Prior learning and the moderating role of metacognition in fast-changing environments

Studies on firms’ renewal strategies often fail to provide useful guidelines to face competitive challenges since they focus on firms’ past learning. In this paper we develop the concept of prior learning to show the negative effect deriving from adopting old solutions for new problems in fastchanging settings. Metacognition, as a higher-order learning capacity, moderates this effect. We propose that the negative effect of prior learning on firms’ innovative capacity is moderated by metacognition, suggesting that in fast-changing environments firms should base their decisions more on higher-order learning then on previous learning.