Final Report Summary - MANETEI (Management of Emergent Technologies for Economic Impact)
The ManETEI network is a research-led training programme designed to create a rigorous collaborative research agenda centred on the multifaceted phenomenon of managing emergent technologies for maximum economic and social impact. It has advanced capability and career development to benefit the early-career and experienced researchers needed to ensure Europe becomes a leading knowledge economy.
For the last four years, the Marie Curie Initial Training Network has brought together a diverse group of leading European Business Schools, research institutes and industrial partners to focus on challenges of managing emergent technologies. The following research questions determined the research endeavour of Marie Curie fellows and their supervisors:
- Develop an integrated model of non-technical (institutional, organisational and managerial) factors that influence the development of emergent technologies.
- Identify strategies and capabilities needed for different members of technology innovation systems to ensure they capture the full value from emergent technologies.
- Develop a balanced model for monitoring the impact of emergent technologies.
- Develop evidence-based tools that guide practitioners in managing emergent technologies.
The conceptual framework has been developed to guide 18 research fellows through their research project and to provide robust tool to integrate insights from independent research activities.
Individual research projects progressed broadly in two directions. First group of researchers embraced the notion that technology innovation unfolds in complex settings where myriad of actors (companies, governments, universities and wider public) collaborate and interact in order to translate technological advances into solutions with impact of economic progress and social wellbeing. The second group zoomed-in and investigated how individual companies organize their innovation processes and identify what constitutes organizational capabilities that help organizations to capture value from emergent technologies. The first group could be further divided into researchers that investigated strategic challenges for policy makers in shaping technology development and those that centred their research on exploring collaborative and networking practices in technological and regional innovation networks. The second group consists of researchers that investigated foundations of organizational capabilities for technological innovation and those who explored how emergent technologies (mostly ICT-enabled) help companies to strengthen their innovation capabilities.
The insights from research exploring collaboration for shaping development of emerging technologies suggest there is an increasing need for capabilities that enable organizations to coordinate interactions between heterogeneous stakeholders and facilitate deliberation and research policy development. Through collaboration different groups of actors influence the attention of their audience by drawing it to particular topics, and implicitly trigger emotions associated with certain words to form attitudes toward technology. Alternative management and governance models - at organisational, institutional and (inter)national levels – needed to initiate new modes of responsible research and innovation. Policy initiatives and funding directly and indirectly shape the links among collaborative networks consisting of universities, public research organisations and firms, as well as the related industrial architecture. ManETEI research also suggests that governments need to design optimal combination of financial and fiscal instruments to support development and implementation of emerging technologies. The governmental policy will be better informed if intangible drivers and results of innovation are better developed.
Researchers investigating organizational capabilities for managing technology innovation identify importance of mechanisms, which enable group-level competences to be shared and adopted across groups. Managers have an important role to play in initiating such mechanisms through the establishment of appropriate arrangements that foster flexible integration of dispersed knowledge within organization. In particular, a mutable portfolio of both quantitative and qualitative tools for practitioners – as might be appropriate under the changing circumstances – should be employed, such that these tools promote technological innovation by facilitating knowledge exchange among different units and groups. These streams of research recognise a high importance of innovation management, which is quickly becoming a new profession in technology intensive companies. Research focusing on utilizing ICT technologies for strengthening innovation capabilities highlights the relevance of advanced gaming tools for education and training for innovation. It also recognises that recent developments in Web tools and social media platforms have affected the nature and intensity of interactions between organizations and their end-users and suppliers. The research identifies importance of incentives for contributing to technology platform for open innovation.
ManETEI network aspired to create a productive learning environment for early stage and experienced researchers. The network created a platform for sharing knowledge across industry-university divide. Eight dedicated training events and two conference tracks were highlights of training activities. These events brought together ManETEI fellows, their supervisors, established academics outside the network, and importantly, representatives from technology-driven companies. ManETEI researchers completed 24 placements and network visits that exposed them to industrial challenges and increased their employability.
