Organizing for Open Innovation: Aligning Internal Structure with External Knowledge Search

Ihl, Christoph; Piller, Frank T.; Wagner, Philipp

doi:10.2139/ssrn.2164766

Cited by 10 publications

(19 citation statements)

References 112 publications

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“…These mixed arguments remain in the scarce OI literature that has studied this OM, stating opposing effects (e.g. Bucic and Ngo, 2012; Ihl et al , 2012). Some studies have posited that a positive effect of formalization on the influence of OI practices on performance may be justified by enhancing clarity, transparency, objectivity, efficiency and speed.…”

Section: Theory and Hypotheses Developmentmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Also, the few studies that deal with organizational design within the OI field include formalization- and/or decentralization-related variables (e.g. Bucic and Ngo, 2012; Foss et al , 2011; Foss et al , 2013; Ihl et al , 2012). Accordingly, this paper focuses on the role of the organizational structure as a specific factor of a firm’s internal context and suggests that the more flexible it is, by means of a lower degree of formalization and a higher decentralization, the more effective inbound, outbound and coupled OI will be in influencing firm performance.…”

Section: Theory and Hypotheses Developmentmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Some studies have posited that a positive effect of formalization on the influence of OI practices on performance may be justified by enhancing clarity, transparency, objectivity, efficiency and speed. All that because through formalization, processes related with the search, transfer and application of knowledge are organized and systematized (Ihl et al , 2012). Hence, by means of formalization, firms may define accurately what kind of knowledge they need access externally and what procedures they get it through (Giannopoulou et al , 2011).…”

Section: Theory and Hypotheses Developmentmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Open innovation and firm performance: the role of organizational mechanisms

Oltra

Flor

Alfaro

2018

BPMJ

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Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationship between the use of open innovation (OI) practices and firm performance, and the role of organizational mechanisms (OMs) (formalization and decentralization) as moderator variables. Design/methodology/approach The authors build a theoretical framework to define a set of hypotheses that are then verified in an empirical study. These theoretical propositions are tested by using the data gathered from a survey addressed to 244 firms in Spanish low- and medium-technology industries. Findings With regard to inbound practices, the practices oriented to cooperate with partners in a R&D context have a positive influence. The results show that outbound practices, either by direct generation of revenues from licensing payments or, more indirectly, through the indirect marketing and technical benefits that can stem from revealing have a positive effect on firm performance. Coupled practices, which are related to participation in clusters and innovation networks, have the highest impact on firm performance. In the industrial context examined, decentralization exerts a positive effect which enhances the effect of outbound practices meanwhile formalization reduces their positive effect. Practical implications This study helps practitioners in low- and medium-technology firms to determine which OI practices are most beneficial to firm performance and how formalization and decentralization can influence the relationship between OI and firm performance. Originality/value This study helps determine the influence of OI practices in terms of inbound, outbound and coupled types through an analysis of low- and medium-technology firms. The OI literature is enriched by the types herein of the role of OMs, which includes an analysis of how formalization and decentralization moderate the influence of OI practices on firm performance.

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Section: Theory and Hypotheses Developmentmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Theory and Hypotheses Developmentmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Theory and Hypotheses Developmentmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Open innovation and firm performance: the role of organizational mechanisms

Oltra

Flor

Alfaro

2018

BPMJ

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“…Researchers are now discussing the question of how organization structure theories can be coupled to the OI paradigm and which traditional concepts about organizational structure and organizing mechanism theories are in fact responsive to the needs of the open paradigm settings. Dimensions such as specialization, formalization and decentralization should be analyzed in order to investigate their influence on Open Innovation gains (Ihl et al, 2012).…”

Section: Background and Motivationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Implementing open innovation: technological, organizational and managerial tools

Aloini

Lazzarotti

Manzini

et al. 2017

BPMJ

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Implementing open innovation: technological, organizational and managerial tools The concept of open innovation (OI) has generated great interest in the last decade (Chesbrough, 2003); many articles have appeared and interesting special issues (SIs) in prestigious journals have been published (Enkel et al., 2009; West et al., 2014), while others are forthcoming (Corvello et al., 2017; Bogers et al., 2016). This means that OI has been and still is a “hot-topic,” with firms asking academics to help them define specific issues such as the “who” issue, i.e. with whom the collaboration should take place (Laursen and Salter, 2006), the “when” issue, i.e. which phase(s) of the innovation process should be opened (Lazzarotti and Manzini, 2009) and the “how” issue, i.e. how openness should be implemented. As regards the “how,” too little attention continues to be dedicated to the set of tools firms can use to support the implementation of OI and, hence, to how firms can create a positive environment that encourages people to leverage existing technological capabilities outside the boundaries of the organization (Hung and Chou, 2013; Aloini et al., 2015; Lazzarotti et al., 2015) or to capture and benefit from external sources of knowledge in order to enhance current technological developments (Huizingh, 2011), thus – achieving a positive impact on performance (Caputo et al., 2016). Building on literature on innovation and knowledge management, we define such a set as the emergent or intentional system of Technological (information and communication technologies (ICT)), managerial and organizational tools through which the firm influences the collaborative behavior of people inside the firm with the external partners, as well as the collaborative behavior of the partners along the innovation funnel, from the idea generation up to the commercialization phase. Basically the main question is: what are the technological, managerial and organizational (TMO) tools that firms can use along all the phases of the OI process? It is from this perspective that this editorial will propose two interpretive lenses through which the contributions of this SI will be presented: the first concerns the TMO tools that support OI, and the second, the OI process along which the tools are adopted

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“…Ihl et al [21] discussed 2014 International Conference on Management Science & Engineering (21 th ) August 17-19, 2014 Helsinki, Finland -1519 -different structural dimensions that are needed in order to influence external technology acquisition and utilization. Slater & Narver [22] find that inter-functional coordination has a direct effect on the utilization of customer knowledge.…”

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

External knowledge acquisition and innovation performance: The roles of intra-firm communication and innovation incentives

Qin

Wang

2014

2014 International Conference on Management Science &Amp; Engineering 21th Annual Conference Proceedings

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In the era of open innovation, external knowledge acquisition and exploitation have been a strategic choice for improving the innovation of firms. Existing literatures have discovered a complicated relationship between external knowledge acquisition and a firm's innovation but it has failed to explain the mechanism behind this relationship. This study, based on the perspective that external knowledge needs to be internalized by internal firm practices, explores the effect of information communication and innovation incentives on the transformation from an external knowledge acquisition to firm innovation. Hierarchical regression is used to investigate this question through 489 large and medium-sized companies in China and the results show that the positive impact of external knowledge acquisition on firm innovation is partially mediated by within-firm communication and an innovation incentive policy.

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Organizing for Open Innovation: Aligning Internal Structure with External Knowledge Search

Cited by 10 publications

References 112 publications

Open innovation and firm performance: the role of organizational mechanisms

Open innovation and firm performance: the role of organizational mechanisms

Implementing open innovation: technological, organizational and managerial tools

External knowledge acquisition and innovation performance: The roles of intra-firm communication and innovation incentives

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