innovation communities: trust, mutual learning, and action

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NORDIC INNOVATION REPORT 2012:22 // JANUARY 2013

Innovation Communities:Trust, Mutual Learning and Action


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Authors:

Michael J. Lippitz

Robert C. Wolcott

Jrn Bang Andersen

With:

Bradley Harteld

Marmon Pine

Talya Press

Jennier Yee

January 2013

Nordic Innovation Publication 2012:22

Innovation Communities:Trust, Mutual Learning and Action


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Copyright Nordic Innovation 2012. All rights reserved.Ti pubication incude materia protected under copyrit aw, te copyrit or wic i ed by Nordic Innovationor a tird party. Materia contained ere may not be ued or commercia purpoe. Te content are te opinion o tewriter concerned and do not repreent te ofcia Nordic Innovation poition. Nordic Innovation bear no reponibiity

or any poibe damae ariin rom te ue o ti materia. Te or iina ource mut be mentioned wen quotin romti pubication.

Innovation Communities:

Trust, Mutual Learnin and Action

Nordic Innovation Publication 2012:22

Nordic Innovation, Oslo 2012

ISBN 978-82-8277-049-1

(URL:www.nordicinnovation.org/publications)

Author(s):Michael J. Lippitz

Robert C. Wolcott

Jrn Bang Andersen

With:Bradley Harteld, Marmon Pine, Talya Press, Jennier Yee

Publisher

Nordic Innovation, Stensberggata 25, NO-0170 Oslo, NorwayPhone: (+47) 22 61 44 00. Fax: (+47) 22 55 65 56.

Email: [email protected]

www.nordicinnovation.org

Cover photo: iStockphoto.com
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Project Participants

Kellogg School of Management,Center for Research in Technology and InnovationMichael J. Lippitz, Ph.D. (Project leader)Senior Research Fellow

Kellogg Innovation NetworkRobert C. Wolcott, Ph.D.Founder and Executive Director

Nordic InnovationJrn Bang AndersenSenior Innovation Advisor

With:Bradley HartfeldMarmon PineTalya PressJennifer Yee


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Contents

Project Participants . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5

Research Motivation and Scope . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

Project Team . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13

Background . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15

What Do We Mean By Innovation and Innovation Management? 15

Open Innovation 17

Communities of Practice 20

The Innovation Community (InnoComm) Phenomenon . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

The Emergence of InnoComms 21

Denition of InnoComms 23

Types of InnoComms 26

Online Communities 46

Observations and Open Questions about InnoComms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57

InnoComms and Regional Development 57

Regional Differences 60

Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63

Case Studies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64

Innovation Network Corporation of Japan (INCJ) 66

Nordic Innovation 68Kea New Zealand 76

The Colorado Innovation Network (COIN) 80

Knowledge Transfer Networks (KTNs) 84

Manufacturing Innovation Network (MIN) 91

Berkeley Innovation Forum 94

Cardiff University Innovation Network 9 7

The Innovation Network (Cornell) 101

Reference Center for Innovation, Fundao Dom Cabral (FDC) 106

Kellogg Innovation Network (KIN) 111

Knowledge Center for Innovation (KCI), Technion 116

i-Net Practitioners Alliance 120

Intelligent Formulation 123

Club de Paris des Directeurs de lInnovation (CP) 126


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Contents

Society for Organizational Learning (SOL) France 131

UK Innovation Forum (UKIF) 137

Young Presidents Organization (YPO) 140

Aalto Entrepreneurship Society (Aaltoes) 145

Built In Chicago (BIC) 150

Chicagoland Entrepreneurial Center (CEC) 154

Honey Bee Network 158

MIT Venture Mentoring Service (VMS) 163

Aspen Network of Development Entrepreneurs (ANDE) 168

Mistra Centre for Urban Futures 174

Urban Sustainability Directors Network (USDN) 180

ROI Community 189

Table of Abstract. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 194


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8 INNOVATION COMMUNITIEs: TRUsT, MUTUAl lEARNINg AND ACTION

Research Motivation and Scope

Nordic Innovation, supporter o this research1, is a joint eort o Denmark, Finland,Iceland, Norway, Sweden and the autonomous regions o Greenland, land and the

Faroe Islands under the auspices o the Nordic Council o Ministers. Nordic Innovation

aims to create crossborder, crosssector relationships among companies and other

institutions in its member countries ocused on innovation, entrepreneurship and

sustainable growth. It also promotes the Nordic region as a leading innovation hub or

international partners in other parts o the world.

Jrn Bang Andersen, a Senior Advisor to Nordic Innovation, has been an active

participant in the Kellogg Innovation Network2 (KIN), ounded and directed by Robert

C. Wolcott. Though this experience together, we conceived this research project aimed

at identiying and characterizing groups around the world that, like KIN and Nordic

Innovation, are engaged in mutual learning about innovation and entrepreneurship

management.

Initially, we were not certain what kinds o groups we would nd. We were aware o

a handul o groups with which we had been in contact in the course o creating and

growing KIN and in the networks around Nordic Innovation. Much o the early work

involved an iterative process o nding candidates through a combination o Internet

searches and outreach to our proessional networks, while at the same time dening and

redening what exactly we were trying to nd. (As o this writing, a Google search or

the phrase innovation network yields almost our million results.) As we discovered

groups that seemed to exempliy what we consider to be special and dierent about KIN,

we began to develop taxonomies and rene exactly what characteristics dierentiate

groups o interest.

Over time, although the ormal title on the research contract with Nordic Innovation is

Mapping Global Innovation and Entrepreneurship Networks, we came to use the term

Innovation Communities (InnoComms) to emphasize groups that ocus on relationships,

1 Contract 10109, Mappin goba Innovation and Entrepreneurip Networ.

2 www.inoba.or
http://www.kinglobal.org/http://www.kinglobal.org/


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9REsEARCh MOTIVATION AND sCOPE

common interests and experiences, and personal inspiration and support. We distinguishthese rom groups that ocus on achieving specic business, macroeconomic or social

results or on academic research. We will develop this distinction and others in depth in

the body o the report.

For now, what is important is that doing so has narrowed the scope o our research

considerably. We considered that advantageous, as it allowed us to ocus on the

emerging phenomenon o InnoComms and to eliminate organizations and networks

that, while very important and valuable, have been studied extensively elsewhere.

Examples o organizations that were mostly outside the scope o our research included

technology transer oces, IP brokers, startup incubators, technology parks, industrylobbying groups, corporate supplier or user networks, unding agencies, investor groups,

standards bodies and research consortia. That said, we do include certain o these kinds

o groups, to the extent that they acilitate peertopeer learning that is directed at

building general innovationenabling skills, rather than at solving specic problems.

We have been publishing excerpts rom our case studies online3 and maintain a project

website4 where people can send us inormation about their groups. In the end, we ound

and collected basic inormation on more than one hundred InnoComms. From that

set, we conducted interviews and wrote case studies on twentyseven o them, in ten

countries. Our database includes examples rom every continent, though limitations

in our connections and languages made it dicult to nd and identiy InnoComms

in certain parts o the world. We also might not have recognized certain orms o

organizations as InnoComms, and their leaders might likewise not have recognized

themselves as exemplars o our ramework. There are undamental dierences even

within a given country or culture in how people perceive and articulate trust, community,

relationships, change and innovation.

Although InnoComms generally do not ocus on building actual businesses or ostering

collaboration among participants on specic innovation and entrepreneurship

challenges, we believe that they can support company and industry competitiveness,

expansion into international markets and regional economic development. O particular

interest or Nordic Innovationa group o small, highlyeducated countries seeking

ways to collaborate with others in order to remain competitiveis the relationship

between InnoComms, where people come to learn rom and support each other, and

the phenomenon o open innovation, in which companies increase their reliance on

external collaboration globally. We address these topics in various places in this report.

