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Innovation management techniques and development degree of innovation process in service organizations Luigi D’Alvano1 and Antonio Hidalgo2 1

Department of Business Administration, Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, c/José Gutiérrez Abascal, 2, 28006 Madrid, Spain. [email protected] 2 Department of Business Administration, Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, c/José Gutiérrez Abascal, 2, 28006 Madrid, Spain. [email protected]

Service markets are becoming global, open and competitive. Knowledge is more available, technology more complex and service life-cycles are shortening. In order to satisfy this challenge, more innovation management tools are required to get better and more successful new or improved products and services. This paper analyzes the relationship between the use of innovation management tools (IMT) and the degree of development of innovation process through the application of a five phase innovation model (TEMAGUIDE). This is undertaken in a group of service organizations from three sectors: trade, healthcare and education. The sequence of the innovation process development is defined between activities and use of innovation tools. Results show that activities and practices are more developed than use of innovation management tools, and also show that leading innovation organizations have a higher use of IMT.

1. Introduction

A

s customers get higher levels of life quality, their demands for diverse and customized products and services increase. Innovation becomes fundamental in developing a better-value proposition through an increased supply of new or renewed manufactured products and services. Many manufacturers are changing their strategies, and they are now offering services around their products (Robinson et al., 2002) in order to offer a better-value proposition, and every day service organizations need to have more developed processes of innovation to respond to a growing competition. Interest in understanding the nature of service innovation and the key elements to its success is related to the increased

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participation of the service sector in the economy. According to the World Bank (2011), in 2009, 74.8% of gross domestic product (GDP) in the euro area and 77.5% in the United States were attributed to services. The increasing importance of knowledge as an economic driver has major implications for innovation management. In the knowledge economy, establishing bridges between knowledge and the marketplace and putting in place the right environment for innovation are the key to building competitiveness. The knowledge economy also represents new opportunities and requires some design actions to support and take advantage of this economy (Foray, 2000). It is the firm that organizes the creation of value. With the shortening of product and

R&D Management 42, 1, 2012. © 2011 The Authors. R&D Management © 2011 Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 9600 Garsington Road, Oxford, OX4 2DQ, UK and 350 Main St, Malden, MA, 02148, USA.

Innovation management techniques and development degree of innovation process service cycles, firms face the need for more capitalintensive investment and must put more emphasis on the ability to react quickly (Lovelace et al., 2001). For firms, innovation is a crucial mean to create competitive advantage and superior customer value. Among the challenges of the new knowledge economy are the following:

• •

•

•

New types of products and services are more complex because they integrate more technologies (Liikanen, 2003). New approach to innovation management that encompasses all the key areas needs to be mastered to develop successful new products and services efficiently and continuously (Maskell, 1999). New innovation assessment skills that permit firms to assess and implement the most appropriate technology according to their need to keep their competitiveness (Christensen, 1997). The capacity to implement technical and relational tools. Technical tools do not create competitive advantage because they are readily available to competitors (it refers to the acquisition and utilization of new information and communication technologies), while relational tools are in the base of the creation of competitive advantage (the way of doing business, both in the internal and the external environments of firms). In this context, culture, leadership and human resources management are key elements (Lengrand and Chartrie, 1999).

Chiesa et al. (1996) show the importance of tools in their model for technological innovation audit. The effective use of appropriate systems and tools is one of three enabling processes. The technical innovation audit checks how tools get customer needs, designing new products and promoting creativity. Many new products or services depend on new innovation tools. Thomke (2006) has found that new tools can significantly increase developers’ problemsolving capacity as well as their productivity, enabling them to address categories of problems that would otherwise be impossible to tackle. It is the use of tools that determines whether value is created (or resources are wasted). But that potential should be tempered: new innovation tools must first be integrated into an innovation process considering that each organization has a unique approach of how people, processes and techniques are integrated – a result of formal and informal routines, culture and habits. From here highlights the importance of understanding relationship between adoption and use of innovation management tools (IMT) and development of innovation processes in service organizations. © 2011 The Authors R&D Management © 2011 Blackwell Publishing Ltd

