Conceptual Issues in the Study of Innovation

Downs, George W.; Mohr, Lawrence B.

doi:10.2307/2391725

Cited by 765 publications

(438 citation statements)

References 16 publications

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“…Following Winner (1986), Weick (1990:21) suggests that We deliberately sought vanety in the settings studied, the technologies introduced, and the type of users involved so as to enrich the range of insights and to enhance generalizability (Leonard-Barton, 1990; Van de Ven and Poole. 1990 (Downs and Mohr, 1976; Van de Ven and Rogers, 1988).…”

Section: The Timing Of Technological Adaptationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Windows of Opportunity: Temporal Patterns of Technological Adaptation in Organizations

Tyre

Orlikowski

1994

Organization Science

689

411

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(Rosenberg, 1982;Dutton and Thomas, 1985). These problems, in turn, require adaptation of the technologies already in use.A close understanding of the process of adaptation is critical for several reasons. First, users' adaptations to technologies-in-use often help to shape funher development and research activities (von Hippel. 1988;Dutton and Thomas, 1985). Second, the operating efficiency ultimately achieved with a new technology depends heavily on users' modifications (Enos, 1958;Hollander, 1965;Dutton and Thomas. 1984). Third, modifications affect not just the technologyin-use, but also its physical and organizational context (Leonard-Banon, 1988 (1983) states that when organizations try to rush the introduction process, they fail to identify and correct problems that later hamper productive use of the technology. Thus, "too-rapid implementation of the innovation ... can lead to disastrous results" (Rogers, 1983:364). Similarly, Hughes (1971:152) maintains that "trying to force the pace" of adaptation is counterproductive, while Hage and Aiken (1970:106) suggest that "the longer the elite allow [the] period of tnal and error to continue, the greater the chances of the new program achieving its intended objectives." Finally, Imai (1986) (Kiesler and Sproull, 1982;Starbuck, 1989). Groups in organizations also develop tendencies toward routine behaviors. Over time, they become increasingly unlikely to recognize and respond to new kinds of problems (Kelley and Thibaut, 1954;Katz, 1982;Hackman, 1990). Even research teams have been shown to be reluctant to alter a given technical approach once it has been selected, and the longer the approach has been used, the greater their rigidity (Allen, 1966).At the individual level, research suggests that people's arousal, attention, and motivation to engage in effortful problem solving is not constant over time. Specifically, active problem solving and information processing appear to drop sharply as soon as tasks become familiar or manageable (Langer and Imber, 1979;Kruglanski and Freund, 1983). With increasing exposure, observers tend to "chunk" activities into larger units that convey less information than fine-grained observauons, although a sudden surprise can sometimes reverse the process (Newtson, 1973; Louis and Sutton, 1991). Familiarity also breeds rounnized response patterns; once activities are well entrenched, even superficial resemblance to a known stimulus is sufficient to tngger a familiar response (Luchins, 1942).One of the few scholars to have considered the implications of these behavioral tendencies for technological adaptation is Weick (1990). Following Winner (1986), Weick (1990:21) suggests that "the point at which technology is introduced [may be) the point at which it is most susceptible to influence." Weick argues that "beginnings are of special imponance ... because they constrain what is learned about the technology and how fast it is learned " (1990:21-22 We deliberately sought vanety in the settings studied, the technologies...

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Section: The Timing Of Technological Adaptationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Windows of Opportunity: Temporal Patterns of Technological Adaptation in Organizations

Tyre

Orlikowski

1994

Organization Science

689

411

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“…With almost three quarters of all non-interest expenses lying in marketing and distribution, credit approval and funds movement, many outside suppliers have found ways to achieve economies of scale and effectively supply technology and innovations to banking institutions (Quinn, 1992). We adopted Downs and Mohr's (1976) innovation-decision design so that innovations of varying types were not all considered together. The current method of grouping together innovations by specific types enables us to draw meaningful conclusions about each type.…”

Section: The Samplementioning

confidence: 99%

“…The basic premise of a configurational approach is that organizational phenomena can be better understood by identifying and studying distinct, internally consistent clusters of processes rather than by searching for consistent behavior among all organizational processes. Downs and Mohr (1976) argued that the innovation process is one of the most complex organizational phenomena and a unitary theory of innovation was not acceptable because it led to empirical instability and theoretical confusion. Further, they suggested the development of innovation typologies to assist in our understanding of the innovation process.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Analyzing innovation adoption using a knowledge-based approach