We expect our research will be useul to a wide range o innovation and entrepreneurship

3 www.innovationexceence.com

4 www.inetnet.or
http://www.innovationexcellence.com/http://www.inetnets.org/http://www.inetnets.org/http://www.innovationexcellence.com/


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leaders. Our work can contribute to a betterinormed discussion o the range ostructures, programs and methods that InnoComms have so ar developed. It also

can help us begin to see the signicance and evolution o InnoComms and their role

or economic development, competitiveness and innovation partnerships in a global

economy. The primary target groups are as ollows:

Policymakers seeking to support innovation, entrepreneurship and economic

development

Business practitioners and consultants involved in driving or enhancing innovation

and entrepreneurship

Researchers, teachers and students o innovation and entrepreneurship

Leaders o established and nascent InnoComms


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11PROJECT TEAM

Project Team

Michael J. Lippitz (Project Leader)Mike Lippitz is a Senior Research Fellow with the Center or Research

in Technology and Innovation at the Kellogg School o Management,

Northwestern University; a Principal with Clareo Partners LLC and a

consultant with the Institute or Deense Analyses. Lippitz received

a bachelors degree in Electrical Engineering rom Brown University,

a masters degree in EngineeringEconomic Systems rom Stanord

University and a PhD in Management Science and Engineering rom

Stanord University, under ormer US Secretary o Deense William J.

Perry.

Robert C. Wolcott (Project Oversight and Research)

Robert C. Wolcott is the CoFounder & Executive Director o the Kellogg

Innovation Network (KIN) and a Senior Lecturer in Innovation &

Entrepreneurship at the Kellogg School o Management, Northwestern

University. He teaches corporate innovation and entrepreneurship or

Kellogg in Evanston, Miami and Hong Kong (with HKUST). Wolcott

also coounded and serves as Managing Partner o Clareo Partners

LLC, a corporate strategy and innovation management consultancy

specializing in new business creation and growth. Wolcott received a

BA in European and Chinese History and an MS and PhD in Industrial

Engineering & Management Science rom Northwestern University.

Jrn Bang Andersen (Nordic Research and Oversight)

Jrn Bang Andersen is Senior Advisor to Nordic Innovation on

innovation and globalization. Prior government advisory engagements

include deputy director to Invest in Denmark at the Ministry o Foreign

Aairs, special advisor to the Trade Council o Denmark and the

European Commission. Andersen also consults or private businesses.

He received an MA in political science rom Aarhus University, Denmark,

and an MA in Western European Politics and International Economics

rom University o Essex as part o an Erasmus scholarship.


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Bradley Harteld (Research)Bradley Harteld is an Innovation and Development consultant who has

specialized in the acilitation o private and publicsector innovation and

in the opportunities or creative peace inherent in conict settings in both

corporate and international conict environments. With Terry Winograd,

he coounded the HumanComputer Interaction program at Stanord

University. Harteld received a bachelors degree in Computer Science and

a masters degree in Linguistics rom Brown University, as well as a masters

degree in Public Policy rom Harvard University.

Marmon Pine (Research, Website and Database Creator)Marmon Pine is an established entrepreneur and has assisted numerous

hightech companies in their startup phase. He is an independent research

analyst or Clareo Partners LLC, and acts as a Business Adviser to the Vice

President o Engineering and Support Services or a national distributor o

medical equipment. Pine received a BS in Electrical Engineering rom the

Illinois Institute o Technology and an MS in Electrical Engineering rom the

University o Southern Caliornia.

Talya Press (Research)

Talya Presss strengths lie in her multicultural background and her twenty

years o experience as a CEO o international companies in sectors as

diverse as airline security, deense and the IT industry. Today she coaches

executives and their teams, ocusing on leadership development capacities,

multicultural environments and their challenges, potential optimization

and change management. She has studied Law (University o TelAviv) and

Political Science/History (Hebrew University). She also holds a masters

degree in Business Coaching (International Mozaik).

Jennier Yee (Research, Lead Case Study Writer and Database Management)

Jennier Yee is a startup entrepreneur and Principal at Clareo Partners

LLC. She has worked with highprole media companies such as National

Geographic Society, Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, Time Out, and

Emphasis Media in the AsiaPacic region. She received a bachelors degree

rom Williams College and her MBA rom the Kellogg School o Management

at Northwestern University.


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13sUMMARY

Summary

Innovation Communities (InnoComms) are groups o people who meet regularly,typically with skilled acilitation, to learn and share insights about the challenges

o managing innovation and entrepreneurship. Participants in InnoComms build

management capabilities and proessional networks through this mutual learning

and support, tapping into the knowledge and experience o people outside their own

organization, industry or country. Participants hope to adapt and apply what they learn

to a variety o innovation and entrepreneurship challenges when they return to their

organizations. Inspiration to action is an important part o the InnoComm experience.

InnoComms, as we dene them, do not ocus on building actual businesses or

collaborating to solve specic innovation and entrepreneurship challenges. This

generally distinguishes them rom corporate supplier or user networks, incubators,

research consortia and organizations that match entrepreneurs with investors. Business

partnerships and other ancillary benets may develop among InnoComm participants,

but people are there primarily to learn rom each other about innovation management,

not to do business together.

InnoComms are an emerging phenomenon, so our work was exploratory. We dene,

characterize and provide examples in ve categories o InnoComms:

Governmentsponsored agencies that oster collaboration among businesses and

connect them to academia and government

Universityled groups where executives share case studies and research in innovation

and entrepreneurship management and implementation

Business executive groups that share best practices in innovation management

Nonprot organizations that promote sharing o businessbuilding skills among

independent entrepreneurs

Groups o nonprot organizations that share innovation best practices


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Trust is more important in an InnoComm than in other ora where people gather toshare experiences and learn rom each other, such as conerences about innovation

or Communities o Practice. Innovation and entrepreneurship are inherently about

uncertainty, and missteps are the norm. A certain emotional saety is required or people

to reveal what they do not know and share lessons rom ailure, and the diversity o

participants requires skills in listening. Trust is built and maintained in an InnoComm

through listening deeply to the interests and needs o participants, skillul acilitation and

program design, and the gradual enculturation o participants to sharing and personal

risktaking. It is acilitated by shared mission, engagement, behavioral expectations,

consistency and careul selection o members (exclusivity, curation).

InnoComms oten create an online presence or social media platorm where participants

can share inormation, nd people with common interests and interact. We reckon that

those InnoComms leveraging social media will grow as todays young people advance

proessionally, and more sophisticated Internetbased collaboration tools may enrich the

InnoComm experience online, better recreating inperson levels o trust. Additionally,

we encountered some purely online communities that today tend to be diused and

organic, rather than orchestrated and deliberate like an InnoComm, but intend to oster

inperson networks.

The relationship o Innovation Communities to regional developmentespecially the

creation o innovation clusters or hot spotsis a story still being told. Governments,

regional coalitions, universities, industry, consultants and the World Bank have all made

signicant eorts and investments aimed at creating clusters, with limited success. The

skill enhancement, inspiration and international connection o innovation leaders in an

InnoComm helps individual organizations develop distinctive innovation approaches.

The trusted relationships engendered in an InnoComm could be expected to enhance

the development o clusters.


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Background

Every organization not just business needs one core

competence: innovation.

Peter F. Drucker

What Do We Mean By Innovation and InnovationManagement?

Innovation is increasingly imperative or all types o organizations. Corporations must

continually search or new competitive positions in the ace o globalization, new

market challengers and even the development o whole new markets and industries.

