• Antoine Vernet
  

• Imperial College London
  

• Martin J. Kilduff
  

• U. College London
  

• Ammon Salter
  

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Why are some people able to anticipate the future direction of a community, spotting trends and breakthroughs? Building on network theory, we investigate how structural positions – individual-level closure and project-level brokerage - enable individuals to identify and realize new opportunities in fluid, dynamic technical communities. Using the context of open source software projects, we argue – and empirically demonstrate – that closure enables individuals to anticipate which projects capture the attention of the community, leading to their eventual release. However, we suggest that individuals who connect disconnected projects are in a better position to identify those initiatives that later become innovations. We show that the benefits of these structural positions are moderated by the dynamism and small-worldedness of the fields in which these individuals are active. We hypothesize that in dynamic fields the effect of closure is weakened, whereas the effect of brokerage is heightened. In turn, field-level small-worldedness moderate the effects of brokerage. We find partial support for these moderators. We explore the implications of these findings for community-based organizing, opportunity identification and network theory.

• doi:10.5465/AMBPP.2013.17165abstractACAD MANAGE PROCJanuary 2013 2013(Meeting Abstract Supplement) 17165
  
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