New Product Development Practices and Early‐Stage Firms: Two In‐Depth Case Studies

New product development practices (NPD) have been well studied for decades in large, established companies. Implementation of best practices such as predevelopment market planning and cross‐functional teams have been positively correlated with product and project success over a variety of measures. However, for small new ventures, field research into ground‐level adoption of NPD practices is lacking. Because of the risks associated with missteps in new product development and the potential for firm failure, understanding NPD within the new venture context is critical. Through in‐depth case research, this paper investigates two successful physical product‐based early‐stage firms' development processes versus large established firm norms. The research focuses on the start‐up adoption of commonly prescribed management processes to improve NPD, such as cross‐functional teams, use of market planning during innovation development, and the use of structured processes to guide the development team. This research has several theoretical implications. The first finding is that in comparing the innovation processes of these firms to large, established firms, the study found several key differences from the large firm paradigm. These differences in development approach from what is prescribed for large, established firms are driven by necessity from a scarcity of resources. These new firms simply did not have the resources (financial or human) to create multi‐ or cross‐functional teams or organizations in the traditional sense for their first product. Use of virtual resources was pervasive. Founders also played multiple roles concurrently in the organization, as opposed to relying on functional departments so common in large firms. The NPD process used by both firms was informal—much more skeletal than commonly recommended structured processes. The data indicated that these firms put less focus on managing the process and more emphasis on managing their goals (the main driver being getting the first product to market). In addition to little or no written procedures being used, development meetings did not run to specific paper‐based deliverables or defined steps. In terms of market and user insight, these activities were primarily performed inside the core team—using methods that again were distinctive in their approach. What drove a project to completion was relying on team experience or a “learn as you go approach.” Again, the driver for this type of truncated market research approach was a lack of resources and need to increase the project's speed‐to‐market. Both firms in our study were highly successful, from not only an NPD efficiency standpoint but also effectiveness. The second broad finding we draw from this work is that there are lessons to be learned from start‐ups for large, established firms seeking ever‐increasing efficiency. We have found that small empowered teams leading projects substantial in scope can be extremely effective when roles are expanded, decision power is ground‐level, and there is little emphasis on defined processes. This exploratory research highlights the unique aspects of NPD within small early‐stage firms, and highlights areas of further research and management implications for both small new ventures and large established firms seeking to increase NPD efficiency and effectiveness.     

Other voices,other rooms: differentiating social identity development in organisational and Pro‐Am virtual teams

This paper advocates a social identity approach as a way to overcome the normative limitations of existing virtual team identity research. We also explore how social identity understandings of virtual team identity could benefit from incorporating comparisons between organisational and professional amateur virtual teams; and a focus on technologically mediated dialogues.     

How middle managers' group‐focus emotions and social identities influence strategy implementation

The literature on top‐down strategy implementation has overlooked social‐emotional factors. The results of a three‐year field study of a large technology firm show how top executives who favor an affect neutral task approach can inadvertently activate middle managers' organization‐related social identities, such as length of time working for the company (newcomers versus veterans) and language spoken by senior executives (English versus French), generating group‐focus emotions. These emotions prompt middle managers—even those elevated to powerful positions by top executives—to support or covertly dismiss a particular strategic initiative even when their immediate personal interests are not directly under threat. This study contributes to the strategy implementation literature by linking senior executives' actions and middle managers' social identities, group‐focus emotions, and resulting behaviors to strategy implementation outcomes. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Procedural Justice Climate in New Product Development Teams: Antecedents and Consequences

