Raw Ideas in the Fuzzy Front End: Verbosity Increases Perceived Creativity

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laura J. Kornish ◽  
Sharaya M. Jones
Keyword(s):  
Large Scale ◽  
Innovation Process ◽  
Scale Evaluation ◽  
Fuzzy Front End ◽  
Front End ◽  
The Relationship

At the “fuzzy front end” of an innovation process, organizations typically consider dozens, or even hundreds, of raw ideas. Selecting the best ones is a double challenge: evaluating so many ideas is a large undertaking, and the ideas in their raw form permit only noisy evaluations. In this paper, we demonstrate a further challenge to that large-scale evaluation of raw ideas. We show that verbosity raises the evaluation of ideas, that is, ideas expressed in more words are rated higher. This relationship is especially pronounced for ratings of creativity. Theory tells us that the effect of length on creativity is compounded because length cues both components of creativity—novelty and usefulness. We demonstrate how effort in reading (disfluency) and perceptions of complexity work together to explain the relationship between length and creativity. Our findings provide simple but important new directives for improving the use of crowdsourcing in the practice and study of innovation: either standardize the length of the ideas or control for length in their evaluation. Overall, we urge care with using measures of novelty or creativity when the idea descriptions vary in length.

The Fuzzy Front End: Concept Development in the Automotive Industry

2014 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christer W. Elverum ◽  
Torgeir Welo ◽  
Martin Steinert
Keyword(s):  
Product Development ◽  
New Product Development ◽  
Automotive Industry ◽  
Early Stage ◽  
Innovation Process ◽  
New Product ◽  
Product Development Process ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Fuzzy Front End ◽  
Front End

The fuzzy front end (FFE) of new product development (NPD) is a term that refers to the early stages of the innovation process. This paper investigates the FFE in the automotive industry and addresses the challenges of working in this phase of the innovation process, as well as the academic definition of the FFE relative to the real world. Two parts of the innovation process have been identified and characterized as FFE: the concept-work within satellite front-end departments and the work within the pre-development phase of the vehicle new product development process. It has been identified that one of the greatest challenges related to working in the FFE is developing viable concepts that will “sell” internally. Estimating and conveying the overall value of the final product in terms of costs and customer benefits are two of the key elements that make it difficult to achieve internal “buy in”. Furthermore, it is argued that the most common academic perception of the FFE seem to be inadequate since it only concerns work that ends with a go/no-go decision whether to continue into development or not. Consequently, it fails to capture early-stage development work of transformational innovations, where the decision of development has already been made and the uncertainty is related to the execution of the work — and — not the outcome. Semi-structured interviews with a total of eleven employees at seven different automotive OEMs form the basis for the conclusions made herein.

MANAGING INTER-FIRM COLLABORATION IN THE FUZZY FRONT-END: STRUCTURE AS A TWO-EDGED SWORD

2011 ◽  
Vol 15 (01) ◽  
pp. 145-163 ◽  
Author(s):  
JACOB HÖJ JÖRGENSEN ◽  
CARSTEN BERGENHOLTZ ◽  
RENÉ CHESTER GODUSCHEIT ◽  
ERIK STAVNSAGER RASMUSSEN
Keyword(s):  
Initial Phase ◽  
Innovation Management ◽  
Innovation Process ◽  
Innovation Network ◽  
Fuzzy Front End ◽  
Front End

Literature on innovation emphasises the potential for organisations to collaborate and network instead of carrying out innovation individually. Integrating suppliers, customers and other organisations into the innovation process is perceived as a key to success in innovation management (Chesbrough, 2003). Furthermore, the management of the initial phase of the innovation process has proven vital to the overall innovation success (Kim and Wilemon, 2002a,b). Although the merits of network-based innovations are widely acknowledged, the managerial challenges of the initial integration of external organisations in an innovation network are somewhat neglected in the literature. The aim of this paper is hence to address the challenges that an organisation faces when integrating a plurality of suppliers, customers and other organisations into the Fuzzy Front End of the innovation process.

