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Innovation Competency — An Essential Organizational Asset

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Employee-Driven Innovation

Abstract

Ask any top manager whether he wants innovation in his company and he will certainly say yes. Ask the same question further down the organization and most managers will respond in the same way. Follow these managers closely and most of them will have their attention on anything but innovation. This type of hypocrisy is well known in organizations (Brunson, 2003) and, in fact, it can easily be explained. Managers have many other responsibilities and goals that must also be met, such as optimizing production, increasing sales, ensuring quality, and so on, which means that finding the extra time for innovating can be difficult. So, on the one hand, too much creativity and innovation would be a nightmare for managers (Levitt, 2002); on the other hand, creativity and innovation have become crucial for companies to survive. What to do about it?

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© 2012 Lotte Darsø

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Darsø, L. (2012). Innovation Competency — An Essential Organizational Asset. In: Høyrup, S., Bonnafous-Boucher, M., Hasse, C., Lotz, M., Møller, K. (eds) Employee-Driven Innovation. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137014764_6

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