What Comes Before Innovation Kicks in: Contemporary Evidence and Future Directions of Innovative Work Behaviour of Individuals — A Conceptual Literature Review

Abstract

The importance of innovation is widely considered to be of peak importance for today´s enterprises. However, the understanding of one key element leading towards innovation seems to be neglected in scientific research: The innovative work behavior of individuals. Since Scott and Bruce investigated the determinants and introduced a path model of individual innovative work behavior twenty years ago (Scott and Bruce, 1994) much time has passed. New and upcoming trends in management, society and culture therefor could not be considered but influence the concept. This conceptual literature review therefor identifies, evaluates, aggregates and classifies the developments and trends from 2020 and 2021 regarding innovative work behavior. This study analyzed 41 journal articles, which further cited 3,609 publications as references, in EBSCO and Elsevier. The focus of the literature review was studies published in 2020 and 2021 and analyses that covered the topic of individual innovative behavior. The defined research objectives were framed by setting conceptual boundaries. Data was collected by using inclusion/exclusion criteria to then validate and manually review the research results. The results of this review suggest that firstly there is a change visible of the definition of the term itself, which has also influenced the scales being used to be reviewed or shifting. In addition the review shows how changes in working and managing enterprises effect innovative work behavior. They can be grouped into the three areas: role and impact of culture, societal trends and new management trends. Thus the effects of mindfulness, transformational leadership, usage of social media, or corporate social responsibility on innovative work behavior are better understood. This conceptual literature research connects and aggregates the various tendencies and supports new measurement models introduced which might help to identify possible causes of these discrepancies and provide direction for further research. Thereby this conceptual literature review thus sheds light on what otherwise seems to be a familiar concept.