The objective of this paper is to analyze the relationship between the development degree of the innovation process, the use of IMT and the intensity of innovation activities. The paper is organized as follows. Section 2 shows a review of theoretical considerations about innovation in services and IMT. Section 3 describes a five-phase innovation model, known as TEMAGUIDE, and defines three specific rates: the Innovation Process Development Index (IPDI), the IMT Index (IMTI) and the Innovation Activity Index (IAI). Section 4 describes the empirical study and the variables defined, while section 5 presents the general results including the characterization of a group of leading service organizations defined through a cluster analysis based on the degree of development of their innovation processes. In this section, the use of IMT and the intensity of innovation activities are compared with the development degree of the innovation processes for service organizations. Finally, the last section shows the main conclusions and limitations of this research.

2. Theoretical considerations In his studies, Schumpeter (1934) discusses how economic development is driven by innovation, through dynamic processes of ‘creative destruction’ in which new technologies replace existing ones. Under this view, Schumpeter proposed the following forms of innovation: (1) introduction of new goods; (2) introduction of new forms of production; (3) discovery of a new source of raw materials or semielaborated products; (4) opening of a new market; and (5) creating new market structures in an industry. Hidalgo et al. (2002) define innovation from a technological perspective. For them, technological innovation is defined as ‘all technical, industrial and commercial stages leading to successful launch of new products and services into the market or the commercial utilization of new technical processes’. The Oslo Manual (OECD, 2005) proposes the following definition: ‘an innovation is the implementation of a new or significantly improved product (good or service), or process, a new marketing method, or a new organizational method in business practices, workplace organization or external relations’. This definition covers a wide range of different types of innovation compared with the previous definition of the manual that focused solely on technological innovation.

2.1. Innovation in services According to Gadrey (1992), service is defined as the set of processing operations carried out by a service R&D Management 42, 1, 2012

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Luigi D’Alvano and Antonio Hidalgo provider (B) on behalf of a client (A), in a medium (C) held by A, and intended to bring about a change of state in the medium C. Gadrey et al. (1995) add that to produce a service is to organize a solution to a problem (a treatment or an operation) that does not principally involve supplying a good. It is to place a bundle of capabilities and competences (human, technological, organizational) at the disposal of a client and to organize a solution, which may be given to varying degrees of precision. From the perspective of service-dominant (S-D) logic, value service creation is always a collaborative and interactive process and service is the fundamental basis of exchange. In the S-D logic, service is defined as the process of using one’s competences (knowledge and skills) for the benefit of another party (Vargo and Lusch, 2004; Vargo, 2009). More recently, Toivonen and Tuominen (2009) define service innovation as a new service or a renewal of an existing service that is put into practice and which provides benefit to the organization that has developed it; the benefit usually derives from the added value that the renewal provides to customers. In addition, to be an innovation the renewal must be new not only to its developer, but in a broader context, and it must involve some element that can be repeated in new situations. Den Hertog et al. (2010) propose that a service innovation is a new service experience or service solution that consists of one or several of the following dimensions: new service concept, new customer interaction, new value system/business partners, new revenue model and new organizational or technological service delivery system. Service organizations can innovate in any of these dimensions or a combination thereof. Each innovation dimension and their interactions vary depending on every service organizations.

