference Series  ·  2017

Reviews plausible behavioral foundations of hysteresis and proposes tests of different thresholds for initiating and reversing behavior.

Formal
16.

A Model of Probabilistic Hysteretic Switching in Organizations

Rios, L.A. (First Author), Cross, R., & Rachinskii, D.  ·  Extended Abstracts Summer 2016: Slow-Fast Systems and Hysteresis, Theory and Applications (Birkhäuser)  ·  2018

Develops probabilistic switching formulations that distinguish temporary adjustment lags from history dependence surviving slow changes in incentives.

Formal
3.

Background

Academic Positions

  • Assistant Professor of Management
    Purdue University, Mitch Daniels School of Business · 2020 to present
  • Assistant Professor of Management
    The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania · 2016 to 2020

Education

  • PhD, Strategic Management
    Duke University, Fuqua School of Business
  • MBA, Real Estate Development and Finance
    UNC, Kenan-Flagler Business School
  • BA, English & American Literature and Language
    Harvard University

Editorial Service

  • Editorial Board
    Strategic Management Journal
  • Editorial Board
    Organization Science
  • Editorial Board
    Journal of Organization Design
  • Ad Hoc Reviewer
    Strategic Management Journal, Management Science, Organization Science, Strategy Science, Research Policy, and others

Selected Awards & Grants

  • Best Paper, Behavioral Strategy IG, for "When Do Firms Learn by Hiring?"
    SMS Annual Conference, 2025
  • Olin Award: Research Enhancing Business Results · $25,000
    Washington University in St. Louis
  • Krannert Young Faculty Scholar Award · $5,000
    Mitch Daniels School of Business, Purdue University
  • SSHRC Grant · $96,000
    Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada
  • Wharton/Mack Institute Grants (4) · $43,000
    The Wharton School