Co-creation of what? Modes of audience community collaboration in media work

© 2017 SAGE Publications. This article explores processes of co-creation in the media industry, particularly in the context of magazine media brands. We discuss the content and practices of creative collaboration between editorial teams and online audience communities. Based on two empirical case studies using analytical interviews and focus group discussions, we introduce a new model and framework for analysing co-creative processes. The model of co-creative collaboration is focused on three areas of media work: production, marketing and development. We conclude that co-creative processes between editorial teams and audience communities have a definite impact on the future of media work and media management. Importantly, the work of editorial teams is transformed from content production through creating platform concepts to coordinating, managing and nurturing audience communities

Managing for Serendipity: Exploring the Organizational Prerequisites for Emergent Creativity

© 2017 Institute for Media and Communications Management. In this article we explore the conditions for creative work in media organizations from the viewpoint of serendipity and the management of serendipity. Our study contributes to the field of media management research by theorizing change and creativity within the framework of organizational serendipity. Based on an analysis of empirical data collected with the diary method in a media organization, the article also discusses the rationale of managing for serendipity in creative media organizations from strategic, structural, and cultural viewpoints. We argue that the management of organizational serendipity should be aimed at managing for serendipity, not managing serendipity as such. In practice, this means that serendipity management should be understood as creating suitable conditions for serendipitous creative processes and facilitating creative work, motivation, and collaboration in the organization

Rethinking creativity in journalism: Implicit theories of creativity in the Finnish magazine industry

© SAGE Publications. This article explores conceptions of creativity in the media industry, specifically among professionals of journalism working in the magazine industry. It contributes to the development of the theory of creativity from a media industry perspective and produces new conceptual knowledge about creative media work. The article finds that in the magazine industry, journalistic creativity is understood as a practical and multidimensional concept that can be interpreted and applied in many different ways. The different conceptions of creativity reflect both the traditions of the journalistic profession and the challenges now faced by the media and the magazine industry. It is concluded that creative work in the magazine industry is typically goal driven, commercially minded and collaboratively oriented. Also, creative work in the magazine industry is characterized by ongoing processes of gradual reinvention. Other major creative challenges include the development of new ways of working, new media products and new commercial solutions