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Successful Innovation (successful + innovation)
Selected AbstractsValuing of firms' prior knowledge: a measure of knowledge distanceKNOWLEDGE AND PROCESS MANAGEMENT: THE JOURNAL OF CORPORATE TRANSFORMATION, Issue 2 2003Shantha Liyanage Knowledge, especially scientific and technological knowledge, grows according to knowledge trajectories and guideposts that make up the prior knowledge of an organization. We argue that these knowledge structures and their specific components lead to successful innovation. A firm's prior knowledge facilitates the absorption of new knowledge, thereby renewing a firm's systematic search, transfer and acquisition of knowledge and capabilities. In particular, the exponential growth in biotechnology is characterized by the convergence of disparate scientific and technological knowledge resources. This paper examines the shift from protein-based to DNA-based diagnostic technologies as an example, to quantify the value of a firm's prior knowledge using relative values of knowledge distance. The distance between core prior knowledge and the rate of transition from one knowledge system to another has been identified as a proxy for the value a firm's prior knowledge. The overall ,difficulty of transition' from one technology paradigm to another is discussed. We argue this transition is possible when the knowledge distance is minimal and the transition process has a correspondingly high value of absorptive capacities. Our findings show knowledge distance is a determinant of the feasibility, continuity and capture of scientific and technological knowledge. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] Why did we make that cheese?R & D MANAGEMENT, Issue 2 2000An empirically based framework for understanding what drives innovation activity In the more recent product development literature the interplay between R&D skills and competencies and market skills and competencies is seen as a major determinant of successful innovation. The study reported in this article was done in order to cast more light on these two constructs in an industry with low R&D expenditures, but where product development is nevertheless considered to be strategically important. That industry is the food processing industry. The results of a series of case studies indicate that constructs other than R&D and market orientation may be more appropriate for understanding innovation and explaining innovation success in the case material. A new set of constructs focusing on what causes specific innovation activities to occur is proposed and a revised framework is developed. [source] Adaptation and Organizational Connectedness in Corporate Radical Innovation Programs,THE JOURNAL OF PRODUCT INNOVATION MANAGEMENT, Issue 5 2009Donna Kelley This research examines how established companies organize programs for fostering technology-based radical innovation. It addresses conflicts revealed in the innovation literature concerning the appropriate design of the strategic, structural, and process components of these programs. In developing innovation strategies, managers must balance the desire for strategic clarity with the need to allow for creativity and exploration. They must structure programs that ensure innovations benefit from the organization's resources while minimizing the numerous constraints that can impede these unconventional activities. Additionally, though they may favor management processes that provide accountability and effective resource allocation, managers must also ensure these do not restrict the flexibility required for successful innovation. The study is a longitudinal, comparative case analysis of interviews with managers involved in innovation programs in 12 industry-leading multinational corporations. Site visits at each company were followed by biannual interviews with key managers in each company. A total of 81 follow-up interviews were conducted over a three-year period. These interviews were aimed at identifying the changes and progress in the programs over time and internal and external impacts on the organization's innovation activity. The analysis reveals (1) distinct but evolving objectives that maintain a logical strategic connection, (2) adaptive structures that shift and transform but preserve relationships with the broader organization, and (3) flexible processes that are understandable beyond the innovation program and are modifiable, both for the context and in response to learning over time. This suggests that programs introducing high uncertainty and risk into mature corporate environments are highly flexible systems that maintain organizational connectedness as they evolve. For academics, this implies a need to understand the evolution of innovation programs as an adaptive learning process that, regardless of form and purpose, preserves its connection to the traditional organization. For practitioners, it highlights the importance of considering the process, strategic, and structural connections to the broader organization when designing innovation programs and suggests the need for feedback mechanisms to help adapt these elements over time. [source] Harnessing the Creative Potential among Users,THE JOURNAL OF PRODUCT INNOVATION MANAGEMENT, Issue 1 2004Per Kristensson User involvement in the development of new products may offer a novel approach to improved methods of meeting customer needs. These users are considered to offer possibilities for generating original, valuable, and realizable ideas leading to successful innovation. However, the merit of users' ideas compared to ideas generated by the company itself has not been investigated empirically. In the present study, advanced users, ordinary users, and professional product developers were given the task of creating ideas for future mobile phone services. The main purpose was to examine the benefit of involving users in suggesting new product ideas in an innovation project. An