1,721,018 research outputs found
The new needs friends : Simmelian strangers and the selection of novelty
Full text linkResearch Summary
The paradox of rejecting novel ideas while being motivated to select them exists in many realms. Deviating from prior research that investigated several internal levers to promote the funding of novel ideas in the sciences, we focus on an external lever by investigating how seconded employees increase the selection of novel ideas in two ways: (1) they select more novel ideas themselves, and (2) they influence permanent employees to do the same. Combining unique quantitative longitudinal data and 37 in-depth interviews, we test our predictions in the secondment program at the National Science Foundation and find broad support for our theoretical arguments. Our findings have implications for scholars of science and innovation by proposing a relatively light-touch intervention to facilitate the selection of novel ideas.
Managerial Summary
Organizations often face a paradox: they want to select novel ideas but tend to reject them. This study shifts focus from internal measures to an external solution, examining how seconded employees can help. Through both quantitative data and interviews at the National Science Foundation's secondment program, we found that seconded employees choose more novel ideas and influence permanent staff to do the same. This suggests a simple intervention can significantly boost the acceptance of innovative ideas, offering valuable insights for those in the science and innovation. Understanding this dynamic can empower managers to strategically leverage seconded employees, fostering a more innovative and adaptive organizational culture
Empirische Essays über die Rolle von Stars in kollaborativen Organisationen
No full textInspired by the challenges modern organizations face when integrating the talent of their "best and brightest" into increasingly interdependent processes, this dissertation analyzes the role of stars in collaborative organizations. In three independent essays, I investigate (1) how stars affect team performance and what mechanisms are at play, (2) how temporary star absence provides new opportunities for non-star colleagues, and (3) how personal rivalry among stars impacts their individual output and contribution to organizational performance. I address these questions quantitatively by applying microeconometric and quasi-experimental techniques to data from the National Basketball Association (NBA). Rich individual and team-level data enables me to identify stars and link them to the performance of their colleagues and organizations. The core findings of this thesis suggest that the impact of stars is not unidirectional, but ambiguous: On the one hand, stars are vital for team performance and the success of organizations because they possess unique skills that are hard to replace. On the other hand, the dominant role of stars limits the performance opportunities for non-star colleagues and constrains their professional development. Finally, personal motives like trumping a rival induce stars to prioritize individual output, which distinctly reduces their positive impact on organizations. Taken together, the three essays of this thesis thus paint a comprehensive and nuanced picture of stardom in collaborative organizations.Moderne Organisationen stehen vor der Herausforderung, die Fähigkeiten ihrer Mitarbeiter in zunehmend interdependente Arbeitsabläufe zu integrieren. Die herausragenden Fähigkeiten einiger weniger Stars sind dabei von besonderer Bedeutung. Diese Dissertation untersucht deshalb die Rolle von Stars in kollaborativen Organisationen. In drei eigenständigen Essays analysiere ich, (1) wie Stars die Leistung von Teams beeinflussen und welche Mechanismen dabei wirken, (2) wie die vorübergehende Abwesenheit von Stars ihren Kollegen neue Möglichkeiten eröffnet und (3) wie persönliche Rivalitäten zwischen Stars ihre individuelle Leistung und ihren Beitrag zur Leistung der Organisation beeinflussen. Ich untersuche diese Fragen quantitativ auf der Grundlage von Daten aus der National Basketball Association (NBA), die umfangreiche Informationen auf Individual- und Teamebene enthalten. Auf dieser Basis ist es möglich, Stars zu identifizieren und mit der Leistung ihrer Kollegen und Organisationen zu verknüpfen. Dazu verwende ich mikroökonometrische und quasi-experimentelle Methoden. Die zentralen Ergebnisse dieser Dissertation legen nahe, dass der Einfluss von Stars nicht nur in eine Richtung wirkt, sondern ambivalent ist. Einerseits sind Stars zentral für die Leistung von Teams und den Erfolg von Organisationen, weil sie über einzigartige Fähigkeiten verfügen, die sich kaum ersetzen lassen. Andererseits nehmen sie herausragende Stellungen innerhalb von Organisationen ein und beschränken so die Entfaltungs- und Entwicklungsmöglichkeiten ihrer Kollegen. Zuletzt spielen die persönlichen Motive von Stars eine wichtige Rolle: Persönliche Rivalitäten verleiten Stars dazu, ihre individuelle Leistung in den Vordergrund zu stellen, was ihren positiven Einfluss auf Organisationen deutlich verringert. Zusammengenommen vermitteln die drei Essays dieser Dissertation ein umfassendes und differenziertes Bild über die Rolle von Stars in kollaborativen Organisationen
Networks of innovators and the private-collective innovation model : why do firms engage in open source software?
