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Innovation Ecologies
from a Managerial
Perspective
Dr. Johannes Meier, Xi GmbH
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Agenda
✤ General observations on
nature of innovation
✤ Complications
✤ Innovation as a
coordination challenge
✤ New forms of coordination
due to new technologies
✤ Illustration: The 4I-platform
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3.
Innovation
myths vs. reality
✤ Few epiphanies
✤ Few lone rangers
✤ Execution is key (GE mantra)
✤ Continuous reconsideration
✤ Creativity and idleness
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4.
Complications
✤ Increasingly complex anatomy
of knowledge
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5.
Complications
✤ Varying individual prerequisites
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6.
Complications
Cultural contexts for innovation
✤ Focus on existing knowledge
vs. discovery
✤ Our schools vs. creativity
✤ Bologna vs. reflection spaces
✤ Streamlined vs. open career
✤ PE investors vs. nurturing
VC
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Innovation as a coordination challenge
An effective Innovation System
‣ encourages diversity and supports alignment
‣ overcomes the dichotomy between central control and
decentral freedom
‣ allows for failure, but identifies failure early
‣ supports networks of initiatives and actions
‣ supports change processes at all levels and scales.
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Complementarity of diversity and alignment
✤ Can multiple perspectives be incorporated into the innovation process?
✤ Can the richness of contexts be adequately included in the assessment of a problem or
challenge?
✤ Can unproductive reductionism and inappropriate simplification be identified and
avoided?
✤ Is the non-mainstream idea encouraged and appreciated?
✤ Are there appropriate tools and processes to integrate diverse perspectives and
interpretations?
✤ Do efficient conflict resolution mechanisms exist if there is a clash of interpretations?
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Complementarity of central control and decentral freedom
Integration:
Quality of Direction
Organization: Quality of Interaction
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Failure tolerance
✤ but early failure identification (and consequences)
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Networks of
initiatives
Network governance instead of
formal authority
✤ Rules of engagement and
membership
✤ Communities of practice
✤ Appreciation and recognition
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12.
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Change
processes
Management tends
to believe that
anything that has
lasted for a fair
amount of time
must be normal and
go on forever.
Anything that
contradicts what we
have come to
consider a law of
nature is then
rejected as
unsound.
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Die Gestaltung der Gegenwart
ist eine Funktion dessen, wie
die Zukunft sein soll, und das
fantasielose Gegenwartscredo:
»Wie jetzt, nur besser!« macht
nun wirklich keinen Eindruck
mehr. Gerade in der Krise zeigt
sich, wie fatal es sich auswirkt,
wenn ein politisches
Gemeinwesen keiner Idee folgt,
was es sein will und wie seine
Bürger leben wollen.
C. Leggewie, H. Welzer
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15.
New forms of coordination due to
new technologies
✤ New opportunities for participation due to radically
lowered transaction costs
✤ More specific small groups and communities
✤ Coordination in very, large groups without institutional
setting
✤ User-generated content and quality-assurance
✤ Cheap failure
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New forms of participation
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Illustration:
Coordination platform for local labour markets
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Functions of coordination platform
✤ Linking local stakeholders to support adequate local solutions
✤ Orientation framework to integrate different perspectives
✤ Capture of local idiosyncracies
✤ Interactive analytics and visualization tools to support the
generation of a shared sense of reality and of dependencies
✤ Horizontal and vertical provision of information and links about
best practices
✤ Mobilization of stakeholders with the help of milestone and
activity tracking systems
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Thank you for your attention
Dr. Johannes Meier
johannes.meier@xigmbh.de
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