scholarly journals "FUZZY FRONT END" PRACTICES IN INNOVATING JAPANESE COMPANIES

2006 ◽  
Vol 03 (01) ◽  
pp. 43-60 ◽  
Author(s):  
CORNELIUS HERSTATT ◽  
CHRISTOPH STOCKSTROM ◽  
BIRGIT VERWORN ◽  
AKIO NAGAHIRA
Keyword(s):  
Large Scale ◽  
Idea Generation ◽  
New Product ◽  
Market Uncertainty ◽  
Upper Management ◽  
Fuzzy Front End ◽  
Front End ◽  
Frequent Use ◽  
Technical Specifications ◽  
Japanese Companies

In this paper, we report on the results of a large-scale study about typical front-end-related innovation practices in 553 Japanese mechanical and electrical engineering companies. We explore typical activities concerning the generation and assessment of new product ideas, the reduction of technological as well as market uncertainty and front end planning. Finally, we report on the differences between successful and unsuccessful companies. Our study confirms earlier findings about the frequent use of creativity techniques in Japan during the process of idea generation. We also find companies to be intensively involved in upper management and customers on NPD projects. While integrating upper management is of vital importance for assessing new product ideas, integrating customers and users is primarily used to developing product ideas and concepts. We further find evidence that successful companies integrate their customers more frequently in the process of developing and assessing new product ideas than non-successful companies. In addition, the former integrate customer requirements into their product definitions more often and also translate these requirements into technical specifications more frequently than non-successful companies. Finally, successful companies more often systematically plan a project prior to its start than unsuccessful ones.

A model for supporting the ideas screening during front end of the innovation process based on combination of methods of EcaTRIZ, AHP, and SWOT

2020 ◽  
Vol 28 (2) ◽  
pp. 89-96
Author(s):  
Zhe Huang ◽  
Cherifi Ahmed ◽  
Gardoni Mickael
Keyword(s):  
Process Model ◽  
Innovation Process ◽  
Evaluation Methods ◽  
Analytic Hierarchy ◽  
Screening Process ◽  
Fundamental Factor ◽  
Fuzzy Front End ◽  
Front End ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Combination Of Methods

Product innovation is a fundamental factor for a company or even the economy of a country to maintain survival, growth, and long-term success. All innovations begin with creative ideas; however, all the ideas are not the source of an opportunity. Ideas should therefore be carefully evaluated and selected from a wide range of creative ideas using appropriate evaluation methods. This article summarizes seven evaluation methods, discusses the basic principles of the different methods, analyzes their advantages and application advice, and proposes an idea screening process model based on the combination of the EcaTRIZ, analytic hierarchy process (AHP), and SWOT, for supporting the ideas screening during fuzzy front end of the innovation process.

Fuzzy front end patent management and innovation performance

2017 ◽  
Vol 55 (6) ◽  
pp. 1143-1162 ◽  
Author(s):  
Li Zhao ◽  
Yang Xiang ◽  
Qiulu Yi
Keyword(s):  
Innovation Performance ◽  
Equation Modeling ◽  
High Tech ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Fuzzy Front End ◽  
Front End ◽  
Lock In ◽  
The Impact ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Patent Management

Purpose As a resource input in enterprise technological innovation, patents play an important role in influencing innovation performance. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the impact of fuzzy front end (FFE) patent management on innovation performance, and the mediating role of patent commercialization and the moderating effect of technological lock-in. Design/methodology/approach This paper adopts a questionnaire survey from a sample of 203 high-tech Chinese enterprises across multiple industries. Structural equation modeling and the hierarchical regression method were used to test the hypothesis. Findings The results show that the FFE of patent management, namely, patent acquisition and patent protection, positively affect innovation performance. Specifically, patent commercialization mediates the relationship between FFE patent management and innovation performance. Moreover, technological lock-in moderates the relationship between patent management and innovation performance. Practical implications This study puts forward suggestions relating to institution innovation and mechanism innovation for effective patent management in firms, and provides some guidelines for firms to efficiently utilize patents to improve innovation performance. Originality/value This paper provides certain empirical evidence for the study of organizational structure, strategic management, and knowledge governance. As the main participators in technology innovation, high-tech enterprises should utilize both inside and outside resources to acquire patents.

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