With the increasing interest in the concept of justice in the group behavior literature, the procedural justice (PJ) climate attracts many researchers and practitioners from different fields. Nevertheless, the PJ climate is rarely addressed in the new product development (NPD) project team literature. Specifically, the technology and innovation management (TIM) literature provides little about what the PJ climate is, its nature and benefits, and how it works in NPD project teams. Also, few studies investigate the antecedents and consequences of the PJ climate in NPD teams enhancing the understanding of this concept from a practical perspective. This paper discusses the PJ climate theory in a NPD team context and empirically demonstrates how team members' positive collective perceptions of a PJ climate can be developed and how a PJ climate influences a project's performance in NPD teams. In particular, team culture values including employee orientation, customer orientation, systematic management control, innovativeness, and social responsibility were investigated as antecedents, and team learning, speed to market, and market success of new products were studied as outcomes of PJ climate in this paper. By studying 83 NPD project teams it was found on the basis of using partial least squares (PLS) method that (1) the level of employee, customer and innovativeness orientation as well as systematic management control during the project had a positive impact on developing a PJ climate in an NPD team; (2) a PJ climate positively affects team learning and product development time (i.e., speed to market); and (3) team learning and speed to market mediate the relations between the PJ climate and new product success (NPS). Based on the findings, this paper suggests that managers should enhance the PJ climate and team culture in the project team to enhance team learning and to develop products faster. In particular, managers should (1) open a discussion forum among people and create a dialogue for people who disagree with the other project team members rather than dictating or emposing others ideas to them, (2) facilitate information searching and collecting mechanisms to make decisions effectively and to clarify uncertainties, and (3) allow team members to challange project‐related ideas and decisions and modify them with consensus. Also, to enhance the PJ climate during the project, managers should (1) respect and listen to all team members' ideas and try to understand why they are sometimes in opposition, (2) define team members' task boundaries and clarify project norms and project goals, and (3) set knowledge‐questioning values by facilitating team members to try out new ideas and seek out new ways to do things.     

Can You Hear Me Now? Communication in Virtual Product Development Teams*

Globalization and technological advances are driving organizations to extend the boundaries of new product development (NPD) teams from traditional colocated settings to dispersed or virtual settings. Virtual NPD teams have a wide array of information and communication technologies (ICTs) at their disposal. ICTs allow team members to communicate and collaborate as they cope with the opportunities and challenges of cross‐boundary work. The purpose of this paper is to explore ICT use by members of virtual NPD teams. This study presents an exploratory test and integration of two competing perspectives of media use in virtual teams: media capacity theories and social dynamic media theories. Specifically, this paper examines the role of task type, organizational context, and ICT type as critical contingency variables affecting ICT use. It also examines how different patterns of ICT use relate to individual perceptions of team performance. The findings from this study of 184 members of virtual NPD teams in three global firms suggest that communication via ICTs in virtual NPD teams is contingent on a range of factors.     

An investigation of the use of global, virtual, and colocated new product development teams

This paper presents the results of an investigation of differences between global, virtual and colocated new product development (NPD) teams. Specifically, we examined whether and how these three types of teams differed in terms of usage, challenges, and performance. A survey of PDMA members was undertaken to collect the data. Out of 103 firms participating in the survey, 54 had used or were using global teams for some of their NPD efforts. Overall, we found that the use of global teams in our respondent firms is rapidly increasing. Our respondents indicated that by the year 2001, approximately one out of every five NPD teams in their companies are likely to be global. However, our respondents also expect that their companies will be using multiple types of teams that is, global, virtual, and colocated, to develop their new products. Our findings also suggest that global teams generally face greater behavioral and project management challenges than either colocated or virtual teams. Global team performance is also lower than the performance of virtual or colocated teams. Are these challenges associated with poorer performance? In examining this question, our results suggest that greater project management challenges are associated with lower performance, for all three types of teams. Surprisingly, behavioral challenges were not associated with performance for any team type. Our results suggest that firms face different problems associated with managing each type of NPD team—global, virtual and colocated. To effectively manage each type of team may, in turn, require that companies and their managers employ different solutions to these different problems. Additionally, companies may find that the preparation they provide to their managers and team members to work in these different team environments may also need to be different. Further research is clearly needed to address these managerial implications.     