2.2. IMT Brady et al. (1997) define management tools as a document, framework, procedure, system or method that enables a company to achieve or clarify an objective. In this sense, IMT can be defined as the range of tools, techniques and methodologies intended to support the process of innovation and help companies to meet new market challenges in a systematic way (European Commission, 2004; Phaal et al., 2006). Hidalgo and Albors (2008) show how the appropriate use of IMT facilitates the ability of an organization to properly introduce new technologies in products, services, processes and organizations. IMT can help companies to manage more complex innovation projects, adapt organizations to changing cir62

R&D Management 42, 1, 2012

cumstances and meet market challenges in a systematic way. Otherwise, Igartua et al. (2010) analyzed the important role that IMT are playing in facilitating an open innovation strategy, particularly in building and improving the supplier network, aligning members to shared goals, and improving the quality of the project and the company’s ability to introduce appropriate new technologies. However, they alert that IMT do not replace sound practices and organizational processes and recommend that the process must be measured and analyzed, while continuously questioning the efficacy of tools being used. Finally, an important element in the adoption and use of innovation tools is its diffusion across organizations, work undertaken by universities, business schools, consulting firms and research centers (European Commission, 2004). The knowledge and availability of a tool as well as the possibility of external support are key elements to incorporate it into an innovation project. While some areas of innovation management such as creative development have many techniques, other areas such as networking have less well-known techniques available.

3. Methodology: TEMAGUIDE innovation model Initially, studies of innovation processes were related to technological innovation. The process-based model of innovation or technological innovation audit model (Chiesa et al., 1996), the pentathlon model (Goffin and Pfeiffer, 1999), the TEMAGUIDE model (COTEC, 1999) and the process of innovation management model (Tidd et al., 2001; Tidd and Bessant, 2009) are some of the best known. More recent are models of innovation in service organizations. The four-dimensional model of service innovation (Den Hertog, 2000) and the six-dimensional model of service innovation (Den Hertog et al., 2010) are some examples. In this context the TEMAGUIDE model has been applied to the analysis of the innovation process in Spanish service organizations (COTEC, 2004). This research selected the TEMAGUIDE model rather than the technological innovation audit, pentathlon and multidimensional models for the following reasons: first, it is based on the analysis of innovation processes from the organizational perspective and the use of innovation tools; second, it explains in a more detailed way how the development of innovation process can be measured through the study of activities and innovation tools; and third, TEMAGUIDE goes beyond the project tunnel analy© 2011 The Authors R&D Management © 2011 Blackwell Publishing Ltd

Innovation management techniques and development degree of innovation process

FOCUS

SCAN

LEARN

RESOURCE

IMPLEMENT

Figure 1. TEMAGUIDE innovation model (COTEC, 1999).

sis, incorporating the possibility for organizations to learn and improve in both the project tunnel and on its innovation process. Both TEMAGUIDE and the process of innovation management model of Tidd et al. analyze the innovation process through five phases. In TEMAGUIDE these are scan, focus, resource, implement and learn, while in the Tidd et al. model the five phases are signal processing, strategy, resourcing, implementation and learning, and reinnovation. This similarity was probably due to the participation of Prof. J. Bessant in the design of the TEMAGUIDE model in conjunction with A. W. Pearson and J. Butler of Manchester University, and K. Brockhoff of Kiel University. The selection of the TEMAGUIDE model is based on the fact that it was started as an action to promote IMT and to foster the transnational exchange of knowledge and methodological practices in the promotion and use of IMT in small and medium firms, and it explains in detail the relationship between each of the five phases and the IMT expected to be used. The TEMAGUIDE model proposes that the innovation process reflects a cycle of activities (Figure 1). The first phase covers the activities of ‘scan’. In this phase, the organization searches for signals about the need for innovation, market opportunities and technology in order to prepare for changes that could affect its future. In line with the business strategy, the second phase, ‘focus’, consists in generating ideas and opportunities to provide a set of alternative solutions able to improve its competitiveness in the market. The next phase, ‘resource’, consists in developing skills and competences required by chosen innovation projects. The fourth phase, ‘implement’, refers to the innovation project: starting from the initial idea and following various stages, the innovation project becomes a new (or renewed) product or service. The last phase is ‘learn’. In order to enhance the innovation process, organizations should analyze each project through every phase, reviewing differ© 2011 The Authors R&D Management © 2011 Blackwell Publishing Ltd

ences between objectives and results, and achieving knowledge and improvement opportunities. A research based on the TEMAGUIDE model was conducted in Spain to a group of services organizations (COTEC, 2004). The results showed the applicability of the model, such as activities, practices and the degree of development of the innovation processes in the service organizations analyzed. In order to analyze the relationship between the development degree of the innovation process, the use of IMT and the intensity of innovation activities, we defined the following indexes: the IPDI, the IMTI and the IAI.