Governments struggle to provide services eciently and to create nancial and

regulatory environments that support private innovation in creating wellpaying jobs.

Nonprots and NGOs strive to solve problems that oten require adaptation to local

conditions and complex sets o stakeholders while still proving eectiveness to donors.

In all o these contexts, the term innovation can reer to a wide variety o activities and

results. Essential to the denition is contextual novelty. Novelty can reer either to the

introduction o something new and improved or to an activity that requires a person or

organization to do things dierently. (Economist and innovation theory pioneer Joseph

Schumpeter, in his book The Theory o Economic Development, identied the essence

o innovation as the conception, renement and realization o new combinations

something newly tried.) Equally important is the creation o signicant value, which

distinguishes an invention (something new) rom an innovation (something both new

and valuable).

Novelty and value are, o course, matters o degree. For our purposes, we are interested

in attempts by individuals and organizations to expand their capabilities or oerings

into areas beyond their core competencies, where there is signicant uncertainty. The

literature reers to such innovations as radical or disruptive or discontinuous, as


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distinct rom innovations that are incremental or sustaining. Ordinary new productdevelopment, where there are only minimal changes to the orm and unction o an

oering and very little development risk, represents a orm o incremental innovation.5

There are also numerous innovation dimensions, such as product, process,

organizational, brand and others. Business Model Innovation reers to a dierentiating

strategy across elements o a business beyond just product or services, including

partnerships, channels to market, sales competencies, supply chain or manuacturing

capabilities and so orth.

Regardless o the type or scope o an organizations innovation eorts, the innovationmanagement process may be dened as ollows:

Innovation Manaement is the discipline o uidin, discoverin, renin

and selectin concepts or development, and then resolvin uncertainty

rom idea to implementation throuh a deliberative process that varies

based on the level and type o risk at dierent staes6

The notion o innovation managementan oxymoron to someis part o a movement

that seeks to examine and dene the oundations o how knowledge is created

and transerred and how, in an organizational context, it might be managed. That

movement can be traced back to Peter Drucker, who coined the term knowledge

worker in his 1959 book The Landmarks o Tomorrow, and a chapter in his 1969 book

The Ae o Discontinuity, which popularized the term knowledge economy.

As usual, Drucker was prescient. Not until the 1990s did the concept o an inormation

society and its transormative possibilities become widely recognized. Initial eorts

to capture organization knowledge through inormation technology systems were not

producing the expected results. Ikujiro Nonakas 1991 article in Harvard Business Review,

The KnowledgeCreating Company, proposed that learning takes place through social

interactions that combine explicit and tacit knowledge. Tacit knowledge is the know

how, judgment, reasoning process, creativity and wisdom embodied in the work o a

5 For an oranization were eader enuiney upport innovation and provide team wit ufcient and appropriatereource and incentive, te abence o reuar aiure uet tat inifcant innovation i not occurrin. Butin a we-unctionin innovation proce, tee aiure oud ideay occur eary, wen cot are reativey ow.

6 Tere are a variety o metod, too and ramewor or manain innovation proram and project: Maret reearc: Identiy taeoder and teir connection, critica iue and unmet need. Future: Conider ow te word mit unod and te impication o poibe uture tate. Ideation: generate preiminary tout about innovation opportunitie (oten aided by experientia immerion

or creativity tecnique). Option: Combine idea into ubtantia innovation opportunitie, baced up by evidence and init, tat

coud addre critica iue and need today or in te uture. Portoio manaement: group option into on-term rowt patorm tat repreent trateic aternative,

and et prioritie amon tem. Concept deveopment: setc or prototype an eement o a rowt patorm, incudin te oerin, taret

cutomer ement, vaue propoition or a taeoder and requirement to deiver. Buine mode: Fuy defne te buine mode, te required upport ytem and a pan or earnin.


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master cratsman or an experienced scientist, designer or toolbuilder. Peter Senges1990 book The Fith Disciplinedeveloped the concept o a learning organization that

is constantly evolving and adapting, based not only on increasing personal mastery but

also constant challenging o mental models and development o shared vision. Arie de

Geus, head o Shell Oil Companys Strategic Planning Group, showed how such practices

could be instilled within a large corporation to help it become a living company.

Open Innovation

At a conerence in 1990, Bill Joy o Sun Microsystemsis reputed to have quipped, No matter who you are,

most o the smartest people work or someone else.

His statement presaged what would become a major

change in mindset in the eld o innovation. No longer

could companies rely solely on internal development to

cover the range and diversity o innovation relevant to their markets. In 2003, Henry

Chesbrough popularized the term open innovation to reer to a paradigm that assumes

the rms can and should use external ideas as well as internal ideas, and internal and

external paths to market. Open innovation combines internal and external ideas into

architectures and systems whose requirements are dened by a business model.7

The pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries in the 1980s were among the rst to

approach business development based on external monitoring and collaboration. They

partnered extensively with small biotechnology rms to access the tacit knowledge and

intellectual property key to success in a domain characterized by high uncertainty and

requiring a deep and wide range o scientic knowledge and specialized capabilities.

Research suggests that large pharmaceutical companies that were more active external

collaborators also perormed better over the long term with respect to both total market

return and relative valuations.8

Around the same time, Michael Porters research highlighted the importance o

geographic clusters o specialized companies and institutions that collectively

generate betterthanaverage productivity gains. In clusters, people and companies

orm relationships across the proessional, organizational, social and hierarchical

boundaries o companies, universities and government entities involved in one or

more related businesses (along with important support services and other resources).

Many o the advantages o clusters stem rom having the ingredients o innovation and

7 henry Cebrou, Open Innovation (harvard Buine scoo Pre, Cambride, 2003).

8 Robert C. Wocott, Networ tratey, innovation and perormance: A taxonomy o frm networ baed on com-petencie, networ economic and maret tructure, and it appication to te parmaceutica and biotecnooyindutrie (P.D. diertation, Nortwetern Univerity, 2002).

No matter who you are, most

of the smartest people work for

someone else.


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entrepreneurship readily available: access to inormation on technologies and trends,allowing companies to perceive market needs early; sharing o tacit knowledge (even

secrets) within trusted communities; intensive competition in the local market that

keeps everyone on their toes, oten through requent jobhopping by key people; access

to capital to start new businesses in newly invented markets; and tight supplier and user

relationships or executing on new ideas at scale.9 The result, in successul clusters, is

aster cycles o innovation and a strong entrepreneurial culture.

Note that malormed clusters can also retard innovation when companies adopt the

same way o competing and suppress disruptive ideas. The Los Angeles entertainment

cluster, or instance, seems in perpetual battle with new digital technologies. Andgovernments eorts to build clusters more oten than not ail to meet expectations. 10

Recent research suggests that international connections may be more important than

local clusters or driving radical innovation.11

Eric von Hippel described how suppliers and usersnot manuacturersdrive innovation

in some industries.12 The rise o the Internet in the 1990s ostered an explosion in

userdriven innovation in the orm o open source sotware development, customer

communities and the like. The Internet also made it easier to discover new technologies

and product ideas globally, including organized electronic R&D markets. The concurrent

rise in private venture capital in the 1990s encouraged talented knowledge workers

to leave large corporate laboratories, undermining the internal, closed innovation

model in industry ater industry. As a result, more and more companies are adopting

collaborative research models while improving their internal capabilities to search, rene

and integrate into their innovation regimes external knowledge and opportunities.

Technology brokering is another orm o corporate engagement, where some o the

rms R&D resources are reoriented to seek novel combinations o existing technologies

rom outside, seemingly unrelated industries. Andrew Hargadon writes, Pursuing a

strategy o technology brokering means recognizing that a key role o corporate R&D

is bridging the many dierent industries and markets that exist, and building the

necessary combinations o technologies and people to make potential breakthroughs

possible.13 Procter and Gamble has been a leader with its Connect+Develop program,

which engages its R&D sta with outside inventors. Connect+Develop is now a magnet

or entrepreneurs in the consumer packaged goods space.

