Agile Innovation Research Articles

Design fields of agile innovation management in small and medium sized enterprises

Digitalization is regarded as an essential driver of innovation and therefore has a great influence on innovation management. In this context, we identify challenges to which companies must respond as part of their innovation management. Concerning these challenges, agile methods are gaining in importance. Therefore, the submission focuses the analysis of the interaction of digitalization, agility and innovation management in small and medium sized enterprises. As a result, essential design fields were identified to come up with an agile, holistic innovation management in SMEs.

Agile authorship: Evolving models of innovation for information-intensive offerings

Developed economies have seen a shift in economic value away from the production of material goods and toward the production of information-intensive offerings. The process of innovation has evolved in parallel, from staged and gated approaches to agile and iterative processes. Agile innovation models developed in software and technology industries have generally stayed within them, thus applicability of these newer models of innovation to information-intensive market offerings has been limited. We use the paradigm of authorship to provide insights into the evolution of information-intensive offerings and subsequently into the requisite evolution of innovation processes. We demonstrate that agile methods are appropriate for a variety of industries and outputs, and furthermore that more gated and hybrid models of innovation are still relevant in the information economy. To conclude, we discuss how various models of innovation and authorship can be applied by the firm, based on managerial objectives and control.

Trends in agile innovation management

The scope and type of applied innovations, as well as the speed of innovation by companies, today show a growing trend, which requires special efforts from the companies that claim to be leaders in the market. Therefore, these companies are forced to transform their innovative management into new forms. As an especially effective way to transform innovative management into the forefront, agile innovative management has emerged. Therefore, the theoretical desktop research of the state of development of agile innovative management from a number of perspectives has been carried out, as follows: agile innovation systems (AIS) as a phenomenon; the history of the creation of AIS; application of agile methods in companies; the basic function of agile innovation; places of agile innovation in the company; key elements of agile innovation; useful recommendations for companies that develop agile innovation; the process of agile innovation; agile behavioral approach; the uncertainty of agile innovation, and the measurement of agile innovation in companies. This paper summarizes the results of this research and gives guidelines to companies how to successfully implement agile innovation management.

The Agile Innovation Pendulum: A Strategic Marketing Multicultural Model for Family Businesses

This article constitutes the second of two parts of a research project aiming to investigate innovation in family businesses (FBs) and to present a consumer-focused conduit to agility in the strategic marketing multicultural context. The current article explores theoretically the notion of Agile Innovation giving birth to the idea of the Dynamic Equilibrium of Agile Innovation. It subsequently introduces the “missing link” of the Agile Consumer to construct the FB Strategic Marketing Multicultural Agility Pendulum, conceptually and conclusively, while drawing in parallel significant theoretical and executive insights and implications. The research findings and contribution are supportive of family firms’ potentialities, indicating that these organizations have an inherent disposition towards agile innovation, with multicultural management acting as the agent of equilibrium. Caution, however, is demanded in developing the proper value propositions and “softer” agility features that will not perturb the often-delicate balances and unique bundle of features defining FBs. Methodologically, the research retains a scientifically founded exactitude, balancing the primary, the theoretical, and the conceptual countenances through a mixed inductive-deductive approach. The current article is conceptual and is based on a combination of narrative literature review, meta-synthesis literature review, and qualitative primary data (interviews).

The Agile Innovation Pendulum: Family Business Innovation and the Human, Social, and Marketing Capitals

This article constitutes the first of two parts of a research aiming to investigate innovation in family businesses (FBs) and to present a consumer-focused conduit to agility in the strategic marketing multicultural context. The current article studies FBs’ innovativeness in the context of their “familiness,” focusing on the question of how FBs’ human, social/multicultural, and marketing capitals fare in comparison to non-FBs. The research findings are supportive of FBs’ potentialities, indicating an inherent “genetic” disposition towards agile innovation. The research further underlines the need for a new agility framework for FBs, to bear into consideration their transformed (agile) innovation factors and the marketing realities of contemporary business, a task undertaken by the second part of this study. Methodologically, the research retains a scientifically founded exactitude, balancing the primary, the theoretical, and the conceptual countenances through a mixed inductive-deductive approach. The current article is based on a narrative theoretical and quantitative primary data (survey) analyses. The research’s contribution relates to its uncovering of the true FBs’ innovation potentialities; its theoretical linkage to the subjects of agility, strategic marketing and consumer behavior; and their conceptual incorporation into a unified framework (the “Agile Innovation Pendulum”) with explicit scholarly and executive implications.

Agile innovation management in government: A research agenda

Governments are facing an information technology upgrade and legacy problem: outdated systems and acquisition processes are resulting in high-risk technology projects that are either over budget or behind schedule. Recent catastrophic technology failures, such as the failed launch of the politically contested online marketplace Healthcare.gov in the U.S. were attributed to an overreliance on external technology contractors and failures to manage large-scale technology contracts in government. As a response, agile software development and modular acquisition approaches, new independent organizational units equipped with fast reacting teams, in combination with a series of policy changes are developed to address the need to innovate digital service delivery in government. This article uses a process tracing approach, as well as initial qualitative interviews with a subset of executives and agency-level digital services members to provide an overview of the existing policies and implementation approaches toward an agile innovation management approach. The article then provides a research framework including research questions that provide guidance for future research on the managerial implementation considerations necessary to scale up the initial efforts and move toward a collaborative and agile innovation management approach in government.