3.1. IPDI The IPDI identifies the degree of maturity of the innovation process and is a function of existing activities, their frequencies and tools used through the innovation process. The index is defined as the sum of the mean values for each of five phases (Fi), where the outcome of each phase is the average of values obtained for each of its variables (a total of 28 variables have been defined): n

5

∑F

IPDI =

i =1

5

∑v

ij

i

, where Fi =

j =1

n

.

Each variable is evaluated on a Likert scale from 1 (low) to 5 (high), and the maximum value of the IPDI is 5. It would be expected that service organizations with a more developed innovation process show a greater number of activities and IMT.

3.2. IMTI The IMTI identifies the use of IMT through the innovation process and is mathematically defined as follows: m

IMTI =

∑ v (t )

i

i =1

m

where m is the number of variables intended to measure tool utilization in the five phases (a total of eight variables have been defined). The IMTI is evaluated on a Likert scale from 1 (low) to 5 (high). The index is defined so that each variable has an equal importance.

3.3. IAI The IAI is defined as the average sum of all variables that assess innovation activities carried out by the organization. The IAI is calculated using the following formula: R&D Management 42, 1, 2012

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Luigi D’Alvano and Antonio Hidalgo k

IAI =

∑ v (a )

i

i =1

k

where k is the number of variables intended to measure activity intensity in the five phases (a total of 15 variables have been defined). A high value of the IAI identifies organizations that carry out the greatest number of innovation activities. Each variable is evaluated on a Likert scale from a minimum of 1 to a maximum of 5 points, and the index is defined so that each variable has an equal importance.

4. Empirical study and variables To determine the applicability of the TEMAGUIDE model, a research instrument (questionnaire) called ‘service innovation survey’ was made through the following steps: preparation of a draft based on the results of in-depth interviews with experts from each service sector, initial testing and correcting identified problems to specific questions. The questionnaire was configured around a set of 40 questions with 28 variables distributed among the five phases of the innovation model (scan, focus, resource, implement and learn). In order to verify the functionality, use and usefulness of the questionnaire, a beta test was applied to the instrument. Survey was targeted at senior managers of organizations, or instead to those with extensive knowledge and management of innovation processes, to those who were capable of answering by themselves or who were able to contact people who could answer those difficult questions as it has been done in other studies in the field of innovation (O’Regan et al., 2006), or to those individuals who have the ability to coordinate working groups to answer the survey within their organization. The questionnaire was applied in three service sectors: trade (chain stores), health-care (private hospitals) and education (universities with engineering programs) sectors. The study population was composed of a total of 124 organizations: 71 from the trade sector, 16 from the health-care sector and 37 from the education sector. The questionnaire was randomly sent to contacted organizations and a total of 30 organizations responded: 12 from the trade sector (16.9%), 8 from the health-care sector (50%) and 10 from the education sector (27.0%). Service organizations surveyed were analyzed by experts, who considered it relevant to show Venezuela innovation reality for these sectors. In Table 1 we detail, for each of the five phases of the innovation model, the set of variables used to 64


calculate the different indexes (IPDI, IMTI and IAI) and their allocation depending on whether it is an activity, frequency or tool variable. To calculate the IMTI eight variables were used (S4 – scan techniques; F3 – idea generation techniques; F4 – idea selection techniques; I2 – project planning techniques; I5 – product/service innovation techniques; I8 – process innovation techniques; I11 – market innovation techniques; and L2 – learning organizational techniques). Table 2 shows for each variable the group of associated IMT provided in the instrument. These IMT have been selected considering the following criteria: availability, including free accessibility, knowledge, practical usefulness and required resources for implementation, such as external support. Participants in the study were given the option to add more IMT that were not shown explicitly in the questionnaire.