9 Micae Porter, The Competitive Advantage of Nations (Free Pre, New Yor, 1990).

10 Jo lerner, Boulevard of Broken Dreams (Princeton Univerity Pre, Princeton, 2009).

11 Rune Da Fitjar and Andr Rodruez-Poe, Wen loca Interaction Doe Not sufce: source o Firm Innovation

in Urban Norway, (Intitute IMDEA socia science, worin paper, February 2011).12 Eric von hippe, The Sources of Innovation (Oxord Univerity Pre, london, 1988).

13 Andrew haradon, How Breakthroughs Happen (harvard Buine scoo Pre, Cambride, 2003).


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19BACkgROUND

Today, the challenge o innovation management hasevolved rom technologybased product and process

management to networkbased value creation across

the ull breadth o what a corporation does and how it

interacts with its ecosystem o customers, suppliers,

regulators, investors, media and other stakeholders.

Satish Nambisan and Mohanbir Sawhney dened

our models o open innovation based on external

networks (which they term networkcentric innovation). These models distinguished

by whether network leadership is centralized or diused and whether the space or

innovation is dened or emergent:14

Orchestra (centralized leadership, dened innovation space): A diverse set o partners

collaborate around a dened architecture, orchestrated by a lead rm.

Example: the Boein 787 Dreamliner project

Creative Bazaar (centralized leadership, emergent innovation space): A lead company

controls commercialization o a broad set o innovations sourced rom a diverse

network, acilitated by intermediaries.

Example: a music label

Jam Central (diused leadership, emergent innovation space): Innovators network

in an improvisational manner without clear leadership, toward evolving goals.

Example: a musical jam session

Mod Station (diused leadership, dened innovation space): Innovation is

implemented by a diverse, unorganized community o users and experts around an

existing, dened architecture.

Example: the computer amin industry

In our experience, most practitioners and students o innovation use the terms

innovation network and innovation community to reer to these and other types

o business building. We use the term InnoComm to reer to the dierent but related

phenomenon o mutual learning within a network or community, usually distinct rom

doing business or working on a project together. InnoComms are similar to (but not the

same as) Communities o Practice.

14 sati Nambian and Moanbir sawney, The Globnal Brain: Your Roadmap for Innovating Faster and Smarter in aNetworked World(Warton scoo Pubiin, Upper sadde River, NJ, 2008).

The challenge of innovationmanagement has evolved from

technology-based product

and process management to

network-based value creation.


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Communities o Practice

In 1998, Etienne Wenger coined the phrase Community o Practice (CoP), dened as

groups o people who share a concern, a set o problems, or a passion about a topic, and

who deepen their knowledge and expertise in this area by interacting on an ongoing

basis.15 CoPs are closely related to InnoComms and share many characteristics. For

instance, Wengers seven actions to cultivate a successul Community o Practice 16

largely apply to InnoComms also:

1. Design the CoP to evolve with changes in members interests and goals.

2. Create opportunities or open dialog inside the CoP and with people outside.

3. Welcome and allow dierent levels o participation.

4. Develop both public and private community spaces.

5. Explicitly discuss the value and productivity o participation in the CoP.

6. Combine amiliarity and excitement.

7. Create a rhythm or the CoPvibrant but not overwhelming.

CoPs can play an important role in innovation by

providing liquidity in knowledge markets. Innovative

concepts can be generated anywhere within an

organization. Unortunately, they are oten created

in locations where they are unlikely to be acted on.

An eective CoP helps move concepts to the right

locus or action, bridging the perspectives and values

o disparate organizations. For instance, researchers in universities, agencies and

corporations may share undamental skill sets and explicit knowledge but may have

tremendous gaps in tacit knowledge and motivation. The university researcher seeks

insights that can be published, while the agency researcher is looking or ways to meet

the agency mission, and the corporate researcher is seeking potentially protable

products and process improvements. Through a CoP, people with dierent motivations

can dene collectively benecial partnerships.

An InnoComm could be considered to be a orm o CoP. However, the nature o

InnoComms sets them apart and gives them the potential to play an important role in

innovation not routinely addressed by CoPs.

15 Etienne Wener, Ricard McDermott, and Wiiam M. snyder, Cultivating Communities of Practice (harvard Buinescoo Pre, Cambride, 2002).

16 Ibid.

Communities of Practice

can play an important role

in innovation by providing

liquidity in knowledge markets.


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21ThE INNOVATION COMMUNITY (INNOCOMM) PhENOMENON

The Emergence o InnoComms

Innovation and entrepreneurship are increasingly imperative or all types o

organizations: corporations, governments and nonprots. Over the past ew decades,

the management o innovation and entrepreneurship has evolved rom a serendipitous,

championled process to a managed, teambased process. In the 1980s, much attention

ocused on the socalled uzzy ront end, where initial ideas are ormed. Over

time, companies adapted phasegate methods to provide a disciplined yet exible

management tool or the early stages o innovation projects. And there were increased

eorts to improve the quality o ideas through better customer and market insights,

using more sophisticated quantitative analysis, as well as nonquantitative tools such

as ethnographic research and mapping o customers problems to be solved. Some

companies created special spaces or creative ideation.

As earlystage innovation management came to be adopted by companies, the locus o

innovation and entrepreneurship management moved to the problems o managing a

portolio o promising concepts and, more important, to transitioning successul ones

into operating businesses or scaling. Turning a good idea or invention into a signicant

protable business highlighted the need or innovation across all elements o a business,

known today as business system or business model innovation. Related to this, starting

around 2000, companies began creating Corporate Entrepreneurship organizations and

processes or building new businesses in areas adjacent to the corporate core, requiring

changes to several elements o their existing business systems and raising new issues in

leadership and stang.

As innovation and entrepreneurship strategies and practices have matured and diused,

enterprise leadersbe they corporate executives, managers o small and mediumsized

enterprises (SMEs), independent entrepreneurs, government ocials or ocers o

nonprot organizationsbegan to recognize that there are many people acing similar

innovation and entrepreneurship challenges. As described in the previous section, the

rise o open innovation and communities o practice (CoPs) meant that the environment

was ripe or enterprises seeking knowledge about innovation and entrepreneurship

The Innovation Community(InnoComm) Phenomenon


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strategy and about management rom peers outside o their home organizations.

We believe that there are at least our actors that have driven innovation and

entrepreneurship leaders to seek more diverse sources o knowledge, beyond the value

chain o their industries:

1. Companies within an industry tend to adopt undierentiated innovation

approaches.

Manuacturing rms tend to ocus on new technology; chemical companies tend

to ocus on process improvements; consumer products rms tend to ocus on

distribution and branding innovations; nancial rms tend to ocus on developingnew services and customer experiences.17 Innovation leaders seek lessons rom

other industries and other parts o the world to help them see things dierently and

develop distinctive approaches.

2. Many industries have not implemented modern innovation and

entrepreneurship practices.

Certain industries have been able to maintain their competitiveness without

having to rely on innovation and entrepreneurship. But the innovation imperative

is reaching new industries all the time. For instance, companies in the mining

industry are in the midst o the largest market expansion since World War II. In

order to realize the ull potential o this super cycle, companies need to make

signicant changes to their ways o doing business.18 But until recently, there were

ew companies in the mining industry that had developed innovative approaches.

Leaders in these companies have much to learn rom other industries as they begin

their innovation and entrepreneurship journey.

