A multilevel investigation of factors influencing creativity in NPD teams

Understanding creativity in the context of a new product development (NPD) team is of paramount importance, especially in the high-technology industry where creativity is a key resource. Building on the mood-as-input model, this study examines how contextual factors (organizational support and organizational control) moderate the relationship between team affective tone and team creativity. The data collected comprise 343 sets of responses involving 106 NPD teams drawn from high-technology firms. The results of this study show that negative affective tone relates positively to team creativity when organizational support is high and organizational control is low, but the linkage between positive affective tone and team creativity as moderated by context factors is found to be insignificant. This article likewise includes research limitations, future research directions, and theoretical and managerial implications.     

The impact of structural and contextual factors on trust formation in product development teams

This study examines antecedents of trust formation in new product development (NPD) teams and the effects of trust on NPD team performance. A theoretical framework relating structural and contextual factors to interpersonal trust and project outcomes was built, including task complexity as a moderating variable. Hypotheses from this model were tested with data on 93 product development projects carried out in Turkey. The findings showed that structural factors such as moderate level of demographic diversity, proximity of team members, team longevity, and contextual factors (procedural and interactional justices) were positively related to the development of interpersonal trust in NPD teams. The findings also revealed that interpersonal trust had an impact on team learning and new product success, but not on speed-to-market. Further, the findings showed that the impact of interpersonal trust on team learning and new product success was higher when there was higher task complexity. Theoretical and managerial implications of the study findings are discussed.     

The contingent value of exploratory and exploitative learning for new product development performance

This study endeavors to extend research on organizational learning by investigating the complicated effects between exploratory — exploitative learning and new product performance in a single new product project. Specifically, premised on contingency theory the authors investigate the negative nonlinear and interaction effects of project-level exploratory and exploitative learning behaviors on product development performance, and examine internal organizational and external environmental factors to recognize their differential moderating effects between the two learning behaviors and new product performance. Most of the hypotheses are supported based on questionnaire survey results of 253 new product projects. The results indicate that the two type of learning have curvilinear (inverted U-shaped) effects on new product performance, and suggest that product development performance will be enhanced when one learning is at higher level and the other is at lower level. Furthermore, the authors discover that process-based reward, encouragement to take risk, and environment dynamics strengthened the benefits of exploratory on new product performance. On the other hand, the advantages of exploitative learning on new product performance is further enhanced when output-based reward, project development formalization, and environment competitiveness is high. Finally, this study suggests that project managers should pay careful attention to employ the two learning behaviors during new product development.     

Establishing a high-technology knowledge transfer network: The practical and symbolic roles of identification

Knowledge transfer networks (KTNs) are composed of interconnected firms, government entities, and research organizations that play a critical role in the funding, development, and dissemination of knowledge in high-technology industries. Despite the common use of KTNs in situations that require technology inputs spanning multiple firms, little research has examined the start-up of KTNs and the marketing literature has essentially ignored them. Using social network, social identity, and relevant attribution and motivation theories, the authors build a conceptual model that explains key outcomes of start-up KTNs. A preliminary empirical investigation of a UK-wide KTN start-up finds evidence that social identification with the network is a key moderating mechanism. Identification plays a practical role in creating positive knowledge-transfer benefits for firms that are central in the KTN's social network. Identification also plays a symbolic role by affecting participants' perceptions of overall KTN performance in light of knowledge-transfer benefits that they received, and as an antecedent to affective commitment to the KTN.     

Antecedents and consequences of the strategic orientations in new product development: The case of Chinese manufacturers

The objective of the present study is to advance the understanding of the role of the strategic orientation of the firm for successful new product development (NPD), in the context of Chinese manufacturing firms. Through field research accompanied by a review of the related literature, this study identifies customer orientation and technology orientation as crucial strategic components that are important to successful new product development. This research proposes a conceptual model of strategic orientations, in which firm-internal (organizational support) and -external (environmental turbulence) factors are expected to influence strategic orientations, which, in turn, impact NPD performance. The model is tested using data collected from a large-scale survey of 232 manufacturing firms in China. The results largely support the hypotheses derived from the conceptual model. First, organizational support and environmental turbulence have a positive influence on the implementation of strategic orientations. Second, the two strategic orientations show a different pattern of performance implications.     

The use of information technology tools in new product development phases: Analysis of effects on new product innovativeness, quality, and market performance

Extant research has largely ignored empirically examining how information technology (IT) affects new product effectiveness. Using the knowledge-based theory as a foundation, this study examines if, and how, particular IT tools used in the discovery, development, and commercialization phases of the new product development (NPD) process influence NPD effectiveness dimensions, namely, market performance, innovativeness, and quality of a new product. Based on data collected from NPD managers in the US and Canada, the findings indicate that specific IT tools contribute to various measures of new product effectiveness differently. Moreover, the results show the positive effect of these IT tools in different phases of the NPD process. This suggests that with regard to NPD, a decompositional approach that examines the role of IT within each phase of the NPD process is best. Based on these findings, the authors discuss theoretical and managerial implications of the study and suggest paths for future research. Managerially, some interesting results of our study are that decision support systems, file transfer protocols, and concept testing tools would significantly improve NPD effectiveness regardless of the phase they are used.     