Top Management Compositional Effects on Corporate Entrepreneurship: The Moderating Role of Perceived Technological Uncertainty

Because corporate entrepreneurship (CE) is central to firms' ability to compete, adapt, and perform in increasingly turbulent environments, there is a great interest in understanding its origins. To date, prior studies have overwhelmingly focused on the architectural factors—the structures, cultures, resources, and incentives—that shape entrepreneurial processes within organizations and the environmental conditions that stimulate entrepreneurial activity. However, some researchers have recently begun to argue that the requirements and challenges of CE fall most saliently on the shoulders of the firm's top management team. Focusing on various aspects of top managers' activities, roles, and processes, this line of research demonstrates the enabling role of top management teams in their firm's pursuit of CE. We extend this research by examining the impact of top management team composition in terms of human capital and social capital on CE. Additionally, because external environment perceptions within top teams shape their sociopolitical process and framing of the issues facing their firms, we submit that a team's level of perceived technological uncertainty moderates the impact of the team's human and social capital on CE. We find support for these arguments using multisource data from a sample of 99 high‐technology firms. The discussion finally traces the implications of our theory and findings for research and managerial understanding on CE.     

Innovation Performance in New Product Development Teams in China's Technology Ventures: The Role of Behavioral Integration Dimensions and Collective Efficacy

In emerging markets, technology ventures increasingly rely on new product development (NPD) teams to generate creative ideas and to mold these innovative ideas into streams of new products or services. However, little is known about how behavioral integration (a behavioral team process) and collective efficacy (a motivational team process) jointly facilitate or inhibit team innovation performance in emerging markets—especially in China, the world's largest emerging‐market setting with collectivist and high power distance cultures. Drawing on social cognitive theory and behavioral integration research, this article elucidates the relationships between behavioral integration dimensions (i.e., collaborative behavior, information exchange, and joint decision‐making) and innovation performance and also examines how collective efficacy moderates these relationships in China's NPD teams. Results from a sample of 96 NPD teams in China's technology ventures reveal that information exchange is positively associated with innovation performance. Collaborative behavior positively but marginally influences innovation performance, whereas joint decision‐making does not relate to innovation performance. Moreover, collective efficacy demonstrates an important moderating role. Specifically, both collaborative behavior and joint decision‐making are more positively associated with innovation performance when collective efficacy is higher. In contrast, information exchange is less positively associated with innovation performance when collective efficacy is higher. This study makes important theoretical contributions to the literature on team innovation and behavioral integration in emerging markets by offering a better understanding of how behavioral and motivational team processes jointly shape innovation performance in China's NPD teams. This study also extends social cognitive theory by identifying collective efficacy as a boundary condition for the overall effectiveness of behavioral integration dimensions. In particular, this study highlights the condition under which behavioral integration dimensions facilitate or inhibit NPD team innovation performance in China.     

Vertical and Horizontal Cross‐Ties: Benefits of Cross‐Hierarchy and Cross‐Unit Ties for Innovative Projects

Social networks are an important driver for successful innovation, both at the individual level as well as the organizational level. Recent research has also shaped that networks within teams can enhance performance. Innovative project teams are embedded in an organizational context, however, and teams typically consist of people with expertise from diverse backgrounds, and from different units. Team members may have ties to other teams, business units, and hierarchical levels. Although it seems clear that such ties can influence team performance, remarkably little research has focused on what is here referred to as vertical and horizontal cross‐ties. Previous research may have ignored the possibility that vertical and horizontal bridging ties may have different performance outcomes. Although the literature suggests that diversity of input, or horizontal cross‐unit ties will benefit team performance and innovativeness, there is reason to believe that ties to higher levels in the organization might have an effect on project team performance and innovativeness too. This article in particular studies the role of vertical cross‐hierarchy ties. In an exploratory analysis combining quantitative and qualitative results, it is distinguished between horizontal cross‐unit and vertical cross‐hierarchy ties and their contribution to new business development (NBD) project performance, thereby making a substantial contribution to both academic literature and managerial practice. Our study is based on a multiple case‐study approach of several NBD project teams in a large European financial service provider. Our results show that successful innovation project teams are characterized by a large number of cross‐unit ties in combination with a large number of cross‐hierarchical ties compared with less successful project teams. Additionally, proof is found that vertical cross‐hierarchy ties should be concentrated rather than scattered across project members.     