3. Global expansion requires varied models o innovation to benchmark.

Related to actor 2, companies seeking growth through international expansion nd

that success oten depends on creating new business models or dierent countries.

As globalization touches more and more industries, the need to learn about doing

business in oreign markets is increasing. Linking innovation and entrepreneurship

leaders in oreign countries can provide insights into the creation o appropriate

approaches.

4. Connecting with compatriots in other, noncompetitive industries allows or

greater openness and sharing o innovation and entrepreneurship challenges.

Leaders may be reluctant to share their business challenges when there are

competitors in the room. But openness about current weaknesses is critical to

17 Moanbir sawney, Robert C. Wocott and Inio Arroniz, Te 12 Dierent Way or Companie to Innovate (MITSloan Management Review, sprin 2006, pp. 7581).

18 Peter Bryant, Te Cae or Innovation in te Minin Indutry, Wite Paper, Careo Partner, llC, 2011.


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identiying and learning relevant innovation and entrepreneurship managementcapabilities. Innovation and entrepreneurship are inherently about uncertainty,

and missteps are the norm. Greater emotional saety is required or people to reveal

what they do not know and share lessons rom ailure.

Deinition o InnoComms

InnoComms are closely related to but distinct rom CoPs. Best practices are harder

to dene in the eld o innovation and entrepreneurship management than in

other domains o expertise. While skills and processes in a technology eld or astandardized management eld can be learned and applied across organizations, one

can rarely transplant an innovation process or method rom one organization to another

without signicant customization and adaption. Each organizations innovation and

entrepreneurship approach must be tailored to its business context, strategic goals and

organizational culture.

For instance, during the 1970s and 1980s, 3M was recognized as one o the most

innovative companies in the United States. However, commenting on 3Ms wellknown

practice o allowing people to selallocate up to 15% o their time, pharmaceutical

leader and innovator Dr. Nelson Levy quipped, I might as well give my people 15

percent paid leave!19 Google has implemented a version o the 3M practice, allowing

employees to spend 20% o their time promoting their ideas to colleagues, assembling

teams, exploring concepts and building prototypes. But Googles implementation bears

little resemblance to practices at 3M. Rather, practices had to be substantially adapted to

Googles business context and company culture.

InnoComms emphasize diversity. CoPs are requently ormed within a single company

to acilitate inormation exchange and coordination across business units. InnoComm

participants always come rom multiple organizations. At base, innovation requires the

ability to perceive, articulate and synthesize ideas across domains. Seeing things rom a new

angle improves problem solving and value creation. While participants in an InnoComm

share an interest in or responsibility or driving innovation and entrepreneurship in their

organizations, their particular contexts are likely to be quite dierent. Indeed, participants

are attracted to an InnoComm in part or the ability to interact with people rom industries

and cultures that are dierent than those they ordinarily encounter. This diversity o

mindsets creates a greater listening challenge or participants in an InnoComm than would

be required or a CoP or conerence ocused on their particular industry or domain. They

need to suspend critical judgment and reorganize their thinking in order to hear another

person who may represent very dierent expertise and a very dierent perspective.

19 Comment to Robert C. Wocott at a meetin o te keo Innovation Networ, 2004.


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Another element o an InnoComm is inspiration to action. In many companies,innovation and entrepreneurship are not well integrated with corporate strategy, and

executives in charge o driving innovation and entrepreneurship nd they have a lonely

and oten contentious job. For many participants in an InnoComm, orming relationships

with kindred spirits provides support and inspiration or taking on the uphill battle o

ostering signicant change, building their condence to embark on new possibilities.

Participation in an InnoComm can, thereore,

provide a orm o renewal and a place to build a

personal network o supportive colleagues. In the

most intensive InnoComm experiences, participantsmay come to view themselves dierently through

the experience o trust and support in the community. Sometimes, artistic events are

included among an InnoComms activities to better engage the transormative power o

both hemispheres o the brain. In the best case, sharing the InnoComm experience with

respected colleagues can make the achievement o innovation management acumen

seem more personally attainable. In that sense, participants leave an InnoComm event

as better, more creative innovators than when they started.

Successul InnoComms tend to evolve rom inormal meetings to purposeul

engagement that is generally not available rom alternative sources o innovation and

entrepreneurship management skills, such as executive education or engagement o

consultants. As such, they are not ad hocor leaderless. In our denition o an InnoComm,

there is structure and acilitation aimed at building trust and acilitating connections

across boundaries o experience, age, culture, etc.

Critically, however, InnoComms generally do not ocus on building actual businesses or

collaborating to solve specic innovation and entrepreneurship challenges. Partnerships

may orm naturally among InnoComm participants, but people are there to learn rom

each other, not necessarily to do business together or solve specic problems. Etienne

Wenger uses the Impressionists as an example o a CoP. They used to meet in caes and

studios to discuss the style o painting they were inventing together. But they usually

painted alone. In that sense, they were like an InnoComm. However, the interactions

that helped make them into a community o practice were largely leaderless. An

InnoComm is more deliberate. It is not like a conerence or networking event, where the

connections are usually largely unguided and where the expectation is that people are

seeking business connections.

Participation in an InnoComm

can provide a form of renewal.


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InnoComms ocus on learning and relationshipsdistinguishes them rom many important and valuable

networking organizations that ocus on achieving

specic business, macroeconomic or social results (e.g.,

technology transer oces and IP brokers, incubators

and technology parks, industry lobbying groups

and supplier or user networks, unding agencies and

investor groups, and standards bodies and research

consortia). On occasion, however, an organization such as an incubator or technology

transer oce will host an InnoComm. Some o the InnoComms described in our case

studies are hosted by organizations whose capability and communitybuilding activitiessupport their broader eorts to achieve particular results. And, as suggested a moment

ago, participants in InnoComms (and the organizations that sponsor their participation)

expect that some business or social value will arise as a result o the learning and

connections ormed. While orming partnerships is not the ocus, it is common or

business deals to occur among participants or or participating companies to engage

the InnoComm leader or an expert speaker at an event to provide proprietary advice

specic to their corporate innovation and entrepreneurship challenges.

This is perhaps the most subtle aspect o an InnoComm, one that we will delve into in

more depth later in this report, when discussing the importance o trust. The essential

element is that the nancial goals o the host, speakers and participants in an InnoComm

should not interere with the building o trust and openness critical to mutual learning.

In particular, the organizations that host an InnoComm strive to be perceived as an

honest broker. Participants, particularly speakers, must avoid the perception that their

contribution is more ocused on selling or business development than on mutual

learning. This is inevitably a matter o judgment.

In summary, InnoComms are orchestrated groups o people who:

Focus on learning and building capabilities to manage innovation and

entrepreneurship, versus seeking specic business, macroeconomic or social results

Emphasize sharing and mutual learning among regularly involved participants

rom diverse organizations, industries and/or countries, toward building trust and

relationships, as opposed to largely oneway instruction, as in training classes

Are orchestrated and managed by dened leaders and usually include a core

group o committed participants, versus unstructured networking events where

interactions are ad hocand there is little continuity

Are actionoriented not exclusively academic but not aimed necessarily at

orming partnerships among the host, speakers or participants

InnoComms focus on learningand relationships distinguishes

them from many important

and valuable networking

organizations.


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Types o InnoComms

Much o the early work in this research involved an iterative process o discovering

candidates, while at the same time dening and redening what an InnoComm is. We

were interested in learning groups, but we quickly eliminated purely academic networks

because we wanted to ocus on practitioners o innovation. The learning ocus also

eliminated most networks whose goal is achieving specic business, macroeconomic or

social results. Our interest in peertopeer sharing narrowed our scope urther. Over time,

we came to use the term Innovation Communities rather than Innovation Networks

to emphasize that groups o interest ocus on relationships, personal inspiration and

support.