5. Results 5.1. Reliability analysis The data were processed by SPSS (version 17), which was used to determine both Cronbach’s alpha and corrected Pearson’s coefficient, statistical values that determine if recorded values and scales used in the survey were reliable. Values for both Cronbach’s alpha and standardized Cronbach’s alpha were high, above 0.940 in both cases, showing the internal consistency of the survey.

5.2. Analysis of process innovation Participants in the study mentioned brainstorming (86.7%) as main IMT used, followed by trend studies (73.3%), strategic alliances and processes documentation (70.0%), expert meetings (66.7%), best practices (60.0%), value analysis (56.7%), business plan (56.7%) and Gantt chart (56.7%). On the contrary, between the IMT are the less used concept test (10.0%), job to be done (10.0%), concurrent engineering (6.7%), house of quality (6.7%), Delphi method (6.7%) and the Boston Consulting Group (BCG) matrix (3.3%). TRIZ and SCAMPER (idea generation tools) were not mentioned. Table 3 shows a summary of tools most and least used. To determine the relationship between the IPDI and the IMTI, a linear regression analysis was performed. The result is presented in Figure 2. The coefficient of determination R2 is 0.8278, which shows that the IPDI can be fairly explained by the IMTI as an independent variable. For surveyed service organizations, the increased use of IMT is related to a higher development degree of its innovation process. © 2011 The Authors R&D Management © 2011 Blackwell Publishing Ltd

Innovation management techniques and development degree of innovation process Table 1. Variables of the service innovation survey Phase Scan

Variable

S1 S2 S3 S4 Focus F1 F2 F3 F4 Resource R1 R2 R3 R4 Implement I1 I2 I3 I4 I5 I6 I7 I8 I9 I10 I11 I12 I13 I14 Learn L1 L2 Total number of variables

Description

Activity

Scan activities Information sources activities Market intelligence activities Scan techniques Focus activities Idea selection activities Idea generation techniques Idea selection techniques Competence building activities Technology acquisition activities Internal competences development activities Intellectual property right activities Project planning activities Project planning techniques Project planning frequency Product/service innovation activities Product/service innovation techniques Product/service innovation frequency Process innovation activities Process innovation techniques Process innovation frequency Market innovation activities Market innovation techniques Market innovation frequency Organizational innovation activities Organizational innovation frequency Learning organizational activities Learning organizational techniques

X X X

To understand how innovation activities are related to the use of IMT, we developed a scatter matrix called activities and IMT balance matrix (Figure 3). The diagonal line represents innovation processes where there is an equal development degree for both innovation activities and use of IMT. In this case, most service organizations are located below the diagonal line, which means their innovation activities have a higher intensity than use of IMT. This finding could be explained (for these studied organizations) in the sense that innovation begins through the implementation of a few projects with low use of IMT. In the initial stages, main activities are focused on developing successful projects that can spread innovation through organization. The focus is concentrated on activities, which grow in number and complexity, creating a need to use more and better IMT. This innovation development © 2011 The Authors R&D Management © 2011 Blackwell Publishing Ltd

Frequency

Tool

X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X 15

5

X 8

sequence is defined as ‘initially oriented towards activities’, and it shows an IAI greater than the IMTI. In general, service organizations located below the diagonal line have developed their innovation path through this sequence. Through time, activities and IMT use should be balanced through the innovation process.

