Untangling capabilities for managing the front end of innovation

• This article investigates the vital and often underemphasized front end of innovation. It aims to explore how firms utilize organizational capabilities to manage multiple sources of fuzziness (uncertainty, equivocality, and complexity). In so doing, we use the capability- and knowledge-based view to examine the use of firms’ capabilities to navigate the front end process from vague ideas towards corroborated product definition. In our qualitative case of seven manufacturing firms, we explore practices, methods, and routines for managing the front end. We explain that new product ideas can be classified according to different degrees of fuzziness, which implies that not all product ideas can or should be treated in the same way. In fact, certain capabilities are more important for managing the development of ideas at low (i.e. process management and idea refinement) and high (problem formulation and problem solution) levels of fuzziness. Ultimately, we suggest a theoretical framework that elucidates how firms use two distinct paths (i.e. tolerance-based or reduction-based) to transform early new product ideas into corroborated product definitions. In doing so, our results guide project members in matching the magnitude of knowledge problems with organizational capabilities and thereby increase front-end performance.

Subject headings

SAMHÄLLSVETENSKAP  -- Ekonomi och näringsliv -- Företagsekonomi (hsv//swe)

SOCIAL SCIENCES  -- Economics and Business -- Business Administration (hsv//eng)

Keyword

Entreprenörskap och innovation

Entrepreneurship and Innovation

Publication and Content Type

vet (subject category)

art (subject category)