Читать книгу Innovation Economics, Engineering and Management Handbook 1 - Группа авторов - Страница 20

If innovation is born somewhere, in the form of an idea, its development requires a favorable environment, so that it can be nourished by knowledge and exchanges between people who are relatively close, in order to trust and understand each other. Indeed, proximity is required, especially a certain cognitive proximity, in other words, individuals with the same knowledge and skills base who can learn from one another (Boschma 2004). It is for this reason that it is accepted that innovation initially requires a delimited space, a place composed of experts, such as researchers or designers, and also with technical tools, such as scientific apparatus or creative methods. In fact, the work of innovation takes place within a given perimeter with a degree of specialization of activities in research and development units, design centers, laboratories, etc. Beyond this specialization, these spaces are mainly made up of social and material interactions (Hall 1966; Massey 2005). Thus, contextualized practices develop, with a certain degree of confidentiality and even clandestinity (Guérard and Seidl 2013; Grenier and Denis 2017).

This delimitation and specialization of innovation has been contested by a double movement. On one hand, innovation has become an imperative for all companies subject to ambiguous, uncertain, complex and volatile environments (Bennis and Nanus 1985). These conditions imply greater organizational flexibility, with faster rhythms in developing products for the markets. On the other hand, innovation has been progressively democratized (von Hippel 2005) with the idea that innovation is no longer the producer’s activity of creation and also that of users with the simpler and more accessible use of information technology, and more recently, of the 3D printer. This openness to innovation is defended by the proponents of open innovation (Chesbrough 2003, 2006; von Hippel 2005). They point to a paradigm shift in innovation management from a rather closed mode to a more open mode, at both organizational and individual levels. This approach calls the more internalized model of innovation into question, where spaces are more closed and specific to the organization, through a more externalized model with more open spaces, less centered around an organization linked to communities or collaborative movements (Bohas et al. 2017).

This greater porosity still raises questions about how to manage innovation spaces. While innovation has never been a closed phenomenon, these contemporary models refer to a less linear, more dynamic or even more turbulent approach. In this context, how should the organization manage these spaces? Is it necessary to delimit or widen the spaces for innovation? What about the configuration of these spaces?