New product development in Asia: An introduction to the special issue

Given the increasing importance of Asia, the purpose of this special issue is to broaden the scope of our understanding of New Product Development (NPD) by going beyond the traditional Western research settings and looking at how new products are developed in Asia. This paper introduces the special issue on NPD in Asia and identifies key patterns of similarities and differences between Asian and Western NPD practices. The paper highlights key similarities and differences in the areas of organizational/top management support; technological proficiency; customer/market orientation; information sharing; cross-functional interface; entrepreneurship orientation; NPD strategies; innovation orientation; contingencies of innovation orientation; innovative marketing strategies; NPD process; appointment of project managers; rewarding team members; success rate; and cycle time.     

New product development process and time-to-market in the generic pharmaceutical industry

Generic pharmaceutical companies tend to improve their market position by being first in the market when a patent on an original product elapses. The time-to-market of new products is an important source of their comparative advantages. In our study we investigate the organizational and managerial factors lying behind time-to-market in four generic pharmaceutical companies in Central and Eastern Europe. Our research also supports some results found in other studies on the lead-time of new product development. However, we find some factors specific to generic pharmaceutical companies. Our findings are incorporated into a diagnostic model of new product development in generic pharmaceutical companies, which is an important practical result of our research.     

Portfolio of controls in outsourcing relationships for global new product development

Due to increasing globalization and technological discontinuities, firms strive to develop new product capabilities and flexibilities by engaging in outsourcing activities and adopting modular systems. However, these strategies contain risks of opportunistic expropriation of tacit knowledge and costs related to monitoring sourcing partners who are geographically and culturally distant. This study examines the antecedents of control mechanisms through which firms manage the risks and costs associated with outsourcing relationships in global technology-intensive markets. Modularity in design is hypothesized as a moderator of model relationships because it can serve as a substitute for formal or informal controls in a “controls portfolio”.     

Best new product development and management practices in the Korean high-tech industry

This paper investigates critical factors affecting the likelihood of new product success and effective new product development (NPD) models for Korean high-tech firms. Empirical results suggest that successful projects differ from unsuccessful projects in project environment, skills and resources, project leadership, strategic fit, efficient NPD process, and effective product-positioning strategies.This study confirmed that efficient and effective new product development and management were important determinants of high-tech firms' competitive advantage. Furthermore, the findings of this study raised questions about some commonly held beliefs when compared with Western studies focusing on high-tech industries.     

A comparative analysis of new product development by Italian and Japanese manufacturing companies: A case study

Based on survey data from Italian and Japanese companies, six measurement scales are developed for practices, process, strategic guide, and capabilities for new product development as potential determinants of its financial performance, that is, attainment of profit goals and revenue goals. By employing a regression model with a country dummy variable, the differential determinants of financial goals attainment between Italian and Japanese samples are estimated. A significant difference can be found in the impact of new product development capabilities on profit goals attainment only. Then, we evaluate the level of improvement in explanatory power by dividing the pooled sample into two and enabling regression coefficients to take different values, and find no evidences of the significant improvement. Technology and marketing capabilities concerning new product development are demonstrated to be overwhelmingly important to financial performance.     

Leadership and organizational learning's role on innovation and performance: Lessons from Spain

Leadership style has been traditionally emphasized as one of the most important individual influences on firm innovation. Scholars are now paying growing attention to the possibility that the collective capability of organizational learning plays a key role in determining innovation. We propose that leadership style, an individual feature, and organizational learning, a collective process, simultaneously and positively affect firm innovation. A structural equation model and data from 408 large firms in four sectors supported our hypotheses. Organizational learning had a stronger direct influence on innovation than CEO transformational leadership for our sample; however, leadership had a strong, significant influence on organizational learning, indirectly affecting firm innovation. Additionally, innovation positively and significantly influenced performance. Organizational learning also positively affected performance, but interestingly mainly through innovation.     

Balancing exploration and exploitation capabilities in high technology firms: A multi-source multi-context examination

Based on the dynamic capability view, this study examined the balance between exploration and exploitation capability. With this, we proposed a framework that synthesizes the impact of new product creativity and marketing program creativity on new product quality (internal product quality and external product quality), and further understanding the path to performance of new products in a select number of industrial and consumer products. The main findings revealed that the effect of new product creativity in consumer product firms through internal and external product quality was less dominant than those in industrial product firms. In contrast, the effect of marketing program creativity in industrial product firms through only external product quality was less dominant than those in consumer product firms. Additionally, this paper also discusses the research limitations, future research directions, and theoretical and practical implications.