IPE Thrust Seminar | What Management Practices Can Best Help Firms to be Innovative: Insights from China and Finland
Supporting the below United Nations Sustainable Development Goals:支持以下聯合國可持續發展目標：支持以下联合国可持续发展目标：
What Management Practices Can Best Help Firms to be Innovative: Insights from China and Finland
Abstract:
The Chinese government has placed great importance on firms in China being more innovative and innovation is a key driver of competitive advantage and firm performance, thus, understanding what management practices can best help firms to be more innovative is a critical skill that managers working in China need and will be the focus of this seminar. However, innovation is a complex process where higher input, if not correctly designed, does not necessarily lead to higher output. Further, what works best to facilitate innovation in one country may not work best in another country due to cultural and institutional differences. Following a more general and practical introduction, we will discuss in more detail the role of paradoxical management practices which can help to effectively manage key tensions present in the innovation process. While many studies have focused on the tension between exploration and exploitation, there are other potentially-important tensions that have not received much attention. We use Smith and Lewis’ (2011) paradox framework to examine how four pairs of paradoxical practices (performing, organizing, learning, and belonging) are positively associated with innovation/ new product development performance (product effectiveness and process efficiency). We also argue that country context moderates the effectiveness with which paradoxical practices are implemented. Using empirical data from multiple respondents to a survey of 200 Chinese firms and 164 Nordic firms (Finland and Sweden), the results indicate that the performing paradoxical practice is positively related to product effectiveness, whereas the organizing paradoxical practice is positively linked to process efficiency. Moreover, the learning paradoxical practice is positively linked to both product effectiveness and process efficiency. Finally, the moderating role of country context is significant in several of our analyses, indicating that Chinese firms are better able to deal with paradoxical tensions present in new product development than Nordic firms.
Carl Fey is a Professor of Strategy at BI Norwegian Business School. He was a Professor of International Business at Aalto University School of Business from 2016 to August 2022 and Dean of Nottingham University Business School China from 2011-2015. Prior to joining Nottingham, Professor Fey was a Professor of International Business at Stockholm School of Economics in Sweden where among other things he helped to start and lead the development of a branch campus in Russia which became one of the top two providers of EMBA programs in the Russian market on which it focused. Professor Fey’s research explores how cultural and institutional differences between countries affect which management practices work best. He has a special interest in understanding what management practices work best in China. Current research interests include innovation, self-management, organizational culture, knowledge transfer, and firm internationalization. He has published over 60 journal articles in leading journals, is a fellow of the Academy of International Business, and a recipient of the 2013 Journal of International Business Studies Decade Award which is an award given for the article published in the Journal of International Business Studies one decade ago which has had the largest influence on the field of international business, and a recipient of the Journal of International Business Studies Silver Medal in 2019 for the most publications in the journal over the past 50 years. Fey was also named a Qianjiang Scholar (钱江学者) in 2013. He is an experienced executive educator and places importance on ensuring that his research has impact on practice. For example, in the last academic year he had over 100 popular press appearances (including republishing).