The temporal pattern of creativity and implementation in teams

Abstract

Two broad sets of activities underlie team innovation: the creation and the implementation of new ideas. Despite the prevalence of this distinction, the temporal dynamics of creativity and implementation in teams and their relation to successful team innovation are not well understood. Building on and integrating linear phase models and complexity perspectives on the innovation process, we propose a temporal pattern of creativity and implementation that is linked to team innovation. We examine this temporal pattern in a longitudinal study of 76 project teams. Results show that teams engage in creativity throughout the entire life cycle of team projects; however, innovative teams refrain from focusing on implementation in early time frames and increase their focus on implementation over the course of the project. Episodes of unconstrained creativity in early time frames of a project appear to be a critical factor for team innovation. Our research provides a foundation for future research on team innovation that explicitly considers the temporal interplay of creativity and implementation. Practitioner pointsCreativity is a critical factor for team innovation that is relevant not only in the beginning of a team project but throughout its entire life cycle. Teams achieve innovative outcomes if they refrain from focusing on implementation early on and instead allow for prolonged episodes of unconstrained creativity. Innovative teams pay attention to the timing of implementation activities and increase their focus on implementation around the mid-point of a project.

Product innovation and performance in SME’s: the role of the creative process and risk taking

“…Creativity involves a series of stages that constitute the creative process (Georgiev & Georgiev, 2018). There are two valid theoretical perspectives of the creative process (Rosing et al, 2018): the linear perspective assumes a sequence of stages and the perspective of complexity, which believes that the creative stages are intertwined. Although the models differ in the number of stages and specific content of each stage (Reiter-Palmon & Murugavel, 2018), the linear perspective offers better results (Rosing et al, 2018).…”

“…There are two valid theoretical perspectives of the creative process (Rosing et al, 2018): the linear perspective assumes a sequence of stages and the perspective of complexity, which believes that the creative stages are intertwined. Although the models differ in the number of stages and specific content of each stage (Reiter-Palmon & Murugavel, 2018), the linear perspective offers better results (Rosing et al, 2018). All stages of the linear creative process are essential (Reiter-Palmon & Leone, 2019) and failure to correctly complete a stage will lead the actors to step back in the process (Doran & Ryan, 2017).…”

Aligning Leader Behaviors With Innovation Requirements Improves Performance: An Experimental Study

“…Nonetheless, further research should investigate the postulated relationships in a field setting to provide further support in terms of external validity for the ambidextrous leadership model. Second, as we focused on comparing creativity and implementation requirements as boundary conditions, our study did not consider the dynamic interplay or temporal pattern of creativity and idea implementation (Rosing et al, 2018). However, the influence of innovation requirements within the innovation process will be especially interesting when considering the flexible interplay of both requirements (Schroeder et al, 1989;Cheng and van de Ven, 1996).…”

“…However, the influence of innovation requirements within the innovation process will be especially interesting when considering the flexible interplay of both requirements (Schroeder et al, 1989;Cheng and van de Ven, 1996). Researchers have stated that creativity and implementation do not follow a linear temporal pattern and empirical results support this assumption (Schroeder et al, 1989;Rosing and Zacher, 2017;Rosing et al, 2018). It follows that individuals need to change their behaviors regularly to address the changing requirements, resolve associated tensions within the innovation process, and act ambidextrously (Miron-Spektor and Erez, 2017;Rosing and Zacher, 2017;Miron-Spektor et al, 2018).…”

Talent management and innovation management: Review of the literature and challenges for future research

“…Its main assumptions have been that talented people, such as inventors: (1) are more sensitive, resourceful and ingenious (Guilford, 1959); (2) enjoy adventures, are occupied in creative work and endeavour to realize their ideas (Cattani & Ferriani, 2008;Mackinnon, 1962); and (3) are of great significance to innovation performance in organizations, including R&D personnel, engineers, industry experts and so on (Mumford, 2000). Two specific kinds of talents, namely creative and scientific, have been at the centre of the debate that has treated individuals as sources of innovative power in science and technology (Edmondson & Harvey, 2018;Florida, 2002Florida, , 2014Henker, Sonnentag & Unger, 2015;Mumford, 2000;Rosing et al, 2018). Whereas creative talents have been conceived of as dealing with the production of useful new ideas, or ideas that can be implemented to solve significant novel problems (Lubart, 2001), scientific talents have been examined within the frame of the 'linear model of innovation' that prioritizes scientific research as the basis of innovation, and plays down the role of later players in the innovation process (Balconi, Brusoni & Orsenigo, 2010;Godin, 2006).…”