Information styles of marketing and R&D personnel during technological product innovation projects

Abstract The research question in the present article can be phrased in the following way: what are the elements which influence the perception of the utility of information received from another function? A field study research has been conducted in 40 Belgian companies. In each company, we have studied two on-going innovation projects (one planning project, one development project). Crossfunctional communication behaviours at the R&D/marketing interface have been measured by means of mailed structured questionnaires. Three-hundred and eighty-six questionnaires have been returned. The data analyses show that there are four underlying information dimensions, i.e. the perceived relevance, the perceived comprehensibility, the perceived novelty and the perceived credibility of information. We also discuss some contingency variables (function of the message receiver, stage in the innovation process) that might moderate the impact of these dimensions. It will be shown that the interaction between source and receiver has a significant impact on the perceived credibility, the perceived comprehensibility and the perceived novelty of the received information.     

浅谈大型建设工程施工总平面设计

简单介绍了关于大型建设工程施工总平面设计的国内外研究现状。根据大型建设工程施工总平面的概念及特点,将其看作一个系统,采用系统工程学理论和价值工程学原理,结合专家评分法,对大型建设工程施工总平面设计方法进行了分析。以安徽凤台电厂一期工程为例,并进行了实例分析,证明了所提出的大型建设工程施工总平面设计方法是比较系统而合理的,具有一定的可操作性,可以应用于大型建设工程施工。     

Change and persistence with failed technological innovation

Organizations learn by reinforcing past actions. When firms experience actions with negative outcomes, they change in response. Any persistence with such actions is said to be suboptimal, attributable to factors such as threat rigidities. This paper theorizes that persistence may sometimes be rational, attributable to the characteristics of feedback. It uses a novel dataset of medical devices to show how organizations learn to search for future novel or incremental innovations based on failure. It finds that firms change innovation activities when novel innovations fail, but persist when incremental innovations fail. These findings support the hypothesis that inferences based on failure from incremental innovations tend to be more robust, leading firms to be more willing to persist when failure occurs. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

面临入世挑战与机遇的企业技术创新工作

1挑战与机遇加入世贸后,我国建筑企业必将面临生存和发展的严峻挑战。它严峻地考验我国建筑企业的竞争能力,促使企业不得不进行组织结构调整,以及技术创新、制度创新等。但是,这并不意味企业只能被动挨打,坐以待毙,而是挑战与机遇同在,入世也将给我国企业提供难得的二次创业良机。入世后我们企业将可以充分利用世界建筑业技术创新快,管理水平高的机遇,加速提高自己企业的技术创新能力和管理水平。据资料显示,我国企业与国外大承包商在技术创新上的差距很大,我国最好企业科技进步效益率达6%左右,而国外大承包商科技进步效益率大…     

水利工程基本建设项目质量控制工作探讨

水利工程基本建设最根本的着眼点是兴利除害,造福社会,保障社会稳定和经济发展,其建设质量关系到国民经济健康发展和人民生命财产安全。要求参与工程建设各单位都应牢记“百年人大计,质量第一,质量是生命,质量是灵魂,质量重于泰山”这一工程建设主题与主导思想。切实把工程质量当作首要工作任务来抓,要依法照章进行规范化、法制化、科学化质量控制与管理。1概述在当前国家大幅度增加水利工程基本建设投资,高标准建设大江、大河与湖泊和大中型城市防洪体系的形势下,严格工程质量监督管理,确保工程建设质量,显得特别重要与迫切。质量是安全、…     

从优快钻完井到技术创新和管理创新

面对当前低油价形势和长期能源发展趋势,石油上游企业需要有效管控成本,提高油气开发综合效益.钻完井投资占中国海上油气勘探开发生产投资的40％～50％,是企业管控成本、提高资产收益的关键一环.中国海油在钻完井技术管理领域经过不断探索和实践,逐步建立、丰富和完善了优快钻完井技术管理体系,探索创新构建了精准钻完井技术体系,并在建立甲乙方新型商业合作关系方面进行了有益探索,从而有助于甲乙双方应对低油价挑战,共同度过行业严冬,最终实现油公司和服务公司的合作共赢.     

