Evaluating Ideas When Innovators Are Diverse

Abstract

We propose to examine how ideas are evaluated when innovators are diverse and the implications on organizational and individual-level outcomes. This question is timely because managers from more organizations are beginning to evaluate novel ideas and innovators. Organizations finance early stage ventures (e.g. Duschnitsky, 2012; Cohen, Fehder, Hochberg, & Murray, 2019; Lerner & Nanda, 2020), access new ideas via broadcast search (e.g. Jeppesen & Lakhani, 2010; Lifschitz-Assaf, 2018), or directly employ intrapreneurs (Nielson, Peters, & Hisrich, 1985). Managers are increasingly conscious about the diversity of innovators in their networks in part due to growing political and social interest (Dobbin, Kalev, & Kim, 2011; Luo & Zhang, 2020). We propose to bring together five papers presented by a panel of Aleksanda Kacperczyk (London Business School), Rembrand Koning (Harvard Business School), Amisha Miller (Boston University), Dan Wang (Columbia Business School), Nataliya Langburd Wright (Harvard Business School), and Peter Younkin (University of Oregon), which examine the evaluation of ideas from diverse innovators. We will identify novel organizational mechanisms that could affect the diversity of innovators, as well as the implications of evaluation processes on organizations, innovators’ careers, and the direction of innovation. Do Richer Foreign Work Experiences Lead to Intrapreneurial Success? Presenter: Dan Jun Wang; Columbia Business School Judging Foreign Startups Presenter: Nataliya Wright; Harvard Business School Presenter: Rembrand Michael Koning; Harvard Business School Presenter: Tarun Khanna; Harvard U. Changing the System, Not the Seeker: Evaluating Startups Led by Female Founders Presenter: Amisha Miller; Boston U. Questrom School of Business Clearing Hurdles but Digging Holes: An Exit, Not an Entrance: The Employment Opportunities for Black Presenter: Aleksandra Joanna Kacperczyk; - Presenter: Peter Younkin; U. of Oregon Biased Sampling of Early Users and the Direction of Startup Innovation Presenter: Ruiqing Cao; - Presenter: Rembrand Michael Koning; Harvard Business School Presenter: Ramana Nanda; Imperial College London