Once we had collected a ew dozen candidates, we created a taxonomy that distinguished

innovation and entrepreneurship groups based on what kind o organization served as

the host or organizer, where the InnoComm received unding or its operations and

what customers were the ocus or the group. We reasoned that the nature o the

host organizationgovernment, university, business or nonprot organization (NGO,

oundation, etc.)would shape the kinds o activities it would pursue. The source o

unding would inuence the mission and objectives o the InnoComm and, in cases

where the unding comes rom a dierent source than the target participants, highlight

dierent kinds o institutional relationships.

These distinctions created sixtyour possible categories o InnoComms: three aspects

(host, unding, ocus) crossed with our organizational categories (government,

university, nonprot, business). We consolidated some o the categories, considered

examples o each, and identied those that seemed to best t our denition o an

InnoComm. We were let with the ve categories in Table 1.

Table 1. Types o InnoComms

hot: govt.

Fundin: govt. or buine

Focu: Buine

Government-sponsored agencies that

oster collaboration among businesses

and connect them to academia and

government

hot: Univerity

Fundin: govt., buine or nonproft

Focu: Buine

University-led groups where executives

share case studies and lessons in

innovation and entrepreneurship

management and implementation

hot: Buine

Fundin: Buine

Focu: Buine

Business executive groups that share

best practices in innovation managment


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hot: Nonproft

Fundin: govt., buine or nonproft

Focu: Buine

Nonproft organizations that promotesharing o business-building skills

among independent entrepreneurs

hot: govt. or nonproft

Fundin: govt. or nonproft

Focu: govt. or nonproft

Groups o government or nonproft

organizations that share innovation best

practices

In the remainder o this section, we describe each type in turn and provide examples.

Many InnoComms do not t neatly into these categories, however. For instance,

some universityled groups and nonprot organizations receive unding rom localgovernment and pursue a mission that overlaps with governmentsponsored agencies.

Many universities have programs ocused on teaching students skills that will help them

be independent entrepreneurs and link them with mentors, experts and investors. One

o the InnoComms we prole has members that are nonprot organizations that support

entrepreneurs in developing countries. The membership o business executive groups

is very similar to that o certain governmentsponsored and universityled InnoComms,

and they use largely the same methods o ostering peertopeer learning.

There are doubtless other taxonomies that could be used to categorize the InnoComms

we have ound to date, as well as dimensions o the InnoComm experience that we have

yet to identiy. In each category, we have included at least one unusual example that

stretches the denition in particular ways.

Government-Supported Agencies

Governments have a clear interest in promoting business creation and development

in their regions. In the Background section, we described the work o Michael Porter,

which highlighted the importance o geographic clusters o specialized companies and

institutions that, in many cases, are hot spots o innovation and entrepreneurship.

We noted that eorts by governments to build clusters more oten than not ail to

meet expectations. Sometimes, these ailures are due to bad design, such as ailing to

recognize that encouraging innovation and entrepreneurship is more complex than just

redressing problems o insucient unding or entrepreneurs or creating inrastructure.

Innovation hot spots are ecosystems that include experienced lawyers and marketers, a

pool o relevant talent, local customers willing to partner with small and mediumsized

enterprises, universities actively involved in technology transer and networking, and

robust legal systems and capital markets.20

Many, i not most, governmentsupported agencies are directly involved in supporting

commercialization o technologies, incubation o new businesses, or ostering

20 Jo lerner, Boulevard of Broken Dreams (Princeton Univerity Pre, Princeton, 2009).


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connections between entrepreneurs and investors. As such, they generally do not t ourdenition o an InnoComm. However, we discovered several examples o such groups

that also support the creation o peertopeer sharing, which is viewed as complimentary

to their more direct eorts at building local business.

For instance, the Innovation Network Corporation o Japan (INCJ), launched in

2009, is a publicprivate partnership between the Japanese government and major

corporations. INCJ makes investments aimed at ostering ow o technology and

expertise beyond the boundaries o existing organizational structuresbe they start

up companies, mediumsized enterprises or large, established rmsand at building an

ecosystem o innovation. In Japan, many industries retain silo mentalities, and manycompanies have a tradition o going it alone. To overcome this, INCJ created three

distinct approaches to bringing people together. At one o these, the Roman Market,

roughly sixty entrepreneurs, inventors, unctional and operations experts and students

meet monthly to share and discuss innovation and entrepreneurship challenges. About

one third are regular, core members, including seasoned entrepreneurs and VCs. Ater

the meeting, participants continue their discussion inormally at a nearby restaurant.

Nordic Innovation (sponsor o this research project), a subsidiary o the

intergovernmental Nordic Council o Ministers, stimulates innovation and promotes

the Nordic region as an innovation hub in a number o ways: unding and publishing

research, acilitating publicprivate partnerships and ostering learning and networking

between companies. For instance, the Measured and Managed Innovation Programme

(MMI) brings together 100 companies to learn about increasing the eectiveness o

their innovation eorts. Participating companies (selected by the national innovation

agencies o their home country) are diverse in industry, size and maturity. MMI has

helped establish a common understanding and language that supports a shared

perspective on the process and nature o innovation. It has also helped to build

relationships across national boundaries toward the goal o collective improvement. In

addition, Nordic Innovation has other programs to encourage sharing and relationship

building internationally, such as their Nordic Green Global Innovation Centers, which

link executives in the cleantech industry in the Nordic region with their counterparts in

China and Japan.

Kea New Zealand (ormerly Kiwi Expat Association) has built a global network o

expatriate New Zealanders and riends o New Zealand that aims to inspire and connect

skilled and experienced expats with New Zealandbased businesses and social/cultural

institutions. Originally started in 2003 by a small but inuential group o successul

New Zealanders, in 2005 it received signicant unding rom the NZ Ministry o

Economic Development and in 2007 rom the NZ Ministry o Foreign Aairs and Trade,

allowing it to hire ulltime paid Regional Managers in 23 chapters around the world. The

World Class New Zealand program, one o Keas eorts, selects the most successul Kea


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members to, among other things, work collectively with the New Zealand governmentto improve the countrys innovation perormance. A series o census campaigns has

created a detailed database o tens o thousands o New Zealanders around the world.

The Colorado Innovation Network (COIN) was launched in November 2011 by

Governor John Hickenlooper. COINs mission is to stimulate local economic development

by ostering collaboration among leaders rom ederally unded research labs, higher

education institutions, government and community organizations, industry partners

and growth companies, as well as highgrowth entrepreneurs. The Innovation Summit,

rst held in August 2012, hosted more than 250 innovation leaders rom around the

state and world or a twoday summit in Denver. It culminated with a oneyear actionplan addressing how to enable innovation and new business creation, with progress

reports due at the next summit. One COIN initiative, The Urban Innovation Coalition,

brings together municipal, economic development and community leaders rom the

major metropolitan areas o Colorado to share best practices, devise programs, and bring

consistency and eciency to eorts aimed at earlystage businesses. The Colorado

Innovation Index, released annually at the COIN Innovation Summit, measures

Colorados industrydriven and overall innovation progress.

Knowledge Transer Networks (KTNs) aim to stimulate innovation and to improve

the United Kingdoms innovation perormance through peertopeer collaboration

and knowledge transer. KTNs are organized by technical elds (e.g., electronics) or

application domains (e.g., transport), with membership made up o UK businesses,

universities and nance and technology organizations. KTNs organize Special Interest

Groups and provide online access to reports, newsletters, webinars/etraining, events

diaries, econerencing and collaboration tools. Such groups prepare the ground or

companies to collaborate, and KTN acilitates such collaboration by providing program

and policy advice to UK science and technology agencies and other unding sources.