Gopalakrishnan

Bierly

2001

Journal of Engineering and Technology Management

133

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We propose a new typology of organizational innovation based on the integration of theories of organizational learning and theories of knowledge. The three dimensions that we use to construct our typology of innovations are: tacit-explicit, systemic-autonomous and simple-complex. We, then, analyze the impact of these different types of innovations on the method of sourcing, cost of implementation, and innovation effectiveness. We propose that as innovations become more tacit, systemic and complex, they tend to be more internally sourced, more costly to implement, and more effective.We test the hypotheses using innovations from the commercial banking industry. Data for this study were collected from multiple sources. The innovations were categorized into different types by a panel of experts. Data on method of sourcing, cost and effectiveness were collected from a sample of 101 banks. Our results showed that autonomous innovations were less likely to be internally sourced than systemic innovations; autonomous and complex innovations were more costly to implement than systemic and simple innovations. Explicit innovations were seen as more effective than implicit innovations. Implications for theory and practice are discussed.

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“…Downs;Mohr (1976) Coisas diferentes introduzidas em cada organização. Ryan (1978) Sinônimo de criatividade, capacidade criadora e inventiva, a partir de determinada realidade.…”

Section: Quadro 1 -Definições De Inovaçãounclassified

Inovação no setor público: uma instituição pública de ensino sob a ótica dos servidores e colaboradores

Dória

Sano

Lima

et al. 2017

RSP

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Inovação no setor público: uma instituição pública de ensino sob a ótica dos servidores e colaboradores 286Rev. Serv. Público Brasília 68 (2) 285-318 abr/jun 2017Innovación en el sector público: una institución pública de enseñanza desde la perspectiva de los servidores y empleadosEste estudio tiene como objetivo evaluar la tendencia a la innovación en el ámbito administrativo de la rectoría de una institución de educación pública superior, basado en la percepción de sus servidores y empleados. La recolección de datos se llevó a cabo a través del cuestionario desarrollado por el Centre for Public Sector Innovation -CPSI (2008) y adaptado a la realidad brasileña. Los resultados revelaron que el nivel de la tendencia a innovación en la unidad de reporte corresponde a 37,04 puntos e, por lo tanto, está clasificada como un sector "situacionalmente innovador", o sea, es posible verificar acciones y pensamientos innovadores en la institución. Sin embargo, debido a la media estar muy cerca del nivel anterior que clasifica a las organizaciones como tendientes a ser "perezosas", se encontró que la institución no está orientada a la innovación, que esta ocurre por casualidad, que ni todos los procedimientos tienen el propósito de estimular y promover la creatividad, y que no hay una cultura muy innovadora institucionalizada en toda la organización.Palabras clave: innovación, modelo de gestión, enseñanza superior, administración pública Innovation in the public sector: a public educational institution from the standpoint of its public servants and collaboratorsThe objective of this paper is to evaluate the tendency to innovation at the administrative level of the rectory of a public educational institution, based on the perception of its employees and collaborators. Data were collected through a questionnaire developed by the Center for Public Sector Innovation -CPSI (2008) and adapted to the Brazilian reality. The results were then averaged and followed by an arithmetic mean of 37.04, which classifies the institution as "situationally innovative". In this level, innovative actions and thoughts can be found in the institution. However, the result is very close to the previous level that classifies an organization as being "slothful" about innovation, and, thus, it has been found that this institution is not innovation-oriented, which happens at random, and it also means that their procedures are not aimed at stimulating and promoting creativity, nor do they have a highly institutionalized innovative culture.

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Conceptual Issues in the Study of Innovation

Cited by 765 publications

References 16 publications

Windows of Opportunity: Temporal Patterns of Technological Adaptation in Organizations

Windows of Opportunity: Temporal Patterns of Technological Adaptation in Organizations

Analyzing innovation adoption using a knowledge-based approach

Inovação no setor público: uma instituição pública de ensino sob a ótica dos servidores e colaboradores

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