Innovative Resources, Promotion Focus and Responsible Innovation: The Moderating Roles of Adaptive Governance

Abstract

This paper discusses the relationship between innovative resources, promotion focus, adaptive governance and responsible innovation. In accordance with the path of “demand—motivation—behavior”, this paper takes adaptive governance as the moderator, and constructs an influence relationship model of “innovative resources—promotion focus (adaptive governance)—responsible innovation”. Then this paper takes 361 managers from above the middle management level and the technical personnel of enterprises as the investigation objects, and conducts empirical research by using the structural equation model. The results show that: (1) innovative resources have a significant positive impact on responsible innovation; (2) promotion focus partially mediates the effect of innovative resources on responsible innovation; (3) adaptive governance has a positive moderating effect on the relationship between innovative resources and responsible innovation. The results enrich the quantitative research of responsible innovation, reveal the internal mechanism of innovative resources affecting responsible innovation, provide a new way for technological innovation governance and provide a new way of thinking for the transformation from the traditional innovation paradigm into a sustainable innovation paradigm.

Adaptive Governance, Loose Coupling, Forward-Looking Strategies and Responsible Innovation

“…From Figure 3, we can see that CMIN / DF is 1.595 < 5; GFI, AGFI, CFI are all greater than 0.9; PGFI is 0.686 > 0.5; RMSEA is 0.04 < 0.08; RMR is 0.03 < 0.05. The results show that the fitting degree of the model is good [79].…”

The Mediating Role of Responsible Innovation in the Relationship between Stakeholder Pressure and Corporate Sustainability Performance in Times of Crisis: Evidence from Selected Regions in China

“…Helmig et al’s [ 6 ] 10-item scale for measuring key stakeholder pressure was selected for this study, with representative items such as “Our customers’ purchasing habits are changing to support responsible corporations (e.g., fair trade coffee)”. Responsible innovation is based on the four-item scale selected by Stilgoe et al [ 5 ] and Cao et al [ 23 ] in which the representative questions include “In the early stage of innovation activities, companies can conduct a forward-looking analysis of the future impact of innovation activities, so as to guide them in an ethically acceptable and socially satisfactory direction, and achieve controlled risks in innovation activities”. Flexible routine replication is based on the study of Wei and Dang [ 65 ] and a four-item scale was selected, which is representative of questions such as “Firms are able to quickly promote and apply new organizational norms to meet internal and external challenges”.…”

“…Lubberink et al [ 7 ] further propose a framework for responsible innovation in a business context and provide practices conducive to the implementation of responsible innovation. In the business context, responsible innovation covers the whole process of enterprise innovation, including stakeholder participation and prediction at the beginning of innovation, reflection and introspection in the innovation process, and the conformity of innovation results with moral and social expectations [ 9 , 12 , 23 ].…”

“…Studies have focused on the theoretical framework of responsible innovation [ 7 ], the innovation process [ 10 ], governance mechanisms, and from institutional scenarios, resource capacity [ 6 , 23 ] and corporate social responsibility [ 28 ] perspectives to explore the formation mechanism of corporate responsible innovation [ 29 ]. Based on the stakeholder theory, this study presents responsible innovation as a way for enterprises to respond to stakeholder demands and to balance the needs of corporate development with social value expectations to achieve strategic goals for sustainable development.…”

“…To enhance the effectiveness of corporate sustainability strategies and respond to stakeholders’ sustainability needs, threats and opportunities to corporate sustainability strategies must be identified, as well as reducing and avoiding corporate risks and uncertainties [ 18 , 41 ]. Furthermore, enterprises’ initiatives that incorporate social responsibility and stakeholder pressure into strategic corporate thinking can be seen as doing the right thing, thus helping to protect corporate reputation, improve corporate image and ensure the long-term sustainability of the company’s objectives [ 9 , 23 ]. In summary, stakeholder pressure motivates enterprises to respond and fulfill their social and environmental responsibilities while focusing on economic efficiency, which helps enterprises improve corporate sustainability performance.…”