Who Knows What in NPD Teams: Communication Context,Mode, and Task Contingencies

The use of cross‐functional teams in new product development (NPD) benefits firms in many ways. One benefit is the diverse knowledge team members bring to the project, but that benefit can only be appreciated if team members fully utilize and integrate the differentiated expertise of members. As reliance on cross‐functional NPD teams grows, however, firms struggle to exploit the full potential of functionally diverse groups, the biggest obstacle being integrating team members' varied knowledge, expertise, and abilities. Therefore, understanding how information is integrated and used is a primary concern for both practitioners and researchers. Databases and other forms of hard data are methods team members can use to effectively share and integrate knowledge; another method based on social cognition is transactive memory systems (TMS). TMS indicates who will learn what and from whom. The notion is that knowledge is distributed among people in the group, and to make effective use of it, individuals need to know who knows what and who knows who knows what. Grounded in the knowledge‐based theory of the firm, this study investigates the influence of different communication contexts and modes on TMS under different NPD task environments (i.e., exploitation and exploration) in cross‐functional NPD teams. A theoretical model is developed and empirically tested using data collected from 272 ongoing NPD teams of 128 Chinese high‐tech companies. Findings suggest that when teams face tasks defined by exploration, informal communication and face‐to‐face communication are positively associated with TMS, whereas for tasks defined by exploitation, formal communication and computer‐mediated communication are positively related with TMS. Additionally, this study found that TMS is positively related to NPD performance both in terms of project performance and in terms of market performance. Based on these findings, theoretical and managerial implications are drawn regarding resource deployment that encourages the development of effective TMS leading to successful NPD projects.     

Determinants of New Product Development Team Performance: A Meta‐analytic Review

New product development (NPD) has become a critical determinant of firm performance. There is a considerable body of research examining the factors that influence a firm's ability to successfully develop and introduce new products. Vital to this success is the creation and management of NPD teams. While the evidence for the use of NPD teams and the factors that determine their success is accumulating, there is still a lack of clarity on the team‐level variables that are most impactful on NPD success. This meta‐analytic study examines the effects of NPD team characteristics on three different measures of success: effectiveness (market success), efficiency (meeting budgets and schedules), and speed‐to‐market, requiring incorporation of a broader set of team variables than previous studies in order to capture more factors explaining NPD outcomes. Unlike a typical empirical study that considered no more than two team variables to predict NPD performance, this study combines research spanning eight team variables including team input variables (team tenure, functional diversity, team ability, and team leadership) and team process variables (internal and external team communication, group cohesiveness, and goal clarity). Results from 38 studies were aggregated to estimate the meta‐analytic effect sizes for each of the variables. Using the meta‐analytic results, a path analytic model of NPD success was estimated to isolate the unique effects of team characteristics on NPD effectiveness and efficiency. Results indicate that team leadership, team ability, external communication, goal clarity, and group cohesiveness are the critical determinants of NPD team performance. NPD teams with considerable experience and led by a transformational leader are more successful at developing new products. Effective boundary spanning within and outside the organization and a shared understanding of project objectives are paramount to success. Group cohesiveness is also an important predictor of NPD outcomes confirming the importance of esprit de corps within the team. The findings provide product development managers with a blueprint for creating high‐performance NPD teams.     