Manuacturing Innovation Network (MIN)created in 2009 by the Business

Development Oce o the City o Kitchener, Ontariois an online network or

manuacturers and their stakeholders in the Waterloo region o Ontario, Canada. The

MINs activities promote sharing o best practices within the industry through industry

networking groups, where members rom particular industries post presentations,

articles, and other inormation o interest to (a subset o) their peers, and where

interested members can nd each other and connect in person to discuss common

interests in more depth. Along the same lines, MIN maintains an events board or its

members to post educational and networking events. MIN also seeks to encourage

connections between the business community and local universities.

University-Led Groups

A variety o universities have explored hosting InnoComms. Sometimes a university will


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partner with a government agency that perceives community building as supportingits regional economic development mission. In that respect, certain universityled

InnoComms could be considered to be in the same category as the InnoComms

proled in the previous section, but with a more researchoriented avor. We prole

two universityled InnoComms that were launched with unding rom government but

evolved to be membersupported, and one that was launched by a university but later

attracted government unding to expand its eort. As with other governmentsupported

groups, they tend to ocus on small and mediumsized enterprises, though they

sometimes include large companies and local divisions o multinational corporations.

Other universitybased InnoComms are driven by a proessor or proessors who wish toenhance their research in the eld o innovation and entrepreneurship by connecting

with practitioners. These proessors are oten in business schools; relationships with

corporate executives provide them insight into unresolved management issues, while

also exposing executives to the latest academic research. Unlike governmentsupported

groups, which tend to ocus on small and medium enterprises in a particular region,

such universityled InnoComms engaged more with large, global corporations.

A third category o universityled groups are academic programs that also provide

networking support with experienced entrepreneurs and potential investors. We

decided to group these programs along with nonprot groups and oundations in the

next section, which describes groups that are ocused specically on independent

entrepreneurs.

The Cardi University Innovation Network, ormed in 1996, is an example o the

rst orm o universityled InnoComm. Housed within the universitys Strategic

Development Directorate and unded in part by the Welsh government, it serves as a

noncompetitive, neutral space to solve problems and support crosssector innovation

among local businesses and between these businesses and the university. The network

holds nine events per year (that are ree to its members), covering both broad topics and

specic industries. The presentation portion o the program oten includes a case study

o a local company, with learnings that may be benecial to the community atlarge. To

acilitate networking, attendees are colorbadged by themes related to the event topic

so that they may more easily identiy other attendees with similar interests. In addition

to inormal networking and presentations, these programs sometimes include smaller

clinics and onetoone meetings. The network maintains a hotline to address innovation

challenges by connecting people within the community and is experimenting with

social media, aimed in part at engaging groups underrepresented at events, such as

young proessionals and women.

The Knowledge Center or Innovation (KCI), housed within the Faculty o Industrial

Engineering and Management at the Technion, Israel, was ounded in 2008, with


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the goal o accelerating innovation by disseminating inormation and knowledge,ostering collaboration and establishing a network o researchers, businesspeople

and policymakers. Three years o initial unding was provided by the Israeli Ministry

o Science and Technology. KCI ocuses on the interace between hightech and

traditional industries, with some work on service industries as well. The Managing

Innovation Forum, started in 2010, brings together 4045 companies or 810 meetings

per year. A typical meeting begins with a lecture by a CEO or industry or academic

expert. Then there is a break or dinner, and aterwards smaller groups sit around a table

and engage in a live case study o a real company or industry issue. One goal o this less

ormal interaction is to begin building relationships between hightech and lowtech

companies, and some collaborations have already resulted.

Fundao Dom Cabral (FDC) characterizes itsel as, a development center or

executives, entrepreneurs and public managers [that] has been committed to

dialoguing and listening to organizations, and building integrated educational solutions

alongside them. In 2002, FDC ormed an Innovation Center, and today the center

manages three Reerence Centers or Innovation, each with about 1218 participating

companies. The meetings are structured around an open discussion with an innovation

expert; a benchmarking case study rom a company that has experience with the

relevant practice and a acilitated knowledgesharing opportunity, where small groups

o 56 companies meet around a roundtable to discuss issues, challenges and solutions

related to the topic. Each meeting concludes with an open plenary session with the

invited guests. The highlights rom cases and presentations are recorded and made

available on the FDC website and in elaborated case studies and working papers, which

are later made available to the participating companies, to be used to build or develop

new capabilities. (In 2008, ederal and state government agencies began participating

in and, later, unding some o the Innovation Centers research, with a ocus on breaking

down barriers between companies.) To disseminate the knowledge generated, the

center organizes a oneday conerence every year or about 500 people, where each

participating company in a Reerence Center can invite up to ten guests.

Kellogg Innovation Network (KIN) at the Kellogg School o Management,

Northwestern University, was created by a proessor, Robert C. Wolcott, in 2003, in

collaboration with Proessor Mohanbir Sawhney. KIN is a meeting place or business

executives and innovation leaders rom across multiple domains and industries

committed to ongoing collaboration around understanding global trends and market

disruptors, leadingedge research and novel solutions to growth. KIN hosts three events

per year (where participants pay a perevent ee, as or a conerence): two dialogues

or up to 60 people (one hosted at Kellogg and one at a member company), which ocus

on a specic topic in innovation and entrepreneurship management; and KIN Global,

an annual event or about 200 people that addresses broader global issues in the role o

innovation and entrepreneurship in creating prosperity. Through these events, regular


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KIN participants create a meaningul proessional network, and Kellogg researchers arebetter able to dene relevant and timely research problems based on real challenges

acing todays innovation and entrepreneurship leaders. KIN events balance expert

presentations with panels and breakout groups that encourage giveandtake and

mutual learning. Programs leave ample time or inormal discussions and social settings

to build community. Every event includes an artistic program to reinorce the links

between innovation as a creative activity, hard work, analysis and practice, while also

challenging participants to apply both sides o the brain.

Berkeley Innovation Forum at the Haas School o Business, University o Caliornia

at Berkeley, was ounded by Henry Chesbrough, author o the wellknown 2003 bookOpen Innovation. Ater receiving a number o queries about concepts published in

the book, Chesbrough decided that the most ecient way to share best practices was

to convene a group o 1012 companies in an ideasharing orum. Membership in the

Innovation Forum, which costs companies $10,000 per year, includes two twoday

Forums, two brieng sessions, and access to online materials, related workshops, new

research rom Chesbroughs Center or Open Innovation and other relevant innovation

research at Berkeley. Companies that participate in the Innovation Forum cannot be

direct competitors (unless the prior competing member assents to the inclusion o a

competitor) and must be willing to openly engage and contribute to the group. Agendas

are organized around specic topics, typically with a speaker rom outside o Berkeley,

and include time or companies to present their experiences directly to one another

and or structured eedback rom the group. Typical sessions run 4575 minutes and

may be presentations, panels, press conerences (where a presenter makes a short

statement and then takes questions) or workshop challenges (where members work on

a problem together and compete or prizes). The Forum has experimented with evening

entertainment so that participants may share an experience together as an accent to the

program or energizer beore the program begins in earnest.

