Does Opening Strategy in Organizations Lead to Effectiveness and Success?

Despite recent attention in information systems and strategy research considering inclusiveness, transparency, and use of IT tools in strategy formulation (also known as open strategy), the effectiveness of these principles has not been empirically studied in the literature. This research gap is even more prominent when we consider distinct positives and drawbacks of an open strategy approach when synthesising extant literature. This research in progress outlines a macro-level approach to further exploring this highlighted gap in our understanding. Here, research constructs are described and logically positioned within the literature and then, using existing studies from various fields, a number of items to measure each construct are presented. These items are proposed to consider various aspects of open strategy principles (i.e. internal and external, inclusive and transparent). Further, and based on the available literature on openness in strategy, we identify several points to facilitate measuring the open strategy phenomenon. The paper also briefly presents initial findings and an agenda for future steps in relation to data collection and analysis as this research-in-progress moves forward. The paper concludes by remarking intended contributions and potential implications of the study for both practice and research

Creativity and culture in organizations

Organizational culture is averse to innovation. Some organizations are dedicated to creativity as a business (e.g. advertising, cinema or design): they nevertheless apply the classic production rules of labour division, specialism, incremental innovation and evaluation by demand. Creativity applied to organizations themselves, or to in-house processes, is tricky because organizations are by nature averse to change. There, creativity is confronted to a double bind: the injunction to set up something new but within the current rules and culture of the organization. Organizations are “installations” where the culture is distributed within three layers (built environment, embodied competences in members, institutional rules). The innovator jeopardizes the current state of things and hard-won compromises in this installation. That is an uncomfortable position and the fate of many innovators is tragic because they are troublemakers; often also they remain unrecognized. Unlike some other domains, creativity in organizations cannot be individual. We will describe in this chapter the nature of the double bind faced by creativity and innovation in large organizations and list some current solutions