Maximizing Innovative Output in Your Workforce
“The Entrepreneurial Organization: The Effects of Organizational Culture on Innovation Output”
Reece Akhtar, Dimitrios Tsivrikos, Gorkan Ahmetoglu, Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic (2018)
What are the researchers interested in?
“Corporate entrepreneurship is the enabling and promotion of worker’s abilities to innovatively create value within the organization”
To remain competitive in an ever-changing business world, organizations must engage in entrepreneurial behaviors (passion, creativity). From technology disruptions to the latest market trends, employees have to adapt to combat these new pressures. This is called Corporate Entrepreneurship.
Previous researchers have studied the major antecedents of innovative output within organizations, however, it lacks the importance of informal organization factors (e.g. collective norms, assumptions, and beliefs). Ahmetoglu et al., (2018) argue that informal factors have equal, if not more, importance with formal factors (e.g. compensation) in motivating and enabling individuals to engage in entrepreneurial behaviors.
What method did they use?
Ahmetoglu and colleagues sampled 523 participants, all of who are employed with a majority of participants working in entry-level positions. They argue that there are three variables that are likely to be essential to the relationship between entrepreneurial culture and an organizational member’s innovative outputs.
Reinforcement - A culture in which entrepreneurial behavior is positively reinforced, is more likely to increase innovative behaviors in the future.
Engagement - Dedication and absorption of one’s work will lead to more control over how the work is carried out and has also shown to increase creativity levels.
Person-Organization fit (P-O fit) - Emphasizing positive work outcomes will be a result of a high congruence between individual characteristics and the organization’s cultural values.
What did they end up finding?
Referring back to the main reason why the researchers are conducting this experiment –it is cardinal for organizations to develop internal environments and cultural norms that reinforce and are conducive to entrepreneurship and innovation (Ahmetoglu et al., 2018).
Entrepreneurial cultures (reinforcement) do not have a direct effect on innovation, however, they indirectly influence such outcomes by impacting the employee’s state of mind and affectivity (work engagement, etc.) In regards to Person-Organization fit, results showed that high congruence (person = organization) not only activates relevant traits and skills but also allows individuals to freely express their creativity.
Below we have visualized the researcher’s recommendations:
Why does this matter for organizations?
Organizations have sought to find a culture that not only works well but can, also, handle the technological changes in the 21st century. It is crucial to understand what is creativity and how it can be reinforced in an organization. Here, we show you the socio-cognitive aspect of producing innovative output – a mediating factor of work engagement – one’s dedication to one’s work. As shown in the findings, recruiting individuals from the get-go is an important first step in creating the entrepreneurial culture managers are seeking. We hope that this research and the infographic can be used in organizations that are pursuing more creativity and innovation in their workforce.
References
Ahmetoglu, G., Akhtar, R., Tsivrikos, D., & Chamorro-Premuzic, T. (2018). The entrepreneurial organization: The effects of organizational culture on innovation output. Consulting Psychology Journal: Practice and Research, 70(4), 318.