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Innovation encompasses the two major stages

(1) creativity (development of new ideas)
(Creativity, we propose, requires individuals with creative characteristics, who feel free from threat and pressure, and work in a supportive environment.)

(2) innovation implementation (introduction and practical application of new and improved products, services and ways of doing things at work)
(Innovation requires diversity (of knowledge particularly), integration of people’s knowledge and efforts, external challenge or demand, and practical support for innovation.)

“Perceptions of the events, practices, and procedures and
the kinds of behavior that are rewarded, supported, and expected in a setting”

Climate refers to shared perceptions of the work environment (how
organizational members experience organizations and attach common meanings to their perceptions of the environment)

Team climate: considering the size and diversity of many organizations, team climate may be more relevant to group innovation than organizational climate.

(because of greater interaction frequency, task interdependence and
existence of a common goal in teams as compared to entire organizations)

Clarity of and commitment to shared team objectives or vision;

Definition of vision: an idea of a valued outcome reflecting a
higher-order goal and a motivating force at work.

Sense of safety within the group, i.e. non-threatening interpersonal
atmosphere of trust and support

Active involvement in decision-making and group interactions 

Shared concern with excellence of performance quality;

Emphasis on individual and team accountability, mutual monitoring, intra-team advice and critical-constructive appraisals

Expectation, approval and practical support of innovation
attempts (rather than routinely rejecting or ignoring them);
includes both articulated and actually enacted support

TCI alleviated the negative effects of high work demands
(Work demands negatively related to organizational performance when TCI was low (solid line) but not when TCI was high (dotted line))

3 of the 4 strongest findings emerged for TCI factors (vision, support for innovation, task orientation)

weaker results for participative safety

too much intragroup safety might reduce productive conflict and enhance conformity

(Zuviel "Kuschel" verhindert produktiven Konflikt und sorgt für Konformität)

What implications for practice and management in organizations arise from our series of findings?

Interventions should focus on providing the group with

• high norms for innovation
• and creating a climate that is open to change
• and error friendly

 
Team members as well as team leaders and higher management
have to find a balance

• in truly supporting each other in developing and implementing new ideas
• and at the same time monitoring and critically appraising each other

Supervisors and team leaders should strive to provide the team with clearly stated, shared and visionary goals.

“the extent to which team members collectively reflect upon the team‘s objectives, strategies and processes as well as their wider organizations and environments, and adapt them accordingly“

strong implementation plans derived from reflection may enhance innovation

“To get creative results, managers should seek to understand employees‘ motivational orientations in context, so the combination of individual disposition and bureaucratic context yields the most desirable associations with creativity.

Decentralization
brings out the best in learning-oriented employees and attenuates (mildern) the negative of an avoid orientation on creativity. Thus, from a creativity perspective, decentralized decision making is attractive, even when it does little for prove oriented individuals.

Formalized practices
Although the creativity of prove-oriented individuals thrives in less formalized contexts, low formalization actually brings out undesirable tendencies in avoid-oriented team members.

the conclusion would be that creativity is best obtained by (where possible) not selecting avoid-oriented individuals for a team, while creating a team context characterized by high levels of decentralized  decision making and low formalization, to let learning-oriented and prove-oriented individuals flourish.“

“targeted employees‘ shared summary perceptions of the extent to
which their use of a specific innovation is rewarded, supported, and expected within their organization“

>> result of shared experiences and observations
>> strong implementation climate fosters innovation usw by

• a) ensuring employee skill
• b) providing incentives for use/disincentives for avoidance
• c) removing obstacles

(combined with innovation-values fit)

extent to which targeted users perceive that innovation use will foster (or inhibit) fulfillment of their values.

(combined with implementation climate)

Management
Coping with complexity (planning, organizing, problem-solving, determining budgets)

Leadership
Coping with change (providing direction, aligning people, motivating, inspiring)

“The ability to influence, motivate, and enable others to contribute to the effectiveness and success of the organization”

1. Initiation phase > Nurturing
encouraging safety and ideas, being supportive, being open-minded, ensuring a non-judgemental climate

2. Discussion phase > Developing
obtaining opinions, evaluating proposals, agreeing implementation plans, pushing plans forward

3. Implementation phase > Championing
selling the proposal to all groups affected, gaining commitment, ensuring participation in implementation

4. Routinization phase > Validating/modifying
checking effectiveness, identifying weak links, modifying and improving the innovation

Transformational leadership: visionary, inspirational and stimulating leadership engendering higher levels of employee performance and satisfaction

Transactional leadership: exchange-oriented leadership (reward or punishment for good or poor performance)

leaders are sometimes high on both transactional and transformational leadership or low on both!

Augmentation effect: Increase in subordinate performance if supervisors exhibit transformational leadership in addition to transactional leadership

intervene and make corrections only when things already go wrong

perceived as exceptional, confident and trustworthy

encourage others to question assumptions and develop new approaches

Transformational and transactional leadership together explained an impressive 34% of the differences in unit performance (% of achieved goals after 1 year) 

Transformational leadership positive performance predictor

All 3 transactional factors negative performance predictors!

Transformational leadership more positively predicted performance when “support for innovation“ (team climate factor) was high