建筑施工项目HSE管理体系建设研究

近年来职业健康、环境和安全问题越来越引起人们的重视,尤其是如何才能为建筑业从业人员提供健康环境安全保障,更成为建筑行业迫切需要解决的难题。文章提出了通过构建广义的HSE管理体系,包括完善的管理组织机构和对应的责任制度、广泛的监督机制和有效的激励制度的方式来保障建筑行业从业人员的健康、环境与安全。探讨了企业HSE管理流程,建议建立业主负主要责任的安全责任体制。     

中国润滑油行业技术创新探析

近年来,国际石油公司加大了润滑油产品的技术升级换代力度,对世界润滑油行业的影响越来越大。面对强大的竞争压力,我国润滑油企业应加大技术创新力度,实现技术强企。我国润滑油企业主要通过模仿创新、合作创新、自主创新三种主要途径来提高技术整合能力。技术引进除考虑技术的先进性外,应更加注重技术的适用性。成功的技术引进遵循引进→消化吸收→再创新的过程。引进技术的二次创新存在一定的风险,应通过二次创新尽快形成具有自主知识产权的专有技术和核心产品。     

The ambidextrous patterns for managing technological and marketing innovation

Built upon organizational ambidexterity theory, this study provides a new perspective in managing technological and marketing innovation. It distinguishes between simultaneous and sequential patterns of innovation within a firm and takes a longitudinal approach in examining the differential effects of these two ambidextrous patterns of innovation on firm performance. Further, this study investigates the contingent roles of internal product scope and external market dynamism on the above relationships. Using panel data from 158 U.S. firms over 26 years, we find that both simultaneous and sequential patterns are positively associated with firm performance. Further, our findings indicate that a broader product scope strengthens the effect of the simultaneous pattern on firm performance, while weakening that of the sequential pattern on firm performance. When market dynamism increases, the effect of the simultaneous pattern on firm performance is strengthened, while that of the sequential pattern is weakened. Our findings offer managers guidance on the choice of innovation patterns under certain contingencies and how to better manage technological and marketing innovation over time.     

Partner technological heterogeneity and innovation performance of R&D alliances

This study investigates the impacts of partner technology heterogeneity on innovation performance of alliance firms both in terms of R&D output and the enhancement of partners’ innovation capability. We apply a generalized semi-parametric model on a questionnaire survey result of 413 High and New Technology Enterprises in China. In order to ensure the robustness and practicability of our result, PCA is applied to extract comprehensive information and SiZer analysis is employed to test the linearity and significance of the nonparametric functions in the model. Our results indicate that collaborations between partners with different industry technologies exert inversed U-shaped R&D output pattern and affect very little the innovation ability of focal firms. The impact of industry domain divergence is no longer significant when partner technology heterogeneity is added in the model of analysis. Partner technology heterogeneity leads to an ascending S-shaped R&D output pattern and contributes positively to innovation capabilities. One of the implications of our findings is that when choosing R&D alliance partners, firms are better off avoiding candidates from a different industry domain but opt for potential collaborators who are in the same industry but in the different technical domain, which may facilitate more effective organizational learning. Further, we argue that the reasons behind the S-shaped R&D output pattern led by technology heterogeneity being the co-existence of competition and cooperation between partners where firms collaborate in value-creation by combining diverse resources and compete for acquiring partner’s distinct technology and resources. Therefore, we suggest that, for the sustainability of collaborative innovation outcome, both cooperation and competition amongst alliance partners should be encouraged and well balanced at different stages of joint R&D projects.     

道路工程水泥混凝土外加剂施工技术

本文主要对常用的路面工程混凝土外加剂品种、适用范围及其在公路水泥混凝土路面工程中的施工应用技术进行了综述。并指出了在应用过程中的一些注意事项和要点。     

建设项目风险效率的评价

文章提出了对建设项目风险效率进行分析与评价的方法。解释了风险效率的概念,并基于风险投入和风险效应两个维度详细阐述了建设项目风险效率的内涵。结合风险管理的全过程以及风险效率的两个维度,分析了建设项目风险效率的形成机理,并对风险投入和风险效应的内容和量化思路做了进一步的分析。通过对管理学及经济学中效率评价的一般方法的分析,提出了对建设项目风险效率进行评价的方法,以期能基于风险效率提供更好的建设项目风险管理。     

