Innovation management tools: implementing technology watch as a routine for adaptation

Abstract

Innovation management (IM) is a multidisciplinary field which has been growing for the past few decades. However, the management of innovation is often considered equivalent to technology management or the management of research and development. By focusing on a set of small- and medium-sized enterprises operating in a medium-high-tech industry, the paper intends to determine the characteristics of IM tools. In particular, we address one of these tools, technology watch (TW), and define a set of generic stages to introduce the most relevant roles for its implementation. TW consists of the systematic observation, analysis and use of technological information, allowing companies to be aware of their external environment and learn from it. Through the implementation of TW processes, companies are able to assess and adapt their current technological base and the fit of their internal competences to the signals coming from the external environment.

Keywords:

• innovation management
• tools
• implementation
• technology watch
• SME

Acknowledgements

We are grateful to the editor and two referees who have contributed to increasing the clarity of the paper. The author is indebted to all the firms, supporting organisations and technology centres that actively participated in the development and implementation of the TW process. Special mention is given to Patricia O'Connor for her assistance with the language editing of the text and to Mikel Gómez-Uranga for the comments provided in an earlier draft. The author also acknowledges financial support from the Basque Government Department of Education, Language policy and Culture.

Notes on contributor

Jon Mikel Zabala-Iturriagagoitia is a researcher at the Deusto Business School, University of Deusto (Spain). His research and teaching interests are particularly related to the fields of innovation policy and IM. He received his PhD at the Polytechnic University of Valencia (UPV), where he was a member of the Institute of Innovation and Knowledge Management (INGENIO). He has also been a postdoc researcher at CIRCLE (Lund University) and visiting researcher at the Technical Research Centre of Finland (VTT) in Espoo.

Notes

1. Other scholars define IM as the invention and implementation of a management practice, process, structure or technique that intends to enhance firm performance (Birkinshaw, Hamel, and Mol 2008, 825; Mol and Birkinshaw 2009, 1269).

2. Similar figures are obtained when calculating the share of researchers, technicians and support staff employed in the industry when compared with those employed in the Basque innovation system as a whole.

3. Deba, Eibar, Elgoibar, Ermua, Mallabia, Mendaro, Mutriku and Soraluze are the towns located in this district. During the period of industrial development, these towns witnessed the production of sewing machines and bicycles which later led to the development of the industry supplying the automotive industry, such as machine tools. Relevant companies operating in the machine tool segment are located in this area (e.g. Danobat, Ideko, Microdeco, Etxe-tar, Lanbi, Goratu, Kondia and Estarta). These and other companies form part of the Spanish Association of ‘Machine tool, accessories, component parts, and tool manufacturers’ (see http://www.afm.es, accessed May 2014).

4. http://www.imh.es/en (accessed May 2014).

5. http://www.danobatgroup.com/en/about/organization (accessed May 2014).

6. The firms we have included in our analysis may be regarded as ‘strategic and creative’ according to the classification provided by Rush et al. (2014), depending on the level of readiness to accomplish innovation-oriented projects.

7. The group has a research branch called Ideko, a technology centre where more than 100 highly qualified specialists, technicians and researchers are employed.

8. During the course of one year, six workshops were held to share the views of all the researchers who participated in the definition of the TW process and help to perfect it.

9. Several of the previously listed companies had, prior to this study, already prioritised those technological areas that were strategic to their sustainability and matched them with their corresponding responsible observers. Hence, the selection of the interviewees was facilitated by the existence of these roles within the targeted organisations. We therefore focused on those individuals who had previous experience in TW activities, as their opinions could most contribute to adapting the TW process to the particularities of the firms and the sector in which they operate.

10. This section is partially based on Zabala-Iturriagagoitia (2012).

11. This is a field which is arousing increasing interest, not only among IM scholars and practitioners, but also among regulators. The UNE 166006-2006 standard was introduced by the Spanish National Accreditation Body (AENOR) in 2006 as an effort to make the management of R&D and innovation more systematic, and in particular to provide a clearer structure for those companies interested in the introduction of TW processes. http://www.aenor.es/aenor/normas/normas/fichanorma.asp?codigo=N0036140&tipo=N (accessed May 2014).

12. Porter and Cunningham (2005) talk about watchers, technology and business analysts, and finally planners and managers.

13. Due to the large number of technologies identified within each of the technology areas, these have not been included.

14. There are companies (public and private) offering these services to local SMEs at an affordable price. For some examples, see the concluding section.

15. In the last decade, several knowledge management tools and platforms have been developed in order to make the search stages more continuous and systematic (Bucheli and Gonzalez 2007).

16. Dou (1997, 80) talks about ‘general information files’, which should answer the following question: who is doing what, where and when?

17. Porter (2005, 1070) refers to ‘open pagers’, which should ‘point to action recommendations or posing of key choices’ (1074).

18. More examples of public organisations supporting the development of TW activities in Spain can be found in http://www.fecyt.es/especiales/vigilancia_tecnologica/organismos.htm (accessed May 2014).