No full textManaging beyond firm boundaries: Leveraging user innovation networks
No full textBecause innovations change and transform industries, they pose challenges for managers that have to make decisions to cope with a continuously changing competitive landscape. Firms need to develop new innovations to compete by releasing better products and services and at the same time be able to appropriate them to make money and survive. Developing new innovations can stem from firm-internal investments into research and development (R&D). Yet, firms are also dependent on relations with external actors as sources of innovation. Although these external sources of innovation are manifold, users have been shown to be one important source. Users develop customizations and new solutions that occasionally are brought back to the firm as inputs to the innovative process. More recently, the concept of user innovation communities has attracted a lot of interest. I bring forward an idea to view communities as dense user innovation networks characterized by multiplex ties to solve problems. In the context of free and open source software, they are dispersed all over the world, users lack financial compensation, intellectual achievements are attributed to the collective rather than a single actor, and formal planning in the classic sense is eschewed. Individuals that take part in user innovation networks share their achievements in a collective manner and at first glance appear to destroy the business for firms. At the same time, these networks provide an important resource which the firm can use to innovate. This dissertation focuses on how firms try to manage or being involved in these user innovation networks as part of the firms business.My aim is therefore to explore how new firms participate in user innovation networks and how they appropriate and protect returns. By analyzing the phenomenon of commercializing efforts for free and open source software (FOSS), I show how firms work with communities to create a competitive advantage. Drawing on extensive data collection from multiple case studies, archival analysis and network analysis, I address a largely neglected issue of the role of firms in FOSS. The thesis shows that participation in communities can yield a great advantage over competitors. For firms that attempt to leverage user innovation networks, having a beneficial position and membership in these networks is important. It expands the amount of possible resources a firm can draw upon to be innovative and stay ahead of competition. But it comes at a cost, as ties with these networks have a negative side and also limit the room for strategic action.My proposed term user innovation networks provide a more fine-grained analysis of how firms participate. Some individuals have affiliations with firms and links into larger network structures. I thus argue that even within this process that has been characterized as collective, firms sponsor some individuals in order to assimilate what happens in the user innovation network. Firms are more likely to sponsor individuals with networks positions that are more beneficial for orchestrating the network or assimilate what is happening.Theories typically underscore the importance of the internal resources or the role of networks, but this research shows that the interaction between internal resources and networks is the crucial issue. Firms act as brokers between the user innovation network and the market. The specific broker role is held by the individuals that firms dedicate to work in the networks. These individuals bring the expertise of user innovation networks to the firm where it is repackaged and integrated in internal products and services that fulfill a need in the market. Firms combine their network participation with internal expertise to bring new products and services to the market. Because of the uncertainty of how to appropriate returns, firms experiment with various kinds of strategies to align with communities, while at the same time being able to provide something novel to the market
Managing beyond firm boundaries: Leveraging user innovation networks
No full textBecause innovations change and transform industries, they pose challenges for managers that have to make decisions to cope with a continuously changing competitive landscape. Firms need to develop new innovations to compete by releasing better products and services and at the same time be able to appropriate them to make money and survive. Developing new innovations can stem from firm-internal investments into research and development (R&D). Yet, firms are also dependent on relations with external actors as sources of innovation. Although these external sources of innovation are manifold, users have been shown to be one important source. Users develop customizations and new solutions that occasionally are brought back to the firm as inputs to the innovative process.
More recently, the concept of user innovation communities has attracted a lot of interest. I bring forward an idea to view communities as dense user innovation networks characterized by multiplex ties to solve problems. In the context of free and open source software, they are dispersed all over the world, users lack financial compensation, intellectual achievements are attributed to the collective rather than a single actor, and formal planning in the classic sense is eschewed. Individuals that take part in user innovation networks share their achievements in a collective manner and at first glance appear to destroy the business for firms. At the same time, these networks provide an important resource which the firm can use to innovate. This dissertation focuses on how firms try to manage or being involved in these user innovation networks as part of the firms business.
My aim is therefore to explore how new firms participate in user innovation networks and how they appropriate and protect returns. By analyzing the phenomenon of commercializing efforts for free and open source software (FOSS), I show how firms work with communities to create a competitive advantage. Drawing on extensive data collection from multiple case studies, archival analysis and network analysis, I address a largely neglected issue of the role of firms in FOSS.
The thesis shows that participation in communities can yield a great advantage over competitors. For firms that attempt to leverage user innovation networks, having a beneficial position and membership in these networks is important. It expands the amount of possible resources a firm can draw upon to be innovative and stay ahead of competition. But it comes at a cost, as ties with these networks have a negative side and also limit the room for strategic action.
My proposed term user innovation networks provide a more fine-grained analysis of how firms participate. Some individuals have affiliations with firms and links into larger network structures. I thus argue that even within this process that has been characterized as collective, firms sponsor some individuals in order to assimilate what happens in the user innovation network. Firms are more likely to sponsor individuals with networks positions that are more beneficial for orchestrating the network or assimilate what is happening.
Theories typically underscore the importance of the internal resources or the role of networks, but this research shows that the interaction between internal resources and networks is the crucial issue. Firms act as brokers between the user innovation network and the market. The specific broker role is held by the individuals that firms dedicate to work in the networks. These individuals bring the expertise of user innovation networks to the firm where it is repackaged and integrated in internal products and services that fulfill a need in the market. Firms combine their network participation with internal expertise to bring new products and services to the market. Because of the uncertainty of how to appropriate returns, firms experiment with various kinds of strategies to align with communities, while at the same time being able to provide something novel to the market
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
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