Abstract: How to obtain competitive advantage and remain invincible in the competitive market is not only a practical problem faced by enterprise management practice, but also an important theoretical problem to be explored in management research. An increasing number of researches believe that effective organizational learning is one of the significant sources for enterprises to gain competitive advantage. However, there is little attention to organizational forgetting, another aspect of organizational learning. Does organizational forgetting have an effect on the enterprise competitive advantage? This paper discusses this problem, and its theoretical significance is as follows. On the basis of previous studies, a four-quadrant model of organizational forgetting is proposed, which divides organizational forgetting into unintentional organizational forgetting and intentional organizational forgetting. The two main types of unintentional organizational forgetting are memory abrasion and inability to capture, and the two main types of intentional organizational forgetting are unlearning and avoiding bad habits, and then the functions of the two kinds of organizational forgetting are pointed out. The research in this paper has further enriched and promoted the research on organizational forgetting and enterprise competitive advantage in the Chinese context. In addition, this paper has some practical enlightenment for enterprise managers, employees, organization construction and other aspects, and serves practical guiding significance for Chinese enterprise management practice.
This paper starts with a number of case analysis of Suning, Wallace, Haier Group, Waveguide mobile phone, Belle shoes, Galanz, Dali Garden, Tonight Hotel and other eight enterprises, and two dimensions of intentional organizational forgetting, unlearning and avoiding bad habits, are revealed from positive and negative perspectives. Then a model of the relationship between intentional organizational forgetting and enterprise competitive advantage is constructed. At the same time, environmental dynamics is introduced as a moderating variable, and four hypotheses are proposed. After that, questionnaires are distributed online and offline to enterprises established over one year in Shaanxi Province, and 258 valid questionnaires are received. In order to avoid the influence of enterprise characteristics such as enterprise establishment duration on the research results, like most literatures, this paper chooses enterprise establishment duration, enterprise size and industry category as the control variables. After data homology deviation test and sample reliability and validity test, this paper uses SPSS and AMOS as analysis software to conduct correlation analysis, hierarchical regression and other comprehensive analysis of the data, so as to test the main effect and moderating effect. In order to verify the results of hierarchical regression twice, this study also uses path analysis to verify the main effect again, so as to ensure the scientific test conclusion.
This paper draws the following conclusions: 1)Unlearning has a significant positive effect on competitive advantage. Elements such as the original culture and core competitiveness of an organization are easy to be strengthened and amplified by the previous success of an organization, which leads to complacency and closure, giving rise to the “memory trap” of an organization. If this “success dependence” can be broken, it will free the thinking bondage of employees and form new cognition of the organization. As John Wick said, the management scientist, companies never get into trouble because they forget something. Rather, they often fail because they remember too much and rely too much on tradition. 2)Avoiding bad habits has a significant positive impact on competitive advantage. In the empirical analysis, the hierarchical regression coefficient and the standardized path coefficient of structural equation also show that the influence of avoiding bad habits on competitive advantage may be greater than that of unlearning. Therefore, before learning new knowledge, it is of vital importance to identify the value of knowledge and discard harmful knowledge in time. 3)Environmental dynamics plays a significant moderating role in the relationship between unlearning and avoiding bad habits on competitive advantage. The more dynamic the environment is, the more enterprises need to actively forget the old knowledge and change the old thinking, so as to avoid the “bloated” organizational knowledge base and affect the efficiency of knowledge absorption. In other words, in a highly dynamic environment, unlearning is more conducive to the formation of competitive advantage. Similarly, in a dynamic environment, “selective learning” can filter out harmful knowledge in advance and avoid bad habits, which can improve the efficiency of knowledge absorption and promote the formation of competitive advantage.
This paper has the following limitations: First, the sample data of this study is cross-industry, and different industries may have different understanding or emphasis on intentional organizational forgetting. Despite the restrictions to industry categories, there may still be an impact on the results. Future research can accurately target industries, such as high-tech enterprises or a certain industry. Second, all the sample enterprises are located in Shaanxi Province. Since Shaanxi is an undeveloped province, the understanding of enterprises on intentional organizational forgetting may still be in the preliminary stage. On the other hand, the conclusions drawn only from the survey data of Shaanxi Province may not be universal enough.

Key words: intentional organizational forgetting, competitive advantage, environmental dynamics

摘要： 越来越多的研究认为有效的组织学习是企业获取竞争优势的重要来源之一,然而对于组织学习的另一面—组织遗忘,却鲜有关注。组织遗忘是否会对企业竞争优势产生影响？围绕这一问题,本文首先进行了多案例分析,继而构建了主动组织遗忘与企业竞争优势的关系模型,运用258组中国企业的有效问卷调查数据,采用层次回归和结构方程方法进行了实证检验。研究结果表明,忘却学习和避免恶习对竞争优势产生显著正向影响;环境动态性在忘却学习、避免恶习对竞争优势的影响中起显著调节作用。研究结果不仅丰富了主动组织遗忘的理论研究,也对中国企业管理实践具有现实指导意义。

关键词: 主动组织遗忘, 竞争优势, 环境动态性