The relationship and network literature has primarily focused on particular partner types, for example, buyer-supplier relationships or competitor interaction. This article explores the nature and relative importance of different types of interfirm relationships for new product development (NPD) success. The underlying premise of the study is that not only the type of interfirm relationships but also the combination of relationships are important for NPD performance. The interaction with a specific type of partner is expected to influence innovative performance by means of appropriate knowledge transfer. Varying needs for external knowledge, and thus types of relationships, are observed depending on the particular stages in the NPD process, the character of the knowledge base of the firm, and the industrial conditions. The absorption of external knowledge is discussed using the degree of redundancy in knowledge, which is defined as the degree of overlap in the knowledge base of the sender and the recipient of knowledge. Hence, the degree of redundancy has direct implications for the ease and, hence, use of knowledge shared with an external partner. The article is based on data from the Know for Innovation survey on innovative activities among European firms, which was carried out in 2000 in seven European countries covering five industries. The article explores the extent of use of external relationships in collaborative product development and finds that customers are involved more frequently in joint development efforts. Second, the industry association of the most important relationship is studied, and the results show that firms tend to partner with firms from their own industry. The danger in this approach is that firms from their own industry tend to contribute similar knowledge, which ultimately may endanger the creation of new knowledge and therefore more radical product developments. The analyses combine the finding that relationships with customers are used most frequently at both early and late stages of the product development process, with a second and more contradictory finding that at the same time customer relationships have a negative impact on innovative success. Moreover, the combination of customers, with both universities and competitors, has a significant negative effect on innovative performance. The potential causes of this apparent paradox can be narrowed down to two: (1) the average customer may be unable to articulate needs for advanced technology-based products; and (2) the average customer may be unable to conceptualize ideas beyond the

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Stimulation of creativity has long been assumed to enhance innovation. Accordingly, organizing the work environment to unleash the creative potential of employees has been studied extensively. However, the present creativity literature has yet to produce sufficient empirical evidence to confirm this assumption, and therefore the generalizability of the relationship between organizational creativity and innovation remains indeterminate. This paper adopts the leading creativity and innovation models to identify the work environment characteristics stimulating creativity, and subsequently analyses whether this environment leads to product and process innovation in small and medium sized firms. The findings demonstrate that this environment does not yield the same results for product and process innovation, and particular factors of the work environment do not behave according to the expectations to enhance the likelihood of doing innovation. The study discusses these findings and advances the literature by showing that the relationship between organizational creativity and innovation is not generalizable, but is contingent upon the innovation type and, as the discussion will show, particular characteristics related to the firm. Accordingly, the paper suggests new research opportunities to further explore organizational creativity and innovation.

If you would like to write for this, or any other Emerald publication, then please use our Emerald for Authors service information about how to choose which publication to write for and submission guidelines are available for all. Please visit www.emeraldinsight.com/authors for more information. About Emerald www.emeraldinsight.comEmerald is a global publisher linking research and practice to the benefit of society. The company manages a portfolio of more than 290 journals and over 2,350 books and book series volumes, as well as providing an extensive range of online products and additional customer resources and services.Emerald is both COUNTER 4 and TRANSFER compliant. The organization is a partner of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and also works with Portico and the LOCKSS initiative for digital archive preservation. Design/methodology/approach -The study reports the results of mediation analyses conducted on the basis of survey data from 307 firms. Findings -The economic benefits of both inbound and outbound OI are fully captured only if firms provide employees with time, freedom and independence. The results show that employee autonomy fully mediates the relationship between openness and innovation sales, while the adoption of inbound OI is positively associated with the introduction of new products. Practical implications -The opening of innovation induces managers to provide employees with discretion, as OI requires high levels of flexibility and experimentation. Originality/value -The paper addresses theoretically and empirically the role of job design in the implementation of OI, while also distinguishing between the effects of inbound and outbound practices on innovation performance.

The interaction between product innovation and companies' activities aimed at improving the energy efficiency of production facilities has been relatively little studied, but is of great relevance to society and companies given the strong focus of governments on grand challenges like climate change, green innovation technologies, and environmental problems in general. This paper utilizes the 2009 European Manufacturing Survey for the Danish subsample including 335 manufacturing firms. Through factor analysis, this paper confirms three main areas of focus of new product development: efficiency considerations, market attention, and greening of innovation. Logistic regression analysis demonstrates that while market attention is important for the development of new products, green aspects of innovation and efficiency considerations are important for production companies wanting to improve their energy efficiency. When these models are combined, the results highlight that energy efficiency moderates the effect of market attention to new product development. This paper therefore finds that aligning product innovation and energy efficiency is a complex and intertwined processfocusing on one may have indirect detrimental effects on the other. These results point to the conclusion that researchers and practitioners in innovation management have to consider more carefully the specificities and interactions of different types of products and process innovations and their environmental implications, and must formulate new, more sustainable managerial practices combining energy efficiency and product innovation.