Creativity in a 24h-long virtual design team

Creativity has traditionally constituted an important topic in organizations and its importance seems to have increased as we have been moving from traditional, physically collocated to virtual, geographically dispersed team configurations. Our study aims to bridge this gap by examining the case of creativity in virtual design teams (VDTs)—that is, virtual teams in the context of engineering design. We see design as a collaborative activity and use it as the empirical context in this study. We report on the findings from a case study with a temporary, 24h-long, VDT, which examined the relationship between creativity and virtuality. We employed multiple data collection methods, capturing most of the 24h, (i.e. interviews, non-participant observation, videos, design outputs, written communications), and analysed our data thematically following an interpretive approach and by using the ‘team’ as our unit of analysis. Our study extends prior knowledge on creativity in virtual teams by (a) positioning creativity within the VDT lifecycle; and by (b) elucidating the relationship between creativity and the unique characteristics of virtuality. We infer that boundaries, language, geographical dispersion, subgrouping, and computer-mediated communication are associated with creativity in the VDT context; and explain how they influence it

La créativité en petites et moyennes entreprises

Le capital immatériel consiste en un levier de transformation incontournable pour développer un avantage concurrentiel des organisations et sa construction sollicite la créativité organisationnelle. Malgré le nombre impressionnant d’articles publiés au sujet de la créativité et plus particulièrement sur la créativité organisationnelle, les chercheurs dans ce domaine se concentrent sur le cas des grandes entreprises. Partant de ce constat et à la suite d’une revue de littérature approfondie, en connaître davantage sur la créativité dans le contexte de la PME est essentiel pour les PME elles-mêmes, mais également pour les chercheurs dans le domaine. Quelques auteurs ont certes adressé le sujet de la créativité en PME, mais certains aspects ont été négligés et la question actuelle se pose : « Comment la créativité se manifeste-t-elle et se développe-t-elle en PME? ». Cette recherche répond à cette question à deux volets par une collecte de données en deux phases, soit une enquête Delphi auprès d’experts et des entretiens semi-dirigés en PME créatives. Ces deux phases ont permis de connaître les manifestations et les facteurs de développement de la créativité en PME. Les résultats démontrent que les PME créatives obtiennent de meilleures solutions aux problèmes, un développement de nouveaux produits distincts, une satisfaction des clients et des employés, une meilleure compétitivité et améliorent leurs chances de survie. Pour développer cette créativité organisationnelle, la motivation de la haute direction dû à l’environnement interne, les caractéristiques des dirigeants et l’environnement externe mènent à une adoption de comportements par la direction et les gestionnaires puis à la mise en place d’une culture organisationnelle, de pratiques de gestion et d’outils de créativité. Cette étude révèle d’ailleurs que la sélection des idées consiste au point de bascule de la transformation de la créativité organisationnelle en manifestations tangibles de celles-ci. Cette étude constitue le premier pas dans la recherche sur la créativité en PME et devrait être utilisée pour guider des recherches ultérieures dans le but de mieux comprendre la créativité en PME. Intangible assets are great to transform the drivers of an enterprise, and are a crucial part of its competitive advantage. Human capital is built with the creativity of the employees within the firm. Despite the incredible amount of literature written about professionals’ and academics’ creativity, the researchers in the domain of creativity concentrated their work on large organizations. A literature review on the subject suggests that none of the research has explored creativity in SMEs in a global manner. Some authors have addressed the issue of creativity in SMEs, but some points have been neglected, and the question that should be asked is "How is creativity manifested and developed in SMEs?" This research aims at answering this two-sided question. To do so, a two-phase data collection was conducted, which includes a Delphi survey with experts on creativity in SMEs and interviews led with creative SMEs. This data collection resulted in a list of manifestations and elements for the development of creativity in SMEs. The results show that the creative SMEs find more solutions to their problems, develop distinctive products, satisfy their clients and employees, are more competitive, and have a better chance to survive. To develop organizational creativity, the motivation of a highlevel manager is fostered by the internal environment of the firm, the manager’s characteristics, and the external environment of the firm. This motivation will encourage the managers and leaders to adopt certain behaviors, and then put in place an organizational culture, practices and creativity tools. This research also reveals that the selection of ideas is a tipping point in the transformation of organizational creativity into tangible manifestations. This study represents a first step regarding research on creativity within SMEs, and should be used to guide subsequent research in this field to better understand creativity in SMEs

Criatividade e inovação no processo de planeamento de sistemas de informação

Tese de doutoramento em Tecnologias e Sistemas de Informação - Engenharia e Gestão de Sistemas de InformaçãoA criatividade é o produto do génio humano, enquanto gerador de novas ideias. A inovação resulta da transformação das novas ideias em aplicações úteis susceptíveis de melhorar o que existe. Face à crescente competitividade global, a capacidade das organizações utilizarem, eficazmente, as tecnologias da informação e apostarem na inovação são considerados importantes factores para melhorar a competitividade e agilidade das empresas. Sendo o Planeamento de Sistemas de Informação a actividade da organização onde se define o futuro desejado para o Sistema de Informação, afigura-se como importante recorrer a processos criativos para estimular a produção de ideias, produzir novas combinações, obter respostas inesperadas, originais e úteis e, dessa forma, gerar inovação nos Sistemas de Informação e na forma como são utilizados. No entanto, constatámos que os métodos existentes não possuem processos estruturados para implementar este objectivo. Concluiu-se, assim, sobre a necessidade da definição de uma estratégia e de um método específico para introdução de processos criativos no processo de Planeamento de Sistemas de Informação. Partindo do conhecimento existente, foi desenvolvida uma estratégia e um método específico para introdução de criatividade, no processo de Planeamento de Sistemas de Informação. A fim de validar a proposta, foi efectuada uma aplicação prática do método, no contexto de um projecto real de Planeamento de Sistemas de Informação de grande dimensão, tendo sido verificada a sua adequação.Creativity is the product of human genius, while generating new ideas. Innovation is the result of transforming new ideas into useful applications that could improve what exists. Considering the global competitiveness, the organizations ability to make effective use of information technology and to focus on innovation and creativity is recognized as being important. Being the Information Systems Planning the organization activity where desired future for the information system is defined, it is important to use creative processes to support and stimulate the production of new ideas, producing new combinations, get unexpected answers, original and useful, and thereby to generate innovation in the information systems and in the way they are used. However, we found that existing methods do not include structured processes to implement this objective. We conclude, therefore, on the need to define a strategy and a specific method for introduce creative processes in the Information Systems Planning. Based on the existing knowledge, we developed a strategy and a specific method for introduce creative processes in the Information Systems Planning. In order to validate the proposal, we made a method practical application in the context of a real Information Systems Planning project and its suitability was confirmed