Managing triadic supplier relationships in collaborative innovation projects: a relational view perspective

Purpose Suppliers are essential partners in innovation projects, as they own resources, knowledge assets and capabilities that complement those of buying firms. In today’s competitive environment, firms may choose to collaborate with suppliers beyond dyads, forming triadic or three-party relationships. Using the theoretical lens of the relational view (RV), this study aims to explore what type of triad configurations firms use to govern supplier relationships in collaborative innovation projects, how they choose to share resources and implications for project performance. Design/methodology/approach The authors use interview data from buyers and suppliers in six case studies of firms involved in ten collaborative innovation projects. The four constructs of the RV are used to observe how firms govern triadic relationships, combine complementary resources, invest in relationship-specific assets and manage information and knowledge exchange with and between suppliers in innovation projects. Findings Four archetypes of triadic relationships in innovation projects – labeled Triangle, A-frame, D-Frame and Line – are presented and characterized in terms of their structural and relational features. The authors discuss how each triad archetype is applicable to different innovation projects according to specific project characteristics. Originality/value This study is pioneering in its empirical examination of triadic relationships in collaborative innovation projects. It provides a novel typology of four archetypes of triad from the perspective of collaborative relationships with suppliers. Through applying the RV, it advances understanding of how triadic relationships are governed, how they invest in relationship-specific assets, how they combine complementary resources and how they exchange knowledge and information in each type of triad appropriate to different innovation project settings. To date, much of the extant literature has focused on dyads.

Systematic Mapping of Long-Term Urban Challenges

This paper investigates on long-term challenges faced by local governments. Using empirical evidence from Estonia, this paper aims to help fill a research gap in that there is a lack of a systematic approach on how to analyze common urban challenges via direct involvement of local governments. In terms of conceptual framework, a unique combination of public value theory and mission-oriented innovation is proposed. The data is collected via questionnaire, interviews and workshops involving up to 35 local governments. It is important that instead of current problems relating only to one city, this study focuses on finding shared, long-term challenges and, from them, generates a list of top 10 challenges. This provides valuable input to initiating new research and innovation projects in the key, smart city domains (e.g., energy, mobility, built environment, governance and data).

The symbolic costs of advice: how social situations explain the occurrence of unplanned knowledge sharing interactions

PurposeInformal knowledge sharing interactions (IKSI) are of particular value for innovation projects. This is especially true for unplanned IKSI, because they are even more likely to provide non-redundant knowledge and new perspectives than planned IKSI. Seminal studies have shown that the formation of unplanned IKSI can be explained on the basis of spatial structures. Strictly speaking, however, these studies only explain unplanned encounters. Whether unplanned IKSI result from these unplanned encounters, though, cannot be satisfactorily explained on the basis of spatial configurations alone. The purpose of this paper is to tackle this explanatory gap by unraveling the fundamental social processes by application of the symbolic interaction theory.Design/methodology/approachFor this purpose, the formation of 132 IKSI on innovation projects from three research and development departments of large companies was recorded in detail using a combination of diaries and interviews. The data were analyzed using qualitative content analysis.FindingsThe analysis reveals that IKSI cause symbolic costs (image damages), and that these costs vary between types of social situations. Because actors anticipate situation-specific costs, their propensity to initiate IKSI can be explained in terms of the situations in which they encounter one another. Furthermore, the analysis reveals six particularly relevant characteristics of situations and further elaborates the basic argument by analyzing their functioning.Originality/valueThe paper complements previous explanations of unplanned IKSI by opening up the social processes underlying their formation.

Nurse-led projects for people experiencing homelessness and other inclusion health groups: a realist evaluation

Nursing service development or innovation projects, even small-scale ones, can be difficult to deliver and evaluate, due to a lack of resources and support. Results can also be difficult to disseminate, limiting transfer of learning. This paper presents findings from a realist evaluation of 10 small projects supported by the Queen's Nursing Institute Homeless and Inclusion Health Programme to deliver innovation in health care for people experiencing homelessness and other marginalised groups. These nurse-led projects were funded by the Queen's Nursing Institute and the Oak Foundation, and were largely successful in achieving outcomes to support the improved health of people experiencing homelessness and other marginalised groups. This realist evaluation explores the factors that contributed to the delivery of positive outcomes. All were impacted by the context and the response (mechanisms) of people experiencing homelessness and staff within these settings. It is hoped that the lessons learned will enable better support for nurse innovation projects in the future.

