Technology Growth and Development or The Innovation Journey

Technology, Growth, and Development: An Induced Innovation Perspective

Author: Vernon W Ruttan

Technology, Growth, and Development uniquely presents the complexities of technical and institutional change on the foundation of modern growth theory. The author shows how the rates and directions of technical change are induced by changes in competitive funding and institutional innovations in the modern research university and industrial laboratory. In turn, technical change itself becomes a powerful source of institutional change. Organized by the author in four parts, the first-Productivity and Economic Growth-gives specific reasons for the slowing of productivity growth in the United States and other leading industrial countries during the last quarter of the twentieth century. In Part II-Sources of Technical Change-the author examines a host of economic factors that influence invention and innovation; the rate and direction of institutional change; and the adoption, diffusion, and transfer of technology. In Part III-Technical Innovation and Industrial Change-he traces the sources and impact of technical change in five strategically important industries: agriculture, electric power, chemical, computer, and biotechnology. The final section, Part IV-Technology Policy-evaluates the role of technical change in international competition, the role of science and technology in environmental policy, and the evolution of U.S. science and technology policy. Technology, Growth, and Development makes few mathematical demands on students, and will be used in courses within economics departments as well as management and public affairs. In addition, it will be required reading for professional economists, managers, and policy analysts at all levels.

See also: Accounting or Microeconomics

The Innovation Journey

Author: Andrew H Van De Ven

The Innovation Journey presents the results of a major longitudinal study that examined the process of innovation from concept to implementation of new technologies, products, processes, and administrative arrangements. Its findings call into question most of the explanations of the innovation process that have been proposed in the past.
The Minnesota Innovation Research Program, on which this book is based, involved over 30 researchers who undertook longitudinal studies that tracked the development of 14 diverse innovations in real time and in their natural field settings. Studying its results, the authors find that the innovation journey is neither sequential and orderly, nor is it a matter of random trial and error; rather it is best characterized as a nonlinear dynamic system.
The system consists of a cycle of divergent and convergent activities that may be repeated over time and at different organizational levels if enabling and constraining conditions are present. This divergent-convergent cycle is found to be the underlying dynamic that explains the development of corporate cultures for innovation, learning among innovation team members, leadership behaviors of top managers or investors, building relationships and joint ventures with other organizations, and developing an industrial infrastructure for innovation. Resource investments and organizational structure enable this innovation cycle, while external institutional rules and internal focus draw the boundaries of the journey.
The authors conclude with advice for innovation managers and entrepreneurs: learn to "go with the flow," because while they can learn to maneuver through the innovation journey,they cannot control its flow.

Table of Contents:

	Foreword
	Preface
1	Introduction and Overview	3
2	Mapping the Innovation Journey	21
3	Learning the Innovation Journey	67
4	Leading the Innovation Journey	95
5	Managing Relationships during the Innovation Journey	125
6	Building an Infrastructure for the Innovation Journey	149
7	Cycling the Innovation Journey	181
8	The Innovation Journey within an Internal Corporate Structure: The 3M Cochlear Implant Case	223
9	The Innovation Journey in an Interorganizational Joint Venture: The Therapeutic Apheresis Case	291
10	The Innovation Journey in a New Company Start-Up: The Qnetics Case	335
	Bibliography	383
	Index	403