Coordinated Exploration for Grand Challenges: The Role of Advocacy Groups in Search Consortia

Olsen, Anders Ørding; Sofka, Wolfgang; Grimpe, Christoph

doi:10.5465/amj.2015.0730

Cited by 80 publications

(98 citation statements)

References 71 publications

(115 reference statements)

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“…Kogut and Zander 1992;Hargadon and Sutton 1997;Katila and Ahuja 2002;Fleming and Sorenson 2004;Laursen and Salter 2006; see Laursen 2012, for an overview). Prior studies have primarily looked at either a single source of knowledge for innovation or considered external linkages to be a homogenous source (for exceptions see Cassiman and Veugelers 2006;Cassiman and Valentini 2016;Grimpe and Sofka 2016;Olsen, Sofka, and Grimpe 2016). Little empirical research on combinatorial searches across organisational borders has distinguished between multiple sources and investigated the combinations that are more likely to precipitate innovation.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 97%

Winning combinations: search strategies and innovativeness in the UK

Criscuolo

Laursen

Reichstein

et al. 2017

Industry and Innovation

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Searching for the most rewarding sources of innovative ideas remains a key challenge in management of technological innovation. Yet, little is known about which combinations of internal and external knowledge sources are triggers for innovation. Extending theories about searching for innovation, we examine the effectiveness of different combinations of knowledge sources for achieving innovative performance. We suggest that combinations involving integrative search strategies – combining internal and external knowledge – are the most likely to generate product and process innovation. In this context, we present the idea that cognitively distant knowledge sources are helpful for innovation only when used in conjunction with knowledge sources that are closer to the focal firm. We also find important differences between product and process innovation, with the former associated with broader searches than the latter. Using a large-scale pooled sample of UK firms, we find overall support for our conjectures, particularly in terms of product innovation

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 97%

Winning combinations: search strategies and innovativeness in the UK

Criscuolo

Laursen

Reichstein

et al. 2017

Industry and Innovation

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show abstract

“…When NGO employees enter into our business environment, there is another power behind it.Second, individuals with advocacy group work experience can help identify legitimate solutions to innovation problems in the sense that they are acceptable to relevant stakeholders and fulfill responsibilities. Advocacy groups—in their role as stakeholder representatives—have been ascribed legitimacy (Olsen et al, ), defined as “a generalized perception or assumption that the actions of an entity are desirable, proper, or appropriate within some socially constructed system of norms, values, beliefs, and definitions” (Suchman, , p. 574). Former employees of advocacy groups can transfer such legitimacy to innovative firms so that it can rub off (Baum & Oliver, ; Bitektine, ).…”

Section: Theory and Hypothesesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…A major element of the diffusion of innovation is the social system in which customers decide or decline to purchase an innovation (Katz, Levin, & Hamilton, 1963). Barriers to the diffusion of innovation can stem from religious or cultural beliefs, for example, on food products or contraceptives (Rogers, 1995), or social stigmas preventing, for example, patients from adopting new treatments (Olsen et al, 2016).…”

Section: Advocacy Group Work Experience and Its Value For Innovativmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In this article, we focus on advocacy groups as an organizational context in which individuals acquire knowledge and develop unique skills, abilities, and experiences (henceforth referred to as human capital) (Molloy & Ployhart, 2012) when they interact with stakeholders. 1 Advocacy groups represent and organize stakeholders while accumulating stakeholder knowledge, interests, and concerns (Clarkson, 1995;Olsen, Sofka, & Grimpe, 2016). They can alter organizational behavior (Eesley & Lenox, 2006;Frooman, 1999) as their salience to organizations increases (Mitchell, Agle, & Wood, 1997).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Second, the literature on stakeholder interaction with firms has largely focused on collaborations and partnerships (e.g., Harrison & St. John, 1996;Olsen et al, 2016). Few links exist between stakeholder interaction and the creation of human capital (exceptions include Madsen & Bingham, 2014).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 2 more Smart Citations

Signaling valuable human capital: Advocacy group work experience and its effect on employee pay in innovative firms

Grimpe

Kaiser

Sofka

2018

Strategic Management Journal

Self Cite

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Research Summary: The ability of innovative firms to create and capture value depends on innovations that are quickly and widely adopted. Yet, stakeholder concerns can establish important barriers to diffusion. We study the human capital aspect of this challenge and investigate whether innovative firms pay salary premiums to new hires with work experience from advocacy groups like Transparency International. We integrate strategic human capital with stakeholder theory and suggest that advocacy group experience creates signals for valuable human capital in terms of stakeholder knowledge and legitimacy transfers to innovative firms. Using matched data for 3,562 employees in Denmark, we find that new hires with advocacy group experience enjoy larger salary premiums at technologically leading firms, in occupations with direct stakeholder interaction, and for advocacy group top management. Managerial Summary: Innovation research is increasingly aware of the non‐technological factors behind successful innovations. Users, regulators, or public opinion can be benevolent supporters or stingy opponents of innovations. Employees with an understanding of the needs and sensitivities of societal stakeholders should therefore be valuable to innovative firms. We find this to be the case when innovative firms hire employees from advocacy groups representing such stakeholders (e.g., Transparency International). Such employees receive higher salaries than an otherwise comparable reference group. These findings indicate that recruiting needs of innovative firms reward stakeholder experience, not merely technological expertise. They demonstrate how firms can create value in the pursuit of the public interest. Further, advocacy groups emerge as an important career stage allowing individuals to develop credible signals for stakeholder expertise.

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Joining multi‐stakeholder initiatives to fight climate change: The environmental impact of corporate participation in the Science Based Targets initiative

Romito,

Vurro,

Pogutz

2023

Bus Strat Env

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This study theorizes and empirically tests whether firms' decisions to join multi‐stakeholder initiatives, targeting climate mitigation, lead to improved environmental performance. We focus on firms' participations in the Science Based Targets initiative, a multi‐stakeholder initiative meant to support firms in setting greenhouse gas (GHG) emission reduction targets in line with the thresholds defined by the Paris Agreement in 2015. The study hypothesizes that participation reduces firm's concerns about uncertainty and encourages investments in timeous internal climate change activities. We used the coarsened exact matching methodology to create a matched sample of European and North American listed firms participating in the initiative and comparable, non‐participating firms over a 3‐year period from 2015 to 2017. The results showed that firms' participation led to lower levels of GHG emissions compared to similar non‐participating counterparts, especially when they committed to the initiative with the intention to follow the proposed indications.

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Coordinated Exploration for Grand Challenges: The Role of Advocacy Groups in Search Consortia

Cited by 80 publications

References 71 publications

Winning combinations: search strategies and innovativeness in the UK

Winning combinations: search strategies and innovativeness in the UK

Signaling valuable human capital: Advocacy group work experience and its effect on employee pay in innovative firms

Joining multi‐stakeholder initiatives to fight climate change: The environmental impact of corporate participation in the Science Based Targets initiative

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