AWARD CRITERIA
In 1993, approximately 13 years after the Strategic Management Journal was launched, an annual best paper prize was established by co-sponsors Wiley and the Strategic Management Society to honor substantial work published in the SMJ. The award is for a paper published five or more years prior to the recognition. This delay allows time for the impact of papers to be assessed in terms of citations and influence of the paper on teaching, research, and/or practice. Once eligible, a paper remains eligible until selected as the best paper. Continued eligibility allows recognition to be made for those insights and findings that sometimes occur before their time and only become widely recognized as significant until other work is published.
The award committee consists of the Editorial Board of the Strategic Management Journal.
Authors of the winning paper receive a monetary award of US $5,000. The award is given and the author(s) are recognized at the SMS Annual Conference.”
The Dan and Mary Lou Schendel Best Paper Prize 2026 Recipient:
“Science as a map in technological search”
By Lee Fleming and Olav Sorenson
Fleming, L., & Sorenson, O. (2004). Science as a map in technological search. Strategic management journal, 25(8‐9), 909-928. https://doi.org/10.1002/smj.384
The article, “Science as a Map in Technological Search,” by Lee Fleming and Olav Sorenson offers exceptional insights into how scientific knowledge accelerates technological innovation. While prior research has demonstrated a strong relationship between science and invention, this work illuminates the mechanisms through which science contributes to the discovery of valuable new technologies. Conceptualizing invention as a process of searching for novel combinations of existing technologies, the authors argue that science serves as a map that guides inventors toward promising opportunities, helps them avoid unproductive paths, and enables them to solve more complex technological problems. Analyzing a large-scale dataset of patents, the study demonstrates that scientific knowledge is especially valuable when inventors attempt to combine highly interdependent technologies, where trial-and-error approaches are least effective. The paper shows that inventions informed by scientific research are more likely to generate influential outcomes and reduce uncertainty in the innovation process. This work challenges us to think differently about the role of science, not simply as a source of discoveries, but as a guide to technological search. It brilliantly integrates insights from strategy, innovation, and economics while offering important implications for firms, researchers, and policymakers seeking to advance technological progress. Its contribution continues to inspire research on the relationship between science, invention, and economic growth.
About the Recipients:
Lee Fleming (Ph.D., Stanford University) is a Chancellor’s Professor and the Morris C. Chang Distinguished Professor in the Management of Technology Innovation at UC Berkeley, in Industrial Engineering and Operations Research in engineering and Management of Organizations in the Haas School of Business.
His latest work shows how technology clusters enhance exploitation at the expense of exploration, provides a causal model of science and technology knowledge spillovers, offers a longitudinal and field-wide analysis of image duplication fraud in Alzheimer’s research, illustrates the value of government investment in research, and a linked database of inventors and scientists that illustrates how Pasteur Quadrant Researchers (PQRs) provide increased novelty and impact across both technology and science. His dissertation developed theories of invention as recombinant search processes across complex spaces. Dr. Fleming earned his bachelor’s in ECE at UC Davis, Masters degrees in Engineering Management and Statistics, and a Ph.D. in Organizational Behavior in Management Science, all at Stanford. Between 1998-2011 he served (ultimately) as the Albert J. Weatherhead III Professor of Business at Harvard. He founded and served at UC Berkeley as the Director of the Fung Institute for Engineering Leadership from 2011-2021. He has been a professional Horn player, National cycling champion, and member of a family all of whom have (or are pursuing) Stanford engineering degrees.
https://www.linkedin.com/in/leefleming1/
Olav Sorenson (Ph.D., Stanford University) is currently the Joseph Jacobs Chair in Entrepreneurial Studies, Faculty Director of the Price Center for Entrepreneurship & Innovation, Chair of the Strategy Area, and Professor of Strategy and of Sociology, at the University of California Los Angeles. He previously held the Frederick Frank ’54 and Mary C. Tanner Professorship at Yale and the Jeffrey S. Skoll Chair in Technical Innovation and Entrepreneurship at the University of Toronto. He has also served on the faculties of London Business School and the University of Chicago. Olav grew up in South Dakota and received his bachelor’s degree from Harvard College and his master’s and doctoral degrees from Stanford University. He received an honorary doctorate from Aalborg University in 2014 and the Global Award for Entrepreneurship Research in 2018.