Managing technology development teams – exploring the case of microsytems and nanosystems

New sensor and actuator concepts based on microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) and nanoelectromechanical systems (NEMS) are increasingly being developed from lab status toward commercialization. The associated technology development for the provision of improved functionalities and cost reduction often requires highly interdisciplinary development teams where scientists and engineers from different disciplines closely work together. Managing these teams is a key challenge for MEMS/NEMS organizations. This research examined eight technology developments in MEMS/NEMS in international companies. Based on in‐depth interviews with innovators, we explored the managerial aspects of development teams. We identified and discuss (1) leadership, (2) market, (3) team structure and culture, (4) innovation motivation, (5) innovation driver, (6) experience and know‐how, and (7) product vision and innovation strategy as key influences on teams in the early development phases of MEMS/NEMS. Our study reveals that integrative and manufacturing know‐how and capabilities are the most critical capacities to be developed by the team from the idea to the concept phase. The team's lived experience during long development times from 5 to 10 years or more may allow a fast response to changes from market and technology (e.g. materials and nanotechnology). The results indicate that the process of how know‐how and capabilities are created by the team is more important than the mere existence of specific expertise.     

Knowledge sharing in heterogeneous teams through collaboration and cooperation: Exemplified through Public–Private-Innovation partnerships

According to literature on teams and group learning it is important for heterogeneous teams to share knowledge, through the use of different forms of interaction. However, little is known about how different forms of interaction influence knowledge sharing and secure progress during innovation processes. In order to achieve an increased understanding, literature concerning teams and group learning are integrated within a case study of Public–Private-Innovation partnerships (PPI). Specifically, the distinction between different forms of interaction, such as collaboration and cooperation is used to clarify how knowledge sharing and progress are influenced during innovation processes. Three PPI projects have been chosen due to the particularly challenging nature of their composition; consisting of heterogeneous members from both the public and private sectors with dissimilar logics. Overall, our findings point out that 1) those heterogeneous teams that are able to continually integrate their team members' heterogeneous knowledge through a balanced use of collaborative and cooperative interaction forms seem to secure progress during the innovation process, and that 2) those heterogeneous teams that are able to continually re-establish a shared knowledge base, when it has been challenged by a critical incident, seem able to achieve progress during innovation processes.     

How Teamwork Matters More as Team Member Dispersion Increases*

Product development teams become increasingly dispersed because innovative project tasks require the input of specialized knowledge at multiple locations. Prior analyses indicate that as team member dispersion increases teams find it more difficult to perform high‐quality teamwork. Moreover, the literature has largely assumed that the performance effect of teamwork in innovative projects would be driven by the nature of the project task and that this would be true regardless of the degree to which team members were co‐located. The present study argues, however, that teamwork affects team performance more strongly as team member dispersion increases. Two main reasons for this are discussed: (1) High‐quality teamwork can leverage the increased knowledge potential of dispersed teams; and (2) team leaders in more dispersed teams have little possibility to compensate low‐quality teamwork through hands‐on leadership. Responses from 575 managers, team leaders, and team members of 145 new product development (NPD) projects in the software industry were used to analyze the moderating effect of team member proximity on the relationship between teamwork quality and team performance. Using regression analysis, support is found for the initial hypothesis that team member dispersion moderates the relationship between teamwork quality and team performance, that is, that increasing team member dispersion increases the positive impact of teamwork quality on team performance. As such, the present analysis advances understanding of dispersed teams, showing that teamwork quality not only is more difficult to achieve but also is more critical to team performance as team dispersion increases. Furthermore, low‐proximity teams can reach higher levels of effectiveness and efficiency than co‐located ones if they manage to achieve high levels of teamwork over distance. Thus, team dispersion may well be an opportunity and should not just be regarded as a liability to be overcome or avoided. This research recognizes that the vast majority of teams are neither perfectly co‐located nor perfectly virtual. There are many shades of gray between these two extremes, and various individual, team, task, and contextual characteristics may have an effect on how decreases—however small—in geographical proximity affect the process and performance of teams. Future research is encouraged to address such factors at different levels of analysis aimed at providing managers with recommendations for dispersed teamwork.     