Excessive Research - Editorial

Excessive Research highlights the compulsive actions of digital culture, and how we are constantly encouraged to stay active, to make, to share and to secure. While idealised by hackers, these actions are at the same time the conveyors of new agile innovation strategies, and modes of economic and symbolic exchange. A culture of sharing, for instance, is evidently one of the most fetishised activities of the network and describes how value is now created. ‘Sharing is caring’, goes the catchphrase, but by its inclination of excess, loss and indebtedness, sharing also challenges the very logic of accumulation, and hence it must be domesticated and normalised. Articles delve into the nature of these actions and their limits, asking: What happens when research is less about exchange and more about excess?

Smart Manufacturing.

Historic manufacturing enterprises based on vertically optimized companies, practices, market share, and competitiveness are giving way to enterprises that are responsive across an entire value chain to demand dynamic markets and customized product value adds; increased expectations for environmental sustainability, reduced energy usage, and zero incidents; and faster technology and product adoption. Agile innovation and manufacturing combined with radically increased productivity become engines for competitiveness and reinvestment, not simply for decreased cost. A focus on agility, productivity, energy, and environmental sustainability produces opportunities that are far beyond reducing market volatility. Agility directly impacts innovation, time-to-market, and faster, broader exploration of the trade space. These changes, the forces driving them, and new network-based information technologies offering unprecedented insights and analysis are motivating the advent of smart manufacturing and new information technology infrastructure for manufacturing.

The Process of Strategic, Agile, Innovation Development

Despite many attempts to introduce computerization in the healthcare industry, the majority of the current healthcare information systems still fail to meet the rising expectations of patients for service. This study aims to understand how agility and innovation capabilities can be strategically nurtured, developed, and managed to upgrade the quality of healthcare services. Based on a case study, a process model is developed to explain that an agile innovation strategy is a complex helix process involving a firm's sensitivity and responsiveness to integrating and reconfiguring its resources to cope with innovative change. Three key managerial contributions for IT and medical practitioners are presented.

Cost-Oriented Agile Innovation for Mechatronics Management in Less Developed Regions

Cost-oriented automation has a long tradition in IFAC and attracts a lot of attention in literatures associated, for example, with business process improvement. Whilst process-oriented cost reduction (such as LEAN for example) have been widely disseminated, in recent years practical cost-oriented solutions for automatic processes have not been reported so much in the literature. This is surprising given the increasing constraints upon, for example, manufacturing organisations in less developed peripheral regions. This paper re-energises the cost-oriented automation discourse by presenting projects which have used low-cost digital solutions to achieve potentially excellent results. The main contribution of the paper is to demonstrate practical applications of cost-oriented thinking in contexts where practical, cost-oriented automatic control are essential, such as post-conflict developing regions.

The Big Question

The Big Question

Agile Business Models: an approach to support collaborative networks

This research work explores the concept of the ‘Agile Business Models’ for collaborative networks. It is inspired by innovation concept and based on the effects of globalisation and of the Knowledge Economy. The Agile Business Model considers the resources that are spread out and available worldwide as well as the need for each customer to receive a unique customer experience. It aims at reinforcing in the context of the Knowledge Economy the different business models approaches developed so far. This article also identifies the levers and the barriers of Agile Business Models innovation in collaborative networks.

Agile Innovation: A Footprint Balancing Distance and Immersion

To meet the demands of globalization, companies need to continually and rapidly access, absorb, and integrate ideas for innovation from around the world. Yet few innovation footprints are capable of meeting this challenge. This article introduces a model for “agile innovation” that differentiates between the need for a permanent presence in a location and the ability to access knowledge from a distance, by aligning different modes of access and integration against different types of knowledge. Adopting an agile innovation model will give companies the ability to better manage their global innovation footprint, leading to greater efficiency and effectiveness.

Agile innovation: The role of team climate in rapid research and development

The impact of team climate on speed of research and development (R&D) project completion was studied in a sample of 33 R&D teams. West's model of team climate for innovation was measured and analysed in relation to project performance ratings, and also in relation to project leaders' estimates of project progress over a 9‐month period. Three of the four climate scales (namely participative safety, support for innovation, and task orientation) were significantly correlated with project performance rated by managers and customers, and two scales (namely support for innovation and vision) correlated with project leaders' ratings of project innovation. Additionally, results of hierarchical linear modelling showed that the climate scales participative safety and task orientation each predicted the rate at which projects moved towards completion. Teams with more positive initial ratings of these climate factors progressed significantly faster towards project completion over subsequent months than teams with poorer climate ratings. The results extend previous research that has linked team climate with levels of team innovation and performance, by showing that climate also predicts rate or speed of innovation.

Simplicity as a Driver for Agile Innovation

Software and hardware vendors long avoided interoperation for fear of opting out of their own product lines. Yet decisive change came to the automobile industry from a holistic evolution and maturation on many fronts.

Fostering innovation with KM 2.0

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to present a general framework describing how new generations of agile innovation processes can benefit from using KM 2.0 technologies.Design/methodology/approach – An extensive literature review coupled with expert interviews and combined with the authors' experiences and models were used to develop the framework.Findings – A framework including the past and recent concepts and trends in terms of innovation management was developed. It is centered on the new critical roles that customers and the crowd can play in the innovation process. Knowledge management, Web 2.0 and Enterprise 2.0 technologies are important enablers of this framework.Originality/value – The paper presents the framework of a KM environment that can enable agile innovation management processes. Very few frameworks have been developed to support the full innovation process.

Consortia Speaking edited by Thomas A. Peters: Agile innovation clubs

Les consortia de bibliotheques sont devenus des figures familieres du paysage de l'information aux Etats-Unis. L'A. examine les conditions de la croissance et de la maturation de ces consortia, leur viabilite a long terme et leur impact durable. Ils connaissent a present une ere de croissance maitrisee et de diversification des services, et doivent demontrer leur agilite et leur capacite d'adaptation en passant de l'etat de clubs d'achat a celui de clubs d'innovation.