Hypotheses, Managerial insights and
implications per article
Week 2: Creativity
Gong, Y., Kim, T-Y., Lee, D-R., and Zhu, J. (2013) A Multilevel Model of
Team Goal Orientation, Information Exchange, and Creativity
This paper examines how team goal orientation may relate to team and individual creativity
Key takeaway:
Team creativity is determined by team information exchange (TIX), which is determined
by team goal orientation. Shared team performance approach goal leads to shared goals,
member outcome interdependence, and wish for positive joint outcome. TIX leads to exposure
to diverse ideas that may enhance divergent thinking, and that is conducive to creativity.
This higher TIX, but TIX is influenced by trust relationships with team leaders. Low trust
relationship is good for TIX since high trust leads to vulnerability and perceived low/no
consequences of not performing. TIX leads to employees improving their own competences and
bringing different bodies of knowledge, which is referred to as competence creation.
The creative acts (social cues) of individual team members direct attention of other
members to the creative aspect of their work and the importance of creativity, which leads to a
shared perception of norms/expectations of creativity, which in turn leads to a supportive climate
for creativity. With this supportive climate, members are better able to build on and interrelate to
each other's creative ideas. Individuals inputs will combine and integrate to determine team
creativity (so bottom-up influence).
How can managers influence team creativity:
- Shared performance approach goal
- Low trust relationship with team leader
- TIX so divergent thinking starts
- TIX so competence creation starts
- Create supportive climate for creativity
Herrmann, D. and Felfe, J. (2014) Effects of Leadership Style, Creativity
Technique and Personal Initiative on Employee Creativity.
This paper examines the influence of leadership styles and creativity techniques on employee
creativity.
Key take-away:
Leadership style has an impact on employee creativity. Transactional leadership
emphasized that leaders rely on rewards and punishments to achieve optimal job performance
from their subordinates (example: Louis van Gaal) and is good for quantitative creativity, while
,transformational leadership encourage and stimulate their followers to develop new ideas
(example: barack obama), and is good for qualitative creativity.
Creativity techniques, the sequence of steps that a leader takes to promote creativity,
also have an effect on quality/quantity of creativity. There are 3 techniques; associative,
confrontative and provocate techniques, of which associative is related to brainwriting which is
good for quantitative creativity, and provocation (disrupting the usual thought patterns and
encouraging thinking outside of the box) is good for qualitative creativity. The effect of creativity
technique on qualitative creativity is higher in transactional leadership, since the difference is the
biggest there.
An effective leadership style is not as effective as an effective creativity technique, since
leadership style only facilitates the change in perspective, while creativity technique tells you
exactly how to come up with creative ideas. So, transformational leadership excel with
provocation and qualitative creativity, while transactional leadership excel with brainwriting and
quantitative creativity. Furthermore, Provocation technique acts as a substitute for leadership
style as it provides clear and structured guidance for how to develop new ideas. Personal
initiative predicts both quantitative and qualitative creativity.
Hypotheses + rationals
1) Qualitative creativity will be higher in the transformational leadership than in the
transactional leadership
a) Transformational leadership creates an environment that encourages
unconventional thinking, routine ideas are not welcome, and therefore focus on
quality
2) Quantitative creativity will be higher in the transactional leadership than in the
transformational leadership
a) To foster quantity it is important to set and clarify goals and expectations,
evaluate and feedback and coaching, which all is the case in transactional
leadership
3) Qualitative creativity will be higher in the provocation condition than the brainwriting
condition
a) Provocations helps overcome mental fixation which stimulates quality
4) Quantitative creativity will be higher in brainwriting condition than provocation condition
a) Brainwriters have more time to generate ideas and encourages to create as
many ideas as possible
5) The effect of creativity techniques on qualitative creativity will be higher in transactional
leadership than in transformational
a) Since their is more impact (transformational is already creativity stimulating)
6) Personal initiative predict both quantitative and qualitative creativity
7) An effective leadership style is not as effective as an effective creativity technique
a) Provocation technique tells exactly how to come up with new and useful ideas,
while leadership style only facilitates the change in perspective
8) Transactional leadership excel with brainwriting and quantitative creativity
9) Transformational leadership excel with provocation and qualitative creativity
, 10) Provocation technique act as substitute for leadership style as it provides clear and
structured guidance for how to develop new ideas
Perry-Smith, J. E. and Mannucci, P. V. (2017) From Creativity to Innovation:
The Social Network Drivers of the Four Phases of the Idea Journey.
Key-takeaway:
The idea journey contains 4 phases (idea generation, idea elaboration, idea
championing and idea implementation), which all have different needs and facilitators.
The idea generation phase is the phase in which different creative ideas are generated
and the most promising one is selected. In this phase there is the need for cognitive flexibility, to
successfully recombine previous into new knowledge. This phase is facilitated by access to
many weak ties, since weak ties provide access to content that differs from what the creator
already knows because weak ties tend to be non-redundant.
The idea elaboration phase is the phase in which the creator evaluates the novel ideas
potential and further clarifies and develops it. In this phase there is the need for support,
emotional support and constructive feedback. This phase is facilitated by access to a few (½)
strong ties, since strong ties contain trust and trust helps sharing unique ideas. A safe
environment leads to emotional and motivation benefits.
The idea championing phase is the phase in which the creator promotes the novel idea
(green light) and gets the resources and political cover to implement the idea. In this phase
there is the need for influence and legitimacy, and it is facilitated by structural holes. Structure
hole is a gap between 2 individuals who have complementary sources to information. Spanning
structural holes provides knowledge advantage to gather support via lending/direct knowledge.
The idea implementation phase is about converting the idea into tangible outcome. This
phase consists of 2 subphases: production and impact. In this phase there is the need for a
shared vision and understanding. This phase is facilitated by structural closure. Dense networks
create cohesion and social norms and facilitate the production of ideas, and access to a few
outside ties has greatest impact on production
Week 3: Sources of Innovation
Bradonjic, P., Franke, N., and Lüthje, C. (2019). Decision-makers’
Underestimation of User Innovation.
Key-takeaway:
“A realistic perception of the sources of innovation is important as it constitutes the basis
for a rational allocation of resources and thus indirectly impacts the innovation performance of
companies and societies at large”.
Nowadays, users are underestimated as innovators. Causes of this underestimation are
that 1) decision-makers lack direct contact with user innovators, 2) commercialized user
innovations are rarely labeled as such, and 3) transfer media underreports them. Consequences
of this underestimation are that 1) decision-makers overlook information on user innovation
because prior knowledge blinds their attention, 2) decision-makers ignore and misinterpret them