The Ethnographic Contribution to Understanding Co‐worker Relations

Relations among co‐workers are becoming both more important and more complex in modern workplaces as authority over job decisions is shifted from supervisors to quasi‐independent teams. The author develops a model of co‐worker relations that recognizes these changes and evaluates this model using data content coded from the full population of published book‐length workplace ethnographies (N = 204). Confirmatory factor analysis techniques support the existence of three distinct aspects of co‐worker relations: cohesiveness, conflict and peer supervision. The most important determinants of co‐worker relations are employee involvement programmes and management behaviour. Returning to specific case studies allows a theoretical elaboration of how employee involvement and management behaviour condition co‐worker relations. The author concludes by noting the importance of intellectual exchanges between qualitative and quantitative methods for generating new advances in the study of work and employment relations.     

Antecedents and Consequences of Creativity in Product Innovation Teams

The generation of creative ideas and their manifestation as new products (NPs) are fundamental innovation activities of product innovation teams. Despite the importance of generating creative ideas at the fuzzy front end of the product innovation process, our understanding of antecedents and consequences of creativity of product innovation teams is limited. Drawing on Shane and Ulrich's organization design perspective of innovation, this study aims at examining the intermediary role of creativity as a critical link between team dynamics and product competitive advantage. In this study, the authors focus on NP and marketing program (MP) creativity in product innovation teams. They develop and empirically test a model that examines how internal and external team dynamics influence NP and MP creativity, and how NP and MP creativity affect product competitive advantage as a strategic innovation outcome. The study uses 206 matched responses from senior managers and product team leaders in high‐tech manufacturing firms in the United States to avoid common‐method bias. The authors use maximum likelihood estimation in a structural equation model to empirically test the proposed model. They find that two separate dimensions of creativity—novelty and meaningfulness—are differentially affected by team dynamics. For example, NP novelty as a result of divergent process is predominantly influenced by external team factors such as market‐based reward system and planning process formalization. On the other hand, NP meaningfulness as a result of convergent process is dominantly influenced by internal team factors such as social cohesion and superordinate identity. In addition, MP novelty is determined by social cohesion, superordinate identity, planning process formalization, and encouragement to take risks, while MP meaningfulness is influenced by social cohesion and planning process formalization. Our findings also suggest that NP novelty and meaningfulness, but not MP novelty and meaningfulness, play important intermediary roles in determining product competitive advantage. This study contributes to narrowing the important gap in the literature by examining the effect of team dynamics on creativity and by linking creativity to strategic innovation outcomes. Our study suggests that a firm's ability to manage team dynamics toward generating creative NPs and MPs constitutes a dynamic capability that can provide a competitive advantage over the competition.     

Spurring Cross‐Functional Integration for Higher New Product Performance: A Group Effectiveness Perspective*

Spurring integration among functional specialists so they collectively create successful, or high‐performing, new products is a central interest of innovation practitioners and researchers. Firms are increasingly assembling cross‐functional new product development (NPD) teams for this purpose. However, integration of team members' divergent orientations and expertise is notoriously difficult to achieve. Individuals from distinct functions such as design, marketing, manufacturing, and research and development (R&D) are often assigned to NPD teams but have contrasting backgrounds, priorities, and thought worlds. If not well managed, this diversity can yield unproductive conflict and chaos rather than successful new products. Firms are thus looking for avenues of integrating the varied expertise and orientations within these cross‐functional teams. The aim of this study is to address two important and not fully resolved questions: (1) does cross‐functional integration in NPD teams actually improve new product performance; and if so, (2) what are ways to strengthen integration? The study began by developing a model of cross‐functional integration from the perspective of the group effectiveness theory. The theory has been used to explain the performance of a wide range of small, complex work groups; this study is the first application of the theory to NPD teams. The model developed from this theory was then tested by conducting a survey of dual informants in 206 NPD teams in an array of U.S. high‐technology companies. In answer to the first research question, the findings show that cross‐functional integration indeed contributes to new product performance as long conjectured. This finding is important in that it highlights that bringing together the skills, efforts, and knowledge of differing functions in an NPD team has a clear and coveted payoff: high‐performing new products. In answer to the second question, the findings indicate that both intra‐ (or internal) and extra‐ (or external) team factors contribute and codetermine cross‐functional integration. Specifically, social cohesion and superordinate identity as internal team factors and market‐oriented reward system, planning process formalization, and managerial encouragement to take risks as external team factors foster integration. These findings underscore that spurring integration requires addressing the conditions inside as well as outside NPD teams. These specialized work groups operate as organizations within organizations; recognition of this in situ arrangement is the first step toward better managing and ensuring rewards from team integration. Based on these findings, managerial and research implications were drawn for team integration and new product performance.     

