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The emergence of executive champions and their impact on innovation performance

  • Highly recognized case studies and the intuitive notion that a heroic champion is required to help innovations overcome the indifference or even resistance that they face in many organizations explain that there has been a positive bias among academics and managers toward the role of champions in innovation processes. A look into the previous empirical literature on champions reveals, however, that a rigorous empirical investigation into organizational factors causing the emergence of executive champions and their impact on innovation performance is lacking. In addition, previous empirical research on champions is plagued with methodological problems such as measurement issues and single informant bias. This study uses multiple informant data from 258 respondents from 43 firms to examine various hypotheses. The findings reveal that executive champions are likely to emerge in organizational cultures that are conducive to innovation and they are less likely to emerge in organizational cultures that are unfavorable for innovation. We further find a non-linear, inverted u-shaped relationship between the level of executive championing activity and innovation performance. We find, in contrast with the commonly held belief, that executive champions have a strong negative impact on innovation performance particularly in cultures that make it difficult to innovate. Among the tested moderators, only the implementation of incentives for executive champions based on innovation performance offsets the negative impact of these champions on innovation performance. The findings lead us to substantially rethink the commonly believed role champions play in innovation processes.

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Metadaten
Author:Holger Ernst, Thomas Lechler
URN:urn:nbn:de:hbz:992-opus4-6133
Series (Serial Number):WHU-Forschungspapier (094)
Publisher:Wissenschaftliche Hochschule für Unternehmensführung (WHU) Otto-Beisheim-Hochschule
Place of publication:Vallendar
Document Type:Working Paper
Language:English
Date of Publication (online):2018/04/01
Date of first Publication:2003/12/01
Release Date:2018/04/01
Tag:Innovationsbereitschaft; Innovationswettbewerb; Produktinnovation; Wettbewerbsvorteil
Competitive advantage; Innovation competition; Product innovation; Readyness to innovate
Page Number:33
Institutes:WHU Entrepreneurship and Innovation Group / Chair of Technology and Innovation Management
Licence (German):Copyright for this publication