experimental three-group design was used in order to assess the output in terms of its original, valuable, and realizable merit. The results indicated that ordinary users create significantly more original and valuable ideas than professional developers and advanced users. Professional developers and advanced users created more easily realizable ideas, and ordinary users created the most valuable ideas. The results were discussed from the viewpoint of divergent thinking. It was suggested that divergent thinking was facilitated through the opportunity to combine different information elements that appeared separate at the outset, such as personal needs coupled with the functionality of mobile phone services. [source] Making Innovation Happen in Organizations: Individual Creativity Mechanisms, Organizational Creativity Mechanisms or Both?THE JOURNAL OF PRODUCT INNOVATION MANAGEMENT, Issue 6 2000Sundar Bharadwaj Marketing managers increasingly face a product innovation dilemma. Managers will have to sell more with fewer new products in an environment where new products are providing lower revenue yields. Therefore, understanding what drives successful innovation is of paramount importance. This paper examines the organizational innovation hypothesis that innovation is a function of individual efforts and organizational systems to facilitate creativity. Our model formulates creativity as a property of thought process that can be acquired and improved through instruction and practice. In this context, individual creativity mechanisms refer to activities undertaken by individual employees within an organization to enhance their capability for developing something, which is meaningful and novel within their work environment. Organizational creativity mechanisms refer to the extent to which the organization has instituted formal approaches and tools, and provided resources to encourage meaningfully novel behaviors within the organization. Using data collected from 634 organizations, we find support for this hypothesis. The results suggest that the presence of both individual and organizational creativity mechanisms led to the highest level of innovation performance. The results also suggest that high levels of organizational creativity mechanisms (even in the presence of low levels of individual creativity) led to significantly superior innovation performance than low levels of organizational and individual creativity mechanisms. The paper also presents managerial and academic implications. This study suggests that it is not enough for organizations to hire creative people and expect the innovation performance of the firm to be superior. Similarly, it is not enough for firms to emphasize management practices to enhance creativity and ignore individual mechanisms. Although it is true that doing either will improve innovation performance, doing both should lead to higher innovation levels. Our understanding of what and how creativity influences innovation performance can be greatly enhanced by additional research that integrates the intrinsic and extrinsic drivers of creativity. Research that examines the role of team creativity efforts in enhancing innovation performance is also vital to an overall improved understanding of creativity, learning, and innovation within organizations. [source] Innovative Returns to Tradition: Using Core Teachings as the Foundation for Innovative AccommodationJOURNAL FOR THE SCIENTIFIC STUDY OF RELIGION, Issue 1 2004Roger Finke This article argues that religious groups sustain organizational vitality by preserving core teachings and promoting adaptive innovations. The core teachings guard the sacred beliefs and practices held as timeless, and the innovations adapt these teachings to new cultures and contexts,with the most successful innovations building on the core. Using organizational theory and previous research, I explain how core teachings sustain vitality and I uncover the organizational mechanisms stimulating and blocking innovations. Historical examples are used to illustrate how denominations struggle to preserve the continuity of distinctive core teachings and promote adaptive innovations. Finally, I discuss the implications this thesis holds for the study of American religion, both past and present. [source] Building Material Flow Accounts in the United StatesJOURNAL OF INDUSTRIAL ECOLOGY, Issue 5-6 2008A Case Study in Public Sector Innovation Summary Building a national system of material flow accounts in the United States could be an important step toward natural resource sustainability. But the task will not be as simple as "If you build it, they will come." The key to understanding the status of and prospects for official material flow accounts in the United States is to see the picture from the point of view of public sector and environmental innovation generally, rather than from the point of view of building the details of the accounts themselves. A simple model of public sector innovation helps explain what is happening and what needs to happen to make further progress. The model used here has four principal elements: methods, organizational capacity, demand, and actual use. The details and sequence of these elements vary in different situations, but all four must be present for successful innovations. Although aspects of culture, innovation, and government bureaucracy differ from country to country, the basic model appears to be similar across borders, at least in countries belonging to the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). Seen this way, recent events in the United States indicate that (1) there is significant potential for such accounts; (2) the United States is moving toward creating them, although not in a systematic manner, which means that the progression and eventual outcome are uncertain; and (3) there are ways for the research community to participate very positively in the public process. 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