‘Mental mobility’ in the digital age: entrepreneurs and the online home‐based business

Home‐based online business ventures are an increasingly pervasive yet under‐researched phenomenon. The experiences and mindset of entrepreneurs setting up and running such enterprises require better understanding. Using data from a qualitative study of 23 online home‐based business entrepreneurs, we propose the augmented concept of ‘mental mobility’ to encapsulate how they approach their business activities. Drawing on Howard P. Becker's early theorising of mobility, together with Victor Turner's later notion of liminality, we conceptualise mental mobility as the process through which individuals navigate the liminal spaces between the physical and digital spheres of work and the overlapping home/workplace, enabling them to manipulate and partially reconcile the spatial, temporal and emotional tensions that are present in such work environments. Our research also holds important applications for alternative employment contexts and broader social orderings because of the increasingly pervasive and disruptive influence of technology on experiences of remunerated work.     

Resource orchestration for team‐based innovation: a case study of the interplay between teams,customers, and top management

The resource orchestration concept has attracted considerable interest in contemporary innovation research. However, resource orchestration is a manager‐centric framework and not all of its components necessarily reflect the value‐creation processes of organizations focusing on team‐based innovation. Drawing on a single‐case study of an innovative Swedish software company, we illustrate the roles of autonomous teams, customers, and top managers in orchestrating resources for team‐based innovation. Moreover, we introduce the concept of resource flocculation to describe how key actors co‐orchestrate various resource orchestration processes. The study contributes to research on resource orchestration by adapting the model to the conditions characterizing team‐based innovation, and to research on team‐based innovation by addressing how innovative teams are related to overall resource orchestration processes and, ultimately, organizational innovation outcomes.     

Scope versus speed: Team diversity,leader experience,and patenting outcomes for firms

Research Summary: How does the organization of patenting activity affect a firm's patenting outcomes? We investigate how the composition of patenting teams relates to both the scope of their patent applications and the speed with which their patents are approved, by examining the main effects of team members’ intra‐organizational diversity (based on affiliations with formal organizational units and informal organizational communities) and the moderating effects of team leader experience. We test our moderated mediation model in a sample of 121 teams that filed patents in a Fortune 50 company's India R&D center between 2005 and 2015, using proprietary employee data combined with newly released micro‐data from the U.S Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). Our findings illuminate the micro‐foundations of innovation in firms by highlighting a trade‐off between organizing patenting activity to maximize scope versus speed. Managerial Summary: Patenting is an important strategic tool that firms can use to protect and create value from their innovations. A firm can benefit from filing a patent application that gives it a wider possible set of claims related to an innovation. It can also benefit from faster approval of a patent application by the Patent Office. However, our study shows that there is a trade‐off between patent application scope and patent approval speed, which creates tensions for the organization of patenting activities inside firms. In particular, we find that the diversity of a patenting team is positively related to patent scope but negatively related to patenting speed, and that these relationships vary with the experience of the team leader.