Since creation of the term "open innovation" by Chesbrough in 2003, it got incredibly hyped. Presumably, this happend because the term "open innovation" summarized a set of socio-political and economic changes, for instance the shift towards the "Attention economy". Open innovation was seen as an umbrella term for several tools and techniques like crowdsourcing, community based innovation, customer integration, lead users or even toolkits and mass customization. These terms became popular just some years ago and "open innovation" seemed to be the perfect umbrella term.
Different perspectives
We should acknowledge that "open innovation" was originally meant as a marketplace for intellectual property and ideas. Consequently, there is a large difference between what was originally meant by open innovation, how OI is understood by the academic community and how it is understood by practitioners.
Of course, Chesbrough accounted the important role of the user and customer in the innovation process. However, there are many other potential innovators out there. That is why we should always ask ourselves critically: Is this really open innovation? Or is another term more appropriate...
Assessing "open innovativeness"
Today almost every platform and online community with focus on innovation is marketed under the headline "open innovation". So, when we assess these innovation communities (what we will do in one of our future posts), we will focus on what open innovation really means. Accordingly, we will evaluate "open innovativeness" by the following inbound-parameters:
To what extent are one of the following sources used? (by a company, by the online community/website, etc.)
- Suppliers
- Clients or Customers
- Lead Users
- Competitors
- Consultants
- Commercial labaratories, Public or Private R&D institutes
- Universities or other higher education institutions
- General public
- Opinion leaders, opinion brokers (e.g. bloggers)
This scale originated from von Hippel [1986, 1988] and was recently used by Laursen and Salter [2006], Drechsler and Natter [2008]. I added some adaptations to this scale and will use it also in my research project.
We must also not forget the outbound-process of open innovation. Hence, we will also evaluate "open innovativeness" by the following outbound indicators:
To what extent are the following opportunities used? (by a company, by the online community/website, etc.)
- Sale / Divest
- Licensing out
- Financing / Founding Spin-Offs
- Contributing to the general public (the community)
This scale was developed by Chesbrough [2003, 2007], and was recently used by Drechsler and Natter [2008]. I added one adaption and will use it also in my research project.