5.3. Leading group characterization In order to understand the differences between the leading organization and others in terms of intensity of innovation activities and use of innovation tools, we used cluster analysis to determine the number of organizations belonging to the leading innovation group. Cluster analysis is a multivariable technique used to group elements (or variables) so that, on the one hand, objects belonging to the same group are R&D Management 42, 1, 2012

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Luigi D’Alvano and Antonio Hidalgo Table 2. Detailed innovation management tools for each variable Variable

Description

Associated tools

S4

Scan techniques

Bibliometrics Trend studies Formulation and scenario analysis Specialized Internet search engines

F3

Idea generation techniques

F4

Idea selection techniques

I2

Project innovation planning techniques

I5

Product/service innovation techniques

I8

Process innovation techniques

I11

Market innovation techniques

L2

Learning organizational techniques

Brainstorming Suggestion box SCAMPER TRIZ JTBD Innovation project portfolio BCG matrix Strategic alignment test Value analysis Gantt charts WBS Project management programs Work flow Prototyping CAD Operational simulation systems Processes documentation Pareto diagrams Operations research Brainstorming Focus groups In-depth interview House of quality Concept test Brainstorming Gap analysis Reengineering Documentation

Technology observatory Regulatory changes reports Delphi method Patents, brands, industrial models and copyright analysis Ideas concourse Lateral thinking Heuristic rule Experts meetings Clients meetings Select criteria importance research Suppliers meetings House of quality Concurrent engineering Critical Path Method (PERT/CPM) Automated model of contracting Business plans Practical improvements Certifications Cause–effect analysis Process reengineering Functionality tests Value analysis Segmentation studies Market trend studies Brand positioning studies Quantitative research – mass surveys Cause–effect analysis Business case

JTBD, job to be done; WBS, work breakdown structure; CAD, computer-aided design; BCG, Boston Consulting Group.

very similar to each other (i.e. the group is internally cohesive) and, on the other, objects belonging to different groups have different behavior with respect to these variables (i.e. each group is externally isolated from the other groups). Cluster analysis technique was applied to all 30 organizations for a group of 28 variables that measure the five-phase model. Several available methods for hierarchical classification of the surveyed organizations were applied,1 and the proximity method used was the squared Euclidean distance. The dendrogram (Figure 4) shows the result from cluster analysis using square Euclidean distance as a proximity and centroide clustering as hierarchical 66


classification method. As we can see from the dendrogram, the existence of a group of leading innovation organizations composed by organizations number 7, 10, 30, 11 and 22 is clear. These organizations obtained the five highest IPDI in the sample studied. The leading group is composed by three organizations from the trade sector, one from the health-care sector and one from the education sector. This group represents 16.7% of organizations surveyed and 4% of the population. The organization with the highest IPDI is a service organization that belongs to the trade sector, with over 166 stores in Venezuela and approximately 1,600 employees. © 2011 The Authors R&D Management © 2011 Blackwell Publishing Ltd

Innovation management techniques and development degree of innovation process 5.00 y = 0.8546x + 0.608 R² = 0.8278

4.50 4.00

IPDI

3.50 3.00 2.50 2.00 1.50 1.00 1.00

1.50

2.00

2.50

3.00

3.50

4.00

4.50

5.00

IMTI

Figure 2. Regression analysis between the Innovation Process Development Index (IPDI) and the Innovation Management Tools Index (IMTI).

5.00

Type

Tools

Utilization (%)

Most used

Brainstorming Trend studies Strategic alignment Survey and documentation processes Expert meetings Best practices Value analysis Gantt charts Business plans Formulation and scenario analysis Specialized internet search engines JTBD Concept test House of quality Concurrent engineering Delphi method Future search BCG matrix TRIZ SCAMPER

86.7 73.3 70.0 70.0

Least used

66.7 60.0 56.7 56.7 56.7 53.3 46.7 10.0 10.0 6,7 6.7 6.7 3.3 3.3 0.0 0.0

JTBD, job to be done; BCG, Boston Consulting Group.

