 This article introduces the Special Issue and discusses the microfoundations of routines and capabilities, including why a microfoundations view is needed and how it may inform work on organizational and competitive heterogeneity. Building on extant research, we identify three primary categories of micro-level components underlying routines and capabilities: individuals, social processes, and structure. We discuss how these components, and their interactions, may affect routines and capabilities. In doing so, we outline a research agenda for advancing the field's understanding of the microfoundations of routines and capabilities.

Mergers and acquisitions continue to be prevalent despite frequently yielding disappointing outcomes. Post-merger integration plays a critical role in M&A success, yet many questions about M&A implementation remain unanswered. In this article, we review research on post-merger integration, which we organize around strategic integration, sociocultural integration, and experience and learning. We then lay out a research agenda that centers on expanding our understanding of processual dynamics in post-merger integration. We focus on opportunities related to temporality; decision-making; practices and tools; and emotionality.

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International audienceBuilding on the codification and dynamic capabilities literatures, we pursue deeper insight into the underlying mechanisms of deliberate learning in the context of postacquisition integration. We argue that experience codification gives rise to inertial forces that hamper the customization of routines to any given acquisition. We theorize, therefore, that successful acquirers develop higher-order routines-as manifested in two complementary sets of concrete organizational practices-that prevent the generalization of inapplicable ('zero-order') codified routines. After drawing on in-depth qualitative data to help build our theoretical argument, we test it formally with unique survey data on 85 active acquirers

Much is known about the importance of dynamic capabilities. Yet