Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore how capability gaps can be identified and how they can be dealt with in aircraft technology transfers in future offset deals.

Methodology – The study is based on lessons learned as identified from three case studies of technology transfers from Saab, a Swedish aircraft manufacturing company to South Africa, the Czech Republic, and India.

Findings – The capability gap between sender and receiver has to be dealt with on two levels: on an organizational level; and on an individual level. It is proposed that the disseminative capacity constitutes the ability to assess the capability gap between the sender and receiver, and to convert this assessment to adaptations of the product and production process to include in an industrialization process. On the individual level, the capability-raising activities were connected to employees’ knowledge, Personal Development Plans for the transfer of explicit knowledge, as well as on-the-job training to facilitate the exchange of tacit knowledge.

Research limitations –The research is based on case studies from one company.

Originality/value – The paper focuses on the context of offset and reports on actual experiences from a capability perspective of technology transfers within the aircraft manufacturing area. It proposes a structured way of identifying and bridging the capability gap within such transfers.

Recently, offset contracts have become more complex. For the seller to carry through and review the effects and the demands of an offset contract, they need a framework.The paper identifies five main differences between outsourcing and related offset, which are translated into activities to be included in a suggested related offset framework. The paper is based on an in-depth case study of a related offset business at Saab, a Swedish military aircraft producer. The analysis compared the studied case with an existing outsourcing process identified in literature. The paper contributes by providing an overview of the activities taking place during a related offset process and showing the effect of the different hierarchical levels involved in the process on the efficiency of the fulfilment of the offset business. This paper is based on a single case study, and the suggested differences should be verified through further case studies.

This volume of the Research in Organizational Sciences is entitled "Received Wisdom, Kernels of Truth, and Boundary Conditions in Organizational Studies". Received wisdom is knowledge imparted to people by others and is based on authority and tenacity as sources of human knowledge. Authority refers to the acceptance of knowledge as truth because of the position and credibility of the knowledge source. Tenacity refers to the continued presentation of a particular bit of information by a source until this bit of information is accepted as true by receivers. The problem for organizational studies, however, is that this received wisdom often becomes unquestioned assumptions which guide interpretation of the world and decisions made about the world. Received wisdom, therefore, may lead to organizational practices which provide little or no benefit to the organization and, potentially, negative organizational effects, because this received wisdom is no longer valid. The 14 papers in this volume all, in some way, strive to question received wisdom and present alternatives which expand our understanding of organizational behavior in some way. The chapters in this volume each strive to present new ways of understanding organizational constructs, and in so doing reveal how received wisdom has often led to confirmation bias in organizational science. The knowledge that some perceived truths are actually the products of received wisdom and do not stand up to close scrutiny shakes up things within research areas previously thought settled allowing new perspectives on organizational science to emerge

A challenging situation due to a more global market is the increasing need for production relocation. New product development with constant increasing competition challenges the ways to perform production start-up and production relocation. Product development processes focus in general on function of the product and to avoid product quality problems. Production relocation processes also focus on avoiding product quality problems, but problems that occur within production relocation are mostly related to forgotten or misunderstood information. In this paper, a literature review is performed investigating these three areas and relate them to industrial experience. Existing relocation processes are often based on processes for product development. There are several similarities between the production start-up in product development and product relocation since the same result is requested. However, the way to achieve the results can differ within the literature, within the paper are the differences and similarities discussed.

The research within this paper identifies three main categories of cross-cultural communication challenges within international transfer of aircraft production. The first category is organizational structure, hierarchy and delegation of responsibility the second category is consensus behavior and avoidance of conflicts and the third category is individual motivation factors. Furthermore, the paper discusses the need for specific types of cross-cultural training that can be one solution for reducing the problems and difficulties that cultural challenges may induce. The case study indicates that it is important for Aeronautics, a Swedish enterprise, to apply organized cross-cultural training in combination with technical training. To secure the presence of cross-cultural training, suitable types of cultural training could be included in the working process/routine for how to conduct a production transfer.

In transfer of advanced industrial production in connection with offset business may not the selling organization be free to choose the most suitable subcontractor with respect to culture, organization, technical level etc. This paper discusses in specific Aeronautics (one of five business areas at Saab Group) and identifies different complications that can occur when different cultures meet during the transfer of production processes. The research is based on a case study utilizing interviews, observations and literature studies. Compilation and analysis of gathered empirical data indicates that many of the differences that emerge during transfer of production technology from Aeronautics to subcontractors in other countries can be exemplified by: -differences in hierarchal organization between different cultures, Swedes’ consensus behaviour and avoidance of conflicts and differences in individual motivation factors between cultures. All of these are considered from the perspective of different categories of employees such as; operators, engineers and management. For a successful transfer of production, the case study implies that important factors are; harmonization of production documentation between receiver and sender, and education of project team on receiving company’s culture before the production transfer is started.