Who drives the creation of a novel vision? The role of individual insights and the ability of “letting go”

Abstract

This study investigates how novel product visions emerge as team members share and fuse their insights. Existing studies contrast the merits of two possible paths. On the one hand, a vision is mainly conceived by the creative lead, putting forward a direction and then buying-in ownership of the other team members. On the other hand, a vision emerges as a balanced collaborative effort where all team members contribute. Through the sensemaking theoretical lens, we expand this discussion by proposing that regardless of who the main driver of innovation is, what is important in vision creation is the individual’s ability of “letting go” of early insights, namely sense-breaking. We analyze the vision creation dynamics of 26 top management teams. We capture how the verbal descriptions of a vision change from individual insights to a shared concept. We show how “letting go” of earlier creations is as important as adding new ones.