Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to address the limitations of prior views regarding knowledge source exploitation by proposing a phenomenological approach to managerial attention and the antecedents of exploiting knowledge sources within the multinational corporations (MNC) network. Design/methodology/approach: A phenomenological approach to attention is taken to explain the antecedents of managerial attention in knowledge source exploitation behavior. This approach provides an alternative way of conceiving of knowledge source remoteness and familiarity, on the one hand, and exclusion and inclusion on the other. Findings: Drawing on a phenomenological approach to attention, the merits and limits of prior studies of attention and knowledge seeking/exchange behavior are addressed and three modes of managerial attention are proposed - relative attention, mimetic attention, implicit attention - to explain the antecedents of managerial attention to MNC knowledge sources. Originality/value: This approach to knowledge source exploitation and attention provides a rich conceptualization of taken-for-granted assumptions in extant literature on managerial attention and knowledge-seeking behavior. The framework offered here builds on a conceptually rigid foundation of attention that overcomes dualisms such as mind-body, subject-object, and thinking-acting that are often embedded in other mainstream approaches to managerial attention.