Chess is often celebrated as the archetypal strategic game because of its temporal complexity: the real value of a move may remain hidden until many turns later, when the consequences finally emerge. Organisations face a comparable challenge. Strategic and managerial decisions rarely deliver instant results; instead, their outcomes unfold gradually, sometimes over years. This delay between action and consequence creates environments in which the wisdom of a choice is uncertain. Leaders, therefore, draw upon both their internal experience and external sources of information to navigate these challenges. Yet, existing behavioural models of learning have only lightly touched upon how individuals and organisations grapple with such complicated, temporally complex problems.

An international team of scholars has broken new ground on this issue. Professor Ji-hyun Kim of Yonsei University in South Korea, Professor Christina Fang of NYU Stern in the United States, and Assistant Professor Hisan Yang of Louisiana State University have conducted a computational exploration of how external knowledge shapes decision-making in temporally complex problem-solving contexts. Their study was published online on 10 April 2025 in the Articles in Advance section of Organization Science. By bringing together insights from strategy, learning, and decision sciences, the researchers provide a powerful new perspective on the risks and rewards of relying on knowledge that originates outside the organisation.

The results challenge long-held assumptions. While it might seem obvious that access to external knowledge improves performance, the team demonstrates that this is not always the case. As Professor Kim notes, “Our key point is the counterintuitive finding that limited external knowledge can actually impair performance more than having no external knowledge at all in temporally complex problem-solving environments.” When knowledge is partial or incomplete, it can misdirect decision makers, creating the illusion of progress while obscuring better long-term options. In such settings, ignorance may paradoxically be less harmful than reliance on misleading fragments of wisdom.

Central to their findings is the concept of interim attractors. When only a subset of states or actions is illuminated by external knowledge, decision makers begin to value these intermediate signposts as if they were genuine milestones of success. This can cause them to favour actions that lead toward these interim points, rather than those that move more directly toward the ultimate objective. Such distortions are particularly dangerous in environments where feedback is delayed and outcomes accumulate slowly—circumstances that characterise much of organisational strategy. In other words, what appears to be helpful guidance may end up channelling energy into cul-de-sacs of effort.

The researchers illustrate their argument with real-world cases. The ill-fated BlackBerry Storm smartphone by Research in Motion exemplifies how recognising the external signal of growing demand for touchscreens was not enough; without matching internal expertise, the company produced a flawed product that undercut its own market position. In another example, pharmaceutical giants such as Merck, Sanofi, and GSK pursued COVID-19 vaccines based on prior external knowledge of vaccine platforms. However, the approaches that had once brought them success proved unsuitable for the novel coronavirus, leading to abandoned projects despite strong starting positions. These cautionary tales underscore the risks of clinging too tightly to partial knowledge in complex environments.

The implications of this research are wide-ranging. In pharmaceuticals, technology, healthcare, and education, where decisions often involve high stakes and long horizons, organisations must balance external templates and internal experience with great care. The study’s lessons extend to the design of educational curricula, the shaping of public policies, the management of digital transformation, and even individual career development. Over the next decade, the message is clear: the most effective learning and decision making will come not from the accumulation of ever more external knowledge, but from striking a balance—leveraging reliable outside insights while cultivating the patient, experiential learning that equips decision makers to adapt and innovate in the face of temporal complexity.

More information: Ji-hyun Kim et al, Learning in Temporally Complex Problems: The Role of External Knowledge, Organization Science. DOI: 10.1287/orsc.2022.16469

Journal information: Organization Science Provided by Yonsei University