Professor Masaru Karube and Yuki Miyazawa were simultaneously awarded the Best Paper Award in two divisions—the Organization and Natural Environment (ONE) Division and the Technology and Innovation Management (TIM) Division—at the 2026 Academy of Management Annual Meeting. This international academic conference is organized by the US-based Academy of Management (AOM).
【Organization and Natural Environment Division】
Presentation date :
August 3, 2026 11:30AM – 1:00PM ET (GMT-4/UTC-4) at Sheraton in Salon 3 (Philadelphia, USA)
Award Winner :
Ryoji Miyawaki（Doctoral Program, Graduate School of Management, Kyoto University）
Masaru Karube（Director and Professor, Institute of Innovation Research, Hitotsubashi University）
Jin-ichiro Yamada（Professor, Graduate School of Management, Kyoto University）
Yuki Miyazawa（Doctoral Program and IMPP, Graduate School of Business Administration, Hitotsubashi University）
Article Title :
The Power of Negative Materiality: How Market Absence Sustains Regenerative Organizing.
Abstract of the paper :
A substantial body of circular economy research posits market formation as a prerequisite for sustaining circular initiatives. In the absence of markets to absorb recovered by-products or valorize environmental benefits, such initiatives are often expected to stall at the pilot stage. However, this assumption cannot fully explain cases in which organizing persists despite prolonged market absence. This study examines the emergence and persistence of a circular ecosystem in Saga City, Japan, originating from a municipal waste incineration plant—a typical NIMBY facility—without the development of a mature CO2 utilization market. Drawing on a qualitative process case study, we analyze ongoing experimentation, dialogue, and engagement among diverse actors around the future use and meaning of CO2 and the incineration plant. Our analysis identifies two structural conditions that sustained these dynamics: market absence and negative materiality. Under these conditions, orchestration emerged not as design or optimization but as a practice that absorbed frictions and prevented relationships and experimentation from halting. We conceptualize this process as regenerative organizing: a spiral dynamic in which localized experiments, justificatory work, and interactions accumulate through trickle-up processes, regenerating not only material resources such as CO2 but also the knowledge, relationships, emotions, and place meanings that sustain continued organizing. Keywords: Regenerative Organizing; Market Absence; Negative Materiality; Circular Ecosystems
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【Technology and Innovation Management Division】
Presentation date :
August 3, 2026 3:00PM – 4:30PM ET (GMT-4/UTC-4) at Marriott in Salon J (Philadelphia, USA)
Award Winner :
Yuki Miyazawa（Doctoral Program and IMPP, Graduate School of Business Administration, Hitotsubashi University）
Masaru Karube（Director and Professor, Institute of Innovation Research, Hitotsubashi University）
Avimanyu Datta（Professor of Strategy and Entrepreneurship, College of Business, Illinois State University）
Article Title :
Becoming Lead Users: Emergence of a Collective Technological Frame through Manifestations
Abstract of the paper :
A substantial body of research on lead users has extensively examined their characteristics, with a predominant focus on identifying characteristics of lead users. However, prior research implicitly assumes that a shared understanding of which needs and knowledge are considered “advanced” pre-exists among market participants. We challenge this assumption by focusing on how specific users contribute to innovation in a fluid market context where such shared understanding—or a collective technological frame—is absent. We qualitatively analyze a historical case of market emergence of vocal synthesis technology, in which producer-user interaction led to the emergence of a collective technological frame. The results demonstrate that manifestation—an act of linguistically, visually, or materially embodying a future potentiality foreseen within a specific technological frame—enables producers and users with initially divergent technological frames to communicate, mutually adjust their perspectives, and eventually establish a collective technological frame. This also leads to the emergence of a market consensus regarding who the lead users are and their characteristics. Our study challenges the lead user theory’s assumption that characteristics inherent in lead users are predetermined and identifiable ex ante. Instead, we demonstrate how users interacting with producers become lead users ex post through the practice of manifestation.