Project management relationship to green innovation processes in sustainable fabric companies

The concept of green innovation refers to innovation that seeks to make radical or progressive improvements to products or processes that contribute to sustainable development. Green innovation can improve the global image of a business and lead to better market performance. Green innovation projects can contribute to economic growth and a positive quality of life without negatively affecting the environment. Consequently, this study aims to examine the relationship between the development of green materials resulting from green innovation and project management. To achieve the research objective, we conducted a multi-case study with companies developing green innovation derived textile. The findings show that the firms surveyed do not use formal project management to execute their green innovation projects and that their project management is intuitive. Although the companies surveyed are concerned with sustainable development and strive to innovate to satisfy their customers responsibly, their project management practices are informal. This study contributes to the practice. It is possible to introduce project management into enterprises to enhance green innovation while adapting practices or using less formal and bureaucratic techniques.

Challenges of impact assessment in Social Innovation: A qualitative study from two European rural regions

Over recent years, various approaches to assessing the impacts of social innovation (SI) have developed without a uniform method having arisen. There are some issues around how impacts can be assessed, connected with the questions on the nature of impacts, the levels of analysis and effects of a purely positivist approach to impact assessment. While attempting to assess such impacts, various SI initiatives face the diversity of challenges. To this end, the aim of the article is to investigate the experience of said initiatives promoting social innovation related to impact assessment of social innovation. The paper is based on an empirical study conducted with the local development associations and local action groups involved in social innovation projects in two rural regions of Austria and Portugal. The results indicate that, despite recognising the importance of impact assessment regarding social innovation activities and the opportunities it provides, local organisations in question face many challenges in assessing the impacts of social innovation, including conceptual and practical difficulties.

RESEARCH OF FORMS AND METHODS OF INVESTMENT SUPPORT OF INNOVATION ACTIVITIES OF INDUSTRIAL ENTERPRISES

To solve the problems of stimulating the development of innovative activity of domestic enterprises, a number of regulatory acts have been developed in Ukraine today that regulate relations in the sphere of investment in innovation. National legislation defines the following forms of investment of innovative activity: state (municipal) investment, commercial investment, social investment, foreign investment, general investment. In order to receive financial support, the subjects of innovation activity whose innovation projects are listed in the State Register of Innovation Projects shall submit to the State Innovation Financial-Credit Institution (its regional branches) innovative projects and all necessary documents, the list of which is determined by it. The subject of innovative activity, the innovative project of which has been competitively selected, may receive one or more types of financial support from the innovative financial-credit institution, depending on the competitive procedure established by the competitive procedure. Financial support for the implementation of innovative projects can be provided in the form of successive tranches as a result of monitoring the progress of project implementation.The analysis of the structure of state financing of innovation activity by types of economic activity of subjects of innovation in 2018 allows to determine the priority branch of chemical and petrochemical industry. Investing of own funds of subjects of innovative activity is realized through capital investments and financial investments. Structural analysis of sources of financing of innovative activity in Ukraine allows to distinguish the overwhelming share of own funds of the enterprises in the total volumes of financing of their innovative activity. But in the conditions of insufficient level of state support of innovative activity of enterprises and instability of their financial results, as the main source of own funds for investing, the role of financial and credit providing of investments by the subjects of the financial market significantly increases.

Specific Innovation Projects of the Retail Chain ‘Magnit’ and Their Risk Management

Today in conditions of severe competition of commercial enterprises it is necessary to upgrade their work by using different methods, one of them is the development and introduction of innovation projects. However, when an innovation project is worked out each developer faces certain risks requiring high-quality and effective management. Risk management in innovation projects is a complicated process, which is connected with the high level of uncertainty typical of innovation projects. Therefore, to manager risks of innovation projects highlyqualified personnel with sufficient knowledge and information is essential. The author studied the notion ‘innovation project’, investigated the causes of innovation risk rising and provided their classification. Apart from that, innovation projects of the retail chain ‘Magnit’ were analyzed, key problems of managing risks of innovation projects were identified and recommendations on resolving such problems were put forward.

Energy Citizenship in New Energy Concepts

It is assumed by the projects demonstrating Positive Energy District (PED) concepts in cities across Europe that citizens should want and need to be involved in the development of new energy concepts, such as PEDs for these concepts to be deployed successfully. Six different PED research and innovation projects are investigating the types and expectations of citizen engagement. They evaluate the impact of energy citizenship on the success of PED deployment across Europe.