The analysis reflects that the leading group presents simultaneously more use of IMT and activity intensity than the remaining surveyed organizations as shown in Table 4. The IAI is higher than the Innovation Management Technique Index in both groups. © 2011 The Authors R&D Management © 2011 Blackwell Publishing Ltd

IMTI

Table 3. Use of innovation management tools

3.00

1.00 1.00

3 .00

5.00

IAI

Figure 3. Innovation Activity Index (IAI)–Innovation Management Tools Index (IMTI) matrix.

6. Conclusions As consumers demand better and more valuable services, organizations need to improve the innovation process in order to develop in time-to-market new or renewed solutions. As services are becoming more complex and customized, and life cycles shorter, the process of service innovation requires improving its activities and using more and better IMT. This research shows interesting findings in the innovation process analysis in service sector organizations. Among the main results, we highlight the following:

•

The most used IMT belong to known and easy-touse tools. It also shows how more use of IMT is related with higher development of the innovation process. Therefore, more and better use of IMT could facilitate the development of more complex innovation projects in service organizations. R&D Management 42, 1, 2012

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Luigi D’Alvano and Antonio Hidalgo 13 23 1 28 18 14 16 8 20 5 29 17 24 9 15 26 2 4 12 19 25 3 21 27 11 22 7 10 30 6

Figure 4. Dendrogram for analyzed service organizations.

•

Table 4. Comparative indexes by group of service organizations Group

IMTI

IAI

Leader group Remaining 25 Total sample

3.43 1.96 2.20

3.91 2.33 2.60

IAI, Innovation Activity Index; IMTI, Innovation Management Tools Index.

•

•

The development of the innovation process starts by the activities side, and as process complexity increases, the use of more and better IMT become more important and useful. Innovation management needs to balance their practices and activities with the use of IMT in order to get a more efficient innovation process development as it is shown through the IAI–IMTI matrix. In other words, through time, activities and IMT should be balanced through the innovation process.

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Leading organizations present simultaneously better development of its innovation process, use of IMT and activities intensity than remaining organizations. Significant differences between both groups show opportunities to improve activities and the use of IMT. For most studied organizations, an innovation policy should incentivize both encouragement to increase innovation activities and introduction of new and more complex innovation tools.

Finally, it is interesting to note that the results must be considered in the context of existing limitations, which are the sample size and the number of service sectors analyzed. With only 30 surveyed organizations from three different service sectors, it is very important to avoid generalizations. Another limitation is related to the fact that most of the innovation tools considered in the study belong to the project level. In future research, IMT selection criteria should be expanded to include a broader scope of innovation tools, especially those related to culture, corporate entrepreneurship and other support innovation activities. © 2011 The Authors R&D Management © 2011 Blackwell Publishing Ltd

Innovation management techniques and development degree of innovation process

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Note 1. The applied methods were between-group linkage, within-group linkage, nearest neighbor, furthest neighbor, centroide clustering, median clustering and Ward’s method.

Luigi D’Alvano has a mechanical engineering degree from Universidad Simón Bolívar in Caracas (Venezuela). He also holds an MBA from Instituto de Estudios Superiores de Administración (IESA) in Caracas (Venezuela). He is Professor of Service Innovation Management at Instituto de Estudios Superiores de Administración (IESA).


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Luigi D’Alvano and Antonio Hidalgo Antonio Hidalgo is Professor of Technology Strategy, Director of the Research Group of Innovation, IPR and Technology Policy, and Director of the Master and Doctorate Programme in Economics and Innovation Management at the Universidad Politécnica de Madrid (Spain). He received his PhD in industrial engineering from the Universidad Politécnica de Madrid. He acts as an expert to the

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European Commission as technology consultant in different European projects. His works have appeared in R&D Management, Production, Planning and Control Journal, Journal of Intelligent Manufacturing, Journal of Technology Transfer, International Journal of Product Development and International Journal of Technology Management.

© 2011 The Authors R&D Management © 2011 Blackwell Publishing Ltd