Friday, August 29, 2008

Innovation Work Cited in Strategic Direction

My work with the American Productivity Quality Center on the consortium benchmarking study, “Successfully Embedding Innovation: Strategies and Tactics”, was highlighted in the Innovation Section of Strategic Direction.

See – “Innovation and leadership: Executives fail to foster innovation,” Strategic Direction, 24(5), 36-38.

Strategic Direction is an essential management information resource for today's strategic thinkers. As a unique service, we scan through the best 400 management journals in the world and distill the most topical management issues and relevant implications for senior managers out of the cutting-edge research. We regularly present case study reviews of the Fortune 500 companies. Each briefing (no more than 2 to 3 pages long) is prepared by an independent writer who adds their own impartial comments and places the arguments in context. [Source: LINK]

Wednesday, August 27, 2008

Monday, August 25, 2008

AOM.OCIS Doctoral Student Blog Interview

I was recently interviewed for a section on the Organization Communication and Information Systems (OCIS) Division of the Academy of Management Blog. This blog is maintained by a global community of doctoral students interested in various aspects of OCIS. To see the interview – Click Here

Tuesday, August 19, 2008

Talk at the School of Economic and Business Sciences, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg

Date: Friday, 29th August
Time: 9am
Venue: Borkum and Hare Room, 1st floor, New Commerce Building, West Campus.


Crafting Organizational Innovation Processes

Innovation is a crucial component of business strategy, but the process of innovation may seem difficult to manage. To plan organizational initiatives around innovation or to bolster innovation requires a firm grasp of the innovation process. Few organizations have transparently defined such a process. Based on the findings of an exploratory study of over 30 US and European companies that have robust innovation processes, this paper breaks down the innovation process into discrete stages: idea generation and mobilization, screening and advocacy, experimentation, commercialization, and diffusion and implementation. For each stage, context, outputs and critical ingredients are discussed. There are several common tensions and concerns at each stage, which are enumerated; industry examples are also given. Finally, strategies for and indicators of organizational success around innovation are discussed for each stage. Successful organizations will use an outlined innovation process to create a common framework for discussion and initiatives around the innovation process, and to establish metrics and goals for each stage of the innovation process.

Monday, August 18, 2008

Pictures from Cape Town