The logic of innovation in construction

The paper investigates the logic of innovation in construction by addressing four questions: What is actually being renewed in construction? How is it being done? Who is involved? and Why do or do not the companies innovate? The paper draws on a combination of an industrial network perspective and the exploration–exploitation dichotomy to analyze data from a study of innovation in the Norwegian and Swedish construction industries. The findings show that construction companies are increasingly working more systematically to turn project-level ideas into company-wide knowledge. This indicates an innovation logic that is oriented towards exploitation of new combinations through the internal network. The companies are also increasingly concerned with establishing closer connections to customers and users, which have traditionally been weak. This has led to an orientation towards exploitation through the external network, at least on the customer side. In turn, this may lead to more innovative behavior and renewal in the industry as a whole. However, it requires that not only the customer relationships, but also the relationships on the supply side must change. Companies in the construction industry should be conscious about their innovation logic, in terms of whether they base their innovation behavior on a biased orientation towards exploitation or exploration or towards the internal or external network. A balance is needed.     

Determinants of technological innovation in the small firms of Korea

This study identifies the factors determining technological innovations in the small firms in Korea. Two groups of 24 innovative and 25 noninnovative small firms are compared on four categories of variables: environmental, strategic, structural, and top management characteristics, which were found to be important determinants of technological innovation in prior research in developed countries. A multiple discriminant analysis reveals that two top managerial characteristics (risk-taking propensity and tolerance for ambiguity), environmental heterogeneity, environmental scanning strategy, and professionalization of organizational structure are the most significant factors discriminating innovative from noninnovative small firms in Korea. The findings suggest that predominant determinants of technological innovation vary according to the types of organization and, in the case of small firms, managerial attitudes toward innovation is the most critical factor. Other strategic and policy implications for the management of innovation in the small firm context are discussed.     

The diffusion of technological innovation in the commercial banking industry

This paper examines the propensity of organizations to adopt technological innovations. Technological innovations evolve from the stock of skills which organizations have accumulated over time. Linkages with extramural sources of technology are presumed to be important as well. Hypotheses are tested on a sample of commercial banks. Findings show that prior experience in information technology, in tandem with a variety of interfirm linkages, will affect the banks' decision to adopt this innovation.     

Toward an optimal degree of openness in IT innovation projects

In spite of substantial interest in open innovation (OI), both research and practice lack methods that support companies in managing their IT innovation projects (ITIPs) relative to OI. We contribute to the closure of this gap by providing an approach for an ex ante financial evaluation of OI application, which involves developing a theoretical model that determines the optimal degree of openness in ITIPs. Based on our model, we examine relevant causal relationships by analyzing the influence of a company's ability to manage OI and the probability of success in OI application on the theoretical optimum. We find that the optimal openness level is linked with the company's ability to manage OI, which can incorporate organizational, cultural, and technological maturity. To increase the value contribution of OI, companies should focus on a steady improvement in managing OI. The results provide both an indicator for practical decision‐making and a starting point for future research.     

Opening and closing open innovation projects: A contractual perspective

In this article we introduce three concepts from transaction cost economics that have so far remained excluded from the open innovation literature, and that enable us to address the demands in the literature for an explanatory mechanism for closing open innovation: unanticipated disturbances, tolerance zone and interpretations of contracts. First, we argue that threats resulting from unanticipated disturbances are absorbed in a tolerance zone and lead to adaptations in knowledge sharing. Second, we argue that these threats and changes in knowledge sharing at the project level impact the interpretation of the open innovation contract at the firm level. Adopting a contractual perspective, the article contributes to the open innovation literature by explaining the tolerance zone of transitioning between closed and open innovation. We illustrate in a case study on a B2B open innovation project how a threat to value creation leads to a continuation of open innovation, whereas a threat to value capture leads to a closing of open innovation.     

Information leakage in innovation outsourcing

This paper studies an R&D outsourcing contract between a firm and a contractor, considering the possibility that in the interim stage, the contractor might sell the innovation to a rival firm. Our result points out that due to the competition in the interim stage, the reward needed to prevent leakage will be pushed up to the extent that a profitable leakage-free contract does not exist. This result will also apply to cases considering revenue-sharing schemes and a disclosure punishment for commercial theft. Then, we demonstrate that in a competitive mechanism where the R&D firm hires two contractors together with a relative performance scheme, the disclosure punishment might help and there exists a perfect Bayesian Nash equilibrium where the probability of information leakage is lower and the equilibrium reward is also cheaper than hiring one contractor.