ManETEI network confirmed the importance of large scale and structural collaboration between industry and academia in the field of management studies in general and innovation management in particular. It also indicated challenges that impede such collaboration. All partners in the network share a belief that European funding should provide more opportunities for the discipline of management.
For the last four years, the Marie Curie Initial Training Network has brought together a diverse group of leading European Business Schools, research institutes and industrial partners to focus on challenges of managing emergent technologies. The following research questions determined the research endeavour of Marie Curie fellows and their supervisors:
- Develop an integrated model of non-technical (institutional, organisational and managerial) factors that influence the development of emergent technologies.
- Identify strategies and capabilities needed for different members of technology innovation systems to ensure they capture the full value from emergent technologies.
- Develop a balanced model for monitoring the impact of emergent technologies.
- Develop evidence-based tools that guide practitioners in managing emergent technologies.
The conceptual framework has been developed to guide 18 research fellows through their research project and to provide robust tool to integrate insights from independent research activities.
Individual research projects progressed broadly in two directions. First group of researchers embraced the notion that technology innovation unfolds in complex settings where myriad of actors (companies, governments, universities and wider public) collaborate and interact in order to translate technological advances into solutions with impact of economic progress and social wellbeing. The second group zoomed-in and investigated how individual companies organize their innovation processes and identify what constitutes organizational capabilities that help organizations to capture value from emergent technologies. The first group could be further divided into researchers that investigated strategic challenges for policy makers in shaping technology development and those that centred their research on exploring collaborative and networking practices in technological and regional innovation networks. The second group consists of researchers that investigated foundations of organizational capabilities for technological innovation and those who explored how emergent technologies (mostly ICT-enabled) help companies to strengthen their innovation capabilities.
The insights from research exploring collaboration for shaping development of emerging technologies suggest there is an increasing need for capabilities that enable organizations to coordinate interactions between heterogeneous stakeholders and facilitate deliberation and research policy development. Through collaboration different groups of actors influence the attention of their audience by drawing it to particular topics, and implicitly trigger emotions associated with certain words to form attitudes toward technology. Alternative management and governance models - at organisational, institutional and (inter)national levels – needed to initiate new modes of responsible research and innovation. Policy initiatives and funding directly and indirectly shape the links among collaborative networks consisting of universities, public research organisations and firms, as well as the related industrial architecture. ManETEI research also suggests that governments need to design optimal combination of financial and fiscal instruments to support development and implementation of emerging technologies. The governmental policy will be better informed if intangible drivers and results of innovation are better developed.
Researchers investigating organizational capabilities for managing technology innovation identify importance of mechanisms, which enable group-level competences to be shared and adopted across groups. Managers have an important role to play in initiating such mechanisms through the establishment of appropriate arrangements that foster flexible integration of dispersed knowledge within organization. In particular, a mutable portfolio of both quantitative and qualitative tools for practitioners – as might be appropriate under the changing circumstances – should be employed, such that these tools promote technological innovation by facilitating knowledge exchange among different units and groups. These streams of research recognise a high importance of innovation management, which is quickly becoming a new profession in technology intensive companies. Research focusing on utilizing ICT technologies for strengthening innovation capabilities highlights the relevance of advanced gaming tools for education and training for innovation. It also recognises that recent developments in Web tools and social media platforms have affected the nature and intensity of interactions between organizations and their end-users and suppliers. The research identifies importance of incentives for contributing to technology platform for open innovation.
ManETEI network aspired to create a productive learning environment for early stage and experienced researchers. The network created a platform for sharing knowledge across industry-university divide. Eight dedicated training events and two conference tracks were highlights of training activities. These events brought together ManETEI fellows, their supervisors, established academics outside the network, and importantly, representatives from technology-driven companies. ManETEI researchers completed 24 placements and network visits that exposed them to industrial challenges and increased their employability.
ManETEI network confirmed the importance of large scale and structural collaboration between industry and academia in the field of management studies in general and innovation management in particular. It also indicated challenges that impede such collaboration. All partners in the network share a belief that European funding should provide more opportunities for the discipline of management.