Overcoming the stickiness of concepts: the interplay between the barriers to theory building and creativity

Theory building is not only a set of procedures related to the statement of concepts and their relations, but also requires transferring knowledge. Concepts used to construct and develop theoretical contributions must move from the minds of authors to the minds of their audience. This social-organizational process is inherently creative but also fraught with barriers. In this article, we propose a novel model of theory building involving a knowledge transfer process, emphasizing the dialectical interplay between the barriers to theory building and creativity. Drawing inspiration from Gabriel Szulanski’s work, we submit that the process is particularly “sticky”: Unless the theory is adapted to meet various criteria as it progresses through the phases of construction, it is unlikely to reach the end of the process successfully. Still, contrary to the conventional perspective on knowledge transfer, which views “stickiness” as entirely detrimental and assumes that removing barriers always facilitates theory building, we propose an alternative approach. In our model, barriers are seen as both impediments and stimuli for theory building. This dual nature of barriers requires strategic consideration, particularly when aiming to eliminate or mitigate the most harmful forms of stickiness from theory building without disregarding their potential to foster creativity. Our integrated, knowledge transfer-based approach uncovers new strategic ground for addressing the barriers to theory building, making the process socially fluent and more rational.