Value Co-Creation in Industrial Buyer-Seller Partnerships ... - Doria

all must engage in exchanges with the environment as a condition of their survival”(Scott 1992, p 114).According to the resource dependency theory, organizations can increase their chances ofsurvival by taking actions in order to adapt to the environment. Because no organization canexist without exchanges with other organizations different situations of organizationaldependency occur. The extent to which an organization is dependent on anotherorganization determines the power/dependence relationship. The resource dependencytheory depicts the organization as active, not passive, in shaping its own prerequisites forsurvival and success. The organization is dependent on suppliers and customers but theorganization chooses which relationships to enter into and which rules and terms to adapt.According to Aldrich and Pfeffer (1976) the resource dependence model sees:“ The organization as capable of changing, as well as responding to, the environment.Administrators manage their environments as well as their organizations, and theformer activity may be as important, or even more important, than the latter” (Aldrich& Pfeffer 1976, p. 83).The logic of the open systems view and theory of resource dependency both serve as maintheoretical building blocks for the IMP view on business relationships and networks.Companies are seen as open systems, influenced by actors in the environment anddependent on resources provided by other organizations. Consequently it makes sense forcompanies to interact in order to get access to and to make use of these external resources.Connecting this reasoning with Alderson’ s (1957) reasoning about marketing being aboutcreating value by connecting heterogeneous supply and demand through a process ofexchange gives the main basic theoretical assumptions for the study:• Companies are dependent on their environment for their survival• Companies cope with this dependency through establishing relationships(through interaction)• Companies interact with others in order to get access to resources• Companies create value by connecting heterogeneous resources through aprocess of exchange64