مقاله سال ۲۰۱۶

Innovation is widely considered to be a key factor behind economic development and competitiveness for firms, regions, and nations (Frambach and Schilewaert, 2002; Reinders et al., 2010; Tödtling and Trippl, 2005). Furthermore, answering the rising demand for a transition towards an economy with more resource-efficient and sustainable production systems, fueled by global issues such as the increasing resource scarcity, the growing world population, land scarcity and global warming, requires numerous innovations of different magnitude. Minor changes to existing technologies or products, i.e. incremental innovations, are one piece of the puzzle, but the most important driver in this transition are more radical innovations, i.e. new-to-the-world concepts. Successfully implementing these new concepts involves alterations to the core dimensions of the existing socio-technicalsystem, i.e. the stable configuration of linked and aligned dimensions: technology, user practices and markets, industries, infrastructure, policy, and techno-scientific knowledge, as well as alterations to the linkages between these dimensions (Farla et al., 2010; Geels, 2002, 2005, 2006; Kirchen, 2012; Van Humbeeck, 2003). Consequently, these complex radical innovations have to be developed using innovation processes that take into account these multi-dimensional aspects (Bruns et al., 2010; Kroon et al., 2008). However, the mindset of many (innovation) managers, researchers, policy makers and the general public is still dominated by innovation models stemming from approaches that either focus on a single dimension (the push and pull approaches) or on a very limited number of dimensions (the coupled approach) (Berkhout et al., 2010; Caetano and Amaral, 2011; Kroon et al. 2008; Rothwell, 1994; Tödtling and Trippl, 2005). These approaches and their uni-disciplinary models with closed boundaries and in- flexible, linear trajectories without feedback (for an elaborate description of the approaches, see Rothwell, 1994) are ineffective and no longer sufficient to systematically succeed in cost-efficiently delivering (radical) innovations (Bigliardi et al., 2012; Han et al., 2012).

One approach that is well suited as a theoretical background for the development of complex radical innovations is the innovation systems (IS) perspective because of its dynamic approach and holistic view on innovation (Budde et al., 2012). The innovation system construct has been developed to capture and understand the relations between producers, users, governments and institutions, and by doing so, helps to identify system failures and deadlocks, rather than mere market failures as reasons behind innovation failure (Faber and Hoppe, 2013). Consequently, within this paradigm, innovation is viewed as an evolutionary, non-linear and iterative learning process, which requires intense communication and collaboration between different actors in order to take into account the multi-dimensional aspects of innovation (Budde et al., 2012; Tödtling and Trippl, 2005; West and Bogers, 2013). Currently, research on innovation systems is mainly oriented towards the macro level (national innovation systems, NIS (e.g. Carlsson et al., 2002; Freeman, 1995)) and the meso level (regional innovation systems, RIS (e.g. Asheim et al., 2011; Cooke et al., 1997) and sectoral innovation systems, SIS (e.g. Faber and Hoppe; 2013; Malerba, 2002)). Another body of IS-research focusses on the system surrounding a particular technology (technological innovation system, TIS (e.g. Bergek et al., 2008; Carlsson, 1997)). Moreover, due to the globalizing economy, the international or global innovation system (IIS or GIS) is increasingly receiving attention (Balzat and Hanusch, 2004; Chung, 2002; Freeman, 2002; FromholdEisebith, 2007; Walshok et al., 2014). The micro-level however, that of the innovating organization, has received very little attention within the innovation system perspective. As a result, micro-level innovation managers are in need of hands-on models for innovation development (Berkhout et al., 2010) that bring together the many valuable insights currently scattered in different studies and different (innovation) research fields (Alänge, 2013).

In this paper, we develop this innovation systems micro-level, the Organizational Innovation System (OIS), and develop a framework to analyze different organizational innovation systems. With the OIS, we aim to give a more holistic, comprehensive overview of important issues during a radical innovation project – from idea development to commercialization – based primarily on the innovation systems literature and open innovation literature, supplemented with insights from other related literature. Consequently, the organizational innovation system contributes to the innovation literature and practice in four important ways. First, the OIS provides the innovation systems perspective with a micro-level that is currently underdeveloped. Second, the OIS-concept provides innovation managers with a more comprehensive guiding model for the development of complex radical innovations within the multidimensional, multistakeholder innovation systems context. These types of models are currently lacking in both the innovation systems and open innovation perspective (Giannopoulou et al., 2011). Third, by developing a framework for analysis, innovation managers and scholars can study and compare OISs, potentially leading to further valuable insights to increase innovation efficiency and efficacy of innovation organizations. The importance of improving efficacy and efficiency of innovation processes will only increase due to shortening product life cycles, increasing research and development costs, continuously decreasing innovation times and technology becoming increasingly complex (Drechsler and Natter, 2012; Holl and Rama, 2012; Ritter and Gemünden, 2004; Van Haverbeke and Cloodt, 2006). Fourth, improved innovation performance on the organizational level will have a direct positive effect on the performance of related higher system levels, thus increasing growth of the related regions and nations. This is due to the interconnectedness and interdependence of the different system levels (Walshok et al., 2014) (Fig. 1).