Creativity and Innovation Management最新文献

Lead user theory has gained traction in both academia and practice, given that involving lead users (LUs) can yield more innovative and commercially successful products. Yet, measurement inconsistencies have hindered consensus on how to reliably assess lead userness. This paper develops and validates a new 30-item scale that conceptualizes lead userness as a hierarchical construct with two second-order dimensions: ahead of trend (AoT) and high benefit expectation (HBE). Each dimension is further subdivided into three first-order subdimensions, capturing facets such as ideas, information and experience (AoT) or problems, needs and gains (HBE). In multiple studies, the scale demonstrated robust reliability and convergent, discriminant and nomological validity, correlating as expected with key antecedents (e.g., divergent thinking, product knowledge, innate innovativeness and risk aversion) and outcomes (e.g., social innovativeness, opinion leadership, innovation experience and innovation intention). Additionally, a separate predictive and explanatory power study comparing the new scale with seven established measures underscored its superior capacity to account for both past and future user-driven innovation activities. Moreover, a market test across smartphones, e-bikes and refrigerators confirmed that product concepts developed by identified LUs commanded higher willingness to pay than those from regular consumers, reinforcing the scale's practical relevance. Finally, a short-scale variant with six items is introduced as a viable alternative when item minimization is crucial. Taken together, these findings provide a comprehensive inventory for measuring lead userness, laying the foundation for deeper theoretical insights into user-driven innovation and more targeted managerial strategies for collaborating with LUs across diverse product categories.

Corporate venture clienting (CV Clienting) has emerged as a distinct form of corporate venturing (CV) in which corporations engage with startups by adopting their innovative solutions without acquiring equity stakes. Unlike traditional corporate venture capital (CV Capital), which served as the dominant CV approach, CV Clienting structures these relationships around supplier–client dynamics, enabling corporations to access pioneering technologies, foster the growth of future suppliers and minimize long-term capital commitments. However, despite its growing relevance, the governance mechanisms specific to CV Clienting remain underexplored. This study investigates the governance mechanisms underpinning CV Clienting initiatives from a stewardship theory perspective. Drawing on an abductive qualitative analysis of three corporations actively implementing CV Clienting, this research identifies three key dimensions of governance (i.e., formal, relational and transactional) that differentiate CV Clienting from CV Capital. This study shows that stewardship theory can provide a grounding model to support corporates in navigating the governance challenges of CV Clienting when interacting with startups.

The originality of new product ideas in the front-end is crucial for new product development (NPD) success. To foster originality, organisations use idea sprints, where distributed and remote NPD teams working in agile develop ideas under fixed time and cost constraints, exchanging outputs virtually. These virtual transfers, via tools like email, include both product-related factors like idea descriptions and person-related factors like emotions. Emotions expressed about idea descriptions can, however, be distorted during virtual transfers, possibly influencing idea elaboration. Despite their frequent occurrence and potential impact, this issue remains unexplored in the literature. Drawing on emotions as social information (EASI) theory, we test if the expression of excitement reduces, while the expression of frustration increases the originality of new product ideas generated in idea sprints. The results of an online experiment with professional participants in the role of either team member (i.e., idea generator or elaborator) or product owner (i.e., evaluator) during a simulated idea sprint unexpectedly show that both emotions, if expressed by the generator in the virtual transfer to the elaborator, reduce the originality of the new product ideas as evaluated by the product owner. These findings enrich our limited understanding of the role of expressed emotions in virtual transfers for ideation activities in the front-end of NPD.

Generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) is transforming the way people approach creative problem-solving (CPS). Whereas previous technologies were only used as creativity tools, GenAI can also be conceived as an actor taking on different roles that adds a collaborative element to individual CPS processes. So far, research on augmenting CPS with GenAI has focused on creative cognition. In this article, we use a metacognitive perspective as a unique lens to conceptualize AI-augmented approaches to CPS and explore the implications of AI-augmented creative cognition. Based on this, we propose that the collaboration with GenAI in CPS shifts a part of human attention away from executing to monitoring and controlling creative cognition. These imposed metacognitive demands have important implications for our theoretical understanding of AI-augmented CPS and how people can better actualize the creative potential of GenAI. Future research directions and empirical approaches for understanding and addressing these metacognitive demands are discussed along with practical implications for applying CPS.

Generative artificial intelligence (GenAI), such as ChatGPT, is increasingly recognized for its potential to drive innovation, yet questions remain about its ability to mimic human innovation. Leveraging cognitive load theory (CLT), this study explores whether humans can reliably distinguish between incremental and radical innovation ideas in text created by ChatGPT and those created by humans. In an online experiment with 689 participants and 6454 innovation ratings, results from Turing and noninferiority tests showed that participants achieved accuracy only slightly above chance level, with marginally higher accuracy for radical innovations. However, significant differences emerged across thematic clusters: Convenience and health innovations were identified more accurately than education and sustainability innovations. This research advances the understanding of how closely GenAI-generated innovations resemble human ones, emphasizes the need for transparency in GenAI's role within creativity processes and raises questions about developing new indicators for evaluating contributions in increasingly AI-integrated innovation environments.

Social identity theories explain how identities intertwine with individuals' choices and behaviours. Simultaneously, an institutional context imposes constraints on people's agency due to the norms, habits and expectations it engrains. This is the case in the artistic realm, where numerous categorization norms remain implicit. In the present paper, we examine the links between identity and professional activities in the creative crafts sector, which exhibits characteristics of both contemporary arts and traditional crafts. Employing a mixed methodology that combines survey data and a focus group, we explore the ways in which different identities and professional activities within the market for creative crafts are interconnected. We show ‘how’ creative crafts practitioners self-identify (as an artist, craftsman [artisan], designer, maître d'art and creative entrepreneur) and reveal contradictions between—what we label—individuals' self-attributed identity (self-identification) and positioned social identity (the categorization by others). Notably, the identity of the ‘artist’ emerges as the most prominently promoted one, while that of the craftsperson is found to be more comfortable. Specific instances of identity struggles and juggles are identified. To explain the identity positioning issues faced in this sector, we invoke the nomenclative habits and market activities that prevail in creative crafts. Our empirical data allow us to disentangle two distinct identity strategies, which we label ‘rooted identity strategy’ and ‘floating identity strategy’. Our contributions lie in a more in-depth exploration of identity perceptions within cultural and creative industries, by showing how creative people deal with multiple, sometimes conflicting, identities and discussing how this can affect careers.

The recent advancements in generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) could impact the traditional working style. While some professions have already been investigated, the literature falls short in the context of project management. This study examines the impact of GenAI on project managers' performance in planning tasks across different expertise levels. We employ a 2 × 2 factorial design, categorizing participants as project management novices or professionals, with groups either using GenAI or not. Key performance indicators (task completion time, subjective success and task quality) assess GenAI's role for project planning tasks. The findings indicate that GenAI enhances task performance for both novices and professionals. Contrary to expectations, the degree of improvement attributable to GenAI assistance is comparable across both expertise levels. Notably, GenAI tools elevate novices' performance to a level akin to unassisted professionals, suggesting that GenAI can effectively bridge the expertise gap in project management. This research contributes to understanding AI's utility in project management, highlighting its potential as a tool for improving efficiency and decision-making across varying levels of expertise. The results suggest a paradigm shift in project management practices, advocating for the strategic integration of AI to optimize performance and learning while also acknowledging challenges such as overreliance and the need for structured training. This study lays the groundwork for future explorations into the nuanced impacts of AI in project management scenarios.