The Innovation Network at Cornell University is a program o The Leland C. and

Mary M. Pillsbury Institute or Hospitality Entrepreneurship at the School o Hotel

Administration . It was the brainchild o an alumnus, Lee Pillsbury, who wanted to

bring together his hospitality peersa group o the most senior leaders o hotel brands,

management companies, and ownership groupsto ocus on innovation. A core group

o top leaders was recruited or the eort, and they served as a reerence to bring in

others. (Attendance is by invitation only, as the high caliber o meeting attendees would

otherwise attract most o the industry.) The network meets or one day twice per year,

each meeting coinciding with a major hospitality industry conerence that most CEOs

attend. The rst meeting occurred in 2008, just as the Great Recession was hitting the

United States and the world, so the original unding model (corporate subscriptions, like

the Berkeley Innovation Forum) was changed to a sponsorship model by vendors and

service providers to the industry, provided these companies could prove that they were


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innovative. (More recently, participants have been required to make a minimum $1,000taxdeductible git to the school.) The events always have roundtables, and almost hal

the time is set aside or participants to talk to and learn rom each other. To help make the

programs enjoyable and mindexpanding, some o the speakers come rom completely

dierent industries. Recent events have emphasized teambuilding exercises, where

each table is equipped with Intellimeet technology that acilitates realtime sharing o

notes and ideas around challenges presented to the group.

Business Executive Groups

There are a variety o InnoComms that cater to the same audiences as government

or universityled InnoComms but are hosted and acilitated by private companiesor nonprot organizations or selorganize. This oten gives these InnoComms the

character o a club, adding notable rigor and regularity to participants engagement.

The Club de Paris des Directeurs de lInnovation was created in 2008 as a pan

European orumthe members are not just Parisian or Frenchor research, sharing o

experience and networking on innovation and entrepreneurship management. Club de

Paris is the core o a broader group that meets annually or two days, as well as an even

broader group o about 5,000 innovation proessionals. Full membership in the Club

costs 8,500 per year or six halday meetings, six breakast meetings, two operational/

thematic workshops and the annual meeting. (Part o the unding pays or collaborative

research among member companies on agreed topics.) During events, members discuss

case studies and hear rom experts on selected subjects. There is no notion o best

practices but, rather, o biodiversity and sharing experiences. The workshops are lmed

so that members who cannot attend can see both the video record and the research

papers presented. Unlike other ora, where competitors are not in the room together, the

Club embraces competing companies (but no consultants or other innovation service

providers). This requires the creation and maintenance o a climate o trust, which is a

ocus o the Clubs organizers.

Society or Organizational Learning (SOL) is an intentional learning community

composed o organizations, individuals and local SOL communities around the world.

A notorprot, membergoverned corporation, SOL is devoted to the interdependent

development o people and their institutions. Humanismmeaning reinstating the

individual at the center o organizationsis SOLs guiding principle, a philosophy

that creates dialogue, openness, innovation and wellbeing. SOL France, or instance,

was established in 1999. It hosts various peertopeer learning ora. There are three

day seminars 23 times per year or thirty people at a time. (Companies usually send

34 people, and Sol manages the seminars so as to avoid having competitors at the

same seminar.) Each seminar ocuses on a specic topic, on which the group works

collaboratively. Companies can also directly invite other companies to work on topics

o mutual interest, in what is known as a Club des Entreprises. SOL also organizes


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810 events per year where learning tables o six to eight people learn rom stories oinnovation that cover the various stages o the process.

UK Innovation Forum was ormed in 2010 to create a community o science

and innovation among research institutions, startup companies and established

corporations. The organization was originally backed by the UK governments

Department or Business, Innovation and Skills but today is a selunded entity that

charges a small annual subscription ee to its members, ranging rom individuals (30)

to large corporations (1,000). UKIF organizes national and regional events on science

and innovation on a particular theme or technology vertical, usually in conjunction with

a Knowledge Transer Network. (See section on governmentsupported agencies.) UKIFis distinct in having built a robust online meeting place or collaboration and discussion,

where members can turn or help and advice. Matchmaking sotware connects

members based on mutual interests and complementary expertise, and webinars

eature a panel o experts rom among the UKIF membership.

Intelligent Formulation is another UKbased InnoComm that brings together

companies to exchange best practices about innovation management and discoveries

related specically to ormulation science and technology. Intelligent Formulation was

ounded by a regional agency (Yorkshire Chemical Focus, Ltd.) and two universities

(the Institute o Pharmaceutical Innovation at the University o Bradord and Particles

CIC at the University o Leeds). In addition to open events and webinars, Intelligent

Formulation holds Open Innovation Roadshows: invitationonly group gatherings

o 45 noncompeting companies that wish to collaborate on technical innovation or

innovation management. Roadshow ormat can include structured networking, outside

subject matter experts, and opportunities or peertopeer discussion o business

challenges, with Intelligent Formulation serving as a acilitator. (Roadshows are also

intended to encourage scientists to become more entrepreneurial, building business as

well as technical cases or innovation and networking outside o their R&D departments.)

Interested companies take turns hosting gatherings, which include presentations o

each companys needs or challenges.

The iNet Practitioners Alliance also employs a direct companytocompany moti,

where members take turns hosting events. However, this InnoComm was organized

by the companies themselves, without external acilitation or unding. It was started

in 2011 by Whirlpool Global Director o Innovation Moiss Norea, who reached out to

other large, noncompeting companies rom diverse industries: retail, manuacturing,

healthcare and consumer packaged goods. What united these companies was that were

they all using the Double Diamond Process created by the consulting rm Strategos

and, hence, could speak the same language with respect to innovation management.

Membership in the Alliance must be approved unanimously by the other participating

companies. The companies may not be direct competitors o any other company


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in the network, and no vendors or service providers are permitted to join this group.The Alliances primary activity is meetings where innovation leaders and practitioners

share strategies and experiences on particular innovation management topics. Leaders

and practitioners largely meet separately, with leaders ocusing on strategic issues

and practitioners sharing toolkits and best practices and mutually training each other.

Scattered throughout the program are guest speakers with a diverse perspective on

innovation management and strategy.

Young Presidents Organization (YPO) is a global network o chie executives who

have achieved the title o President, CEO, Managing Director or their equivalent or an

established company prior to the age o ortyve. Membership candidates must alsodemonstrate an interest in lielong idea exchange and be willing to commit time to the

organizations activities. YPO is organized into more than 400 local or regional chapters

across 123 countries that are dedicated to organizing educational and networking

opportunities or its membership. Members also participate in smaller YPO Forum

groups, through which they can dig deeper into issues and concerns in a acilitated peer

group. YPO chapters subdivide into Forums o 812 peer members rom noncompeting

businesses who come together to share successes, challenges and other common issues

in a condential idea exchange. YPO also oers virtual orum opportunities based on

leadership, industry, social enterprise and personal interests o members around the

world. These orums and virtual connections represent the oundation o YPOs global

networking activities, engaging members in a community o trust with other peers. To

create a replicable process to establish trust, YPO has created ormal codes o conduct

and communications protocols, as well as inormal rules o engagement to acilitate

an optimal environment or idea exchange. Governing these rules o engagement is

the requirement that all orum members openly share their perspectives without the

intention o being instructive, and that they in turn listen without judgment to what

others may say.

Nonproft Organizations Focused on Independent Entrepreneurs

Independent entrepreneurs can nd support rom organizations that connect them

with mentors and help them network with sources o unding and expertise. Oten,

these organizations are housed in a university as part o a ormal educational program.

There are also a variety o nonprot groups that provide such support. The ocus o

these programs tends to be on building actual businesses and hence lies outside the

denition o an InnoComm but they oten include some activities aimed at peerto

peer mutual learning.

While there are many university programs that provide classes and networking support

to students who aspire to become independent entrepreneurs, we expect that most o

them would ail to meet our InnoComm denition. We did not create case studies o any

o these programs, creating a gap in our research to date. Clearly much mutual learning


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occurs within a school, but we do not include academic groups in our denition o anInnoComm. These programs tend to ocus on creating actual businesses, and much o

the learning is rom experienced entrepreneurs teaching aspiring entrepreneurs, rather

than peers learning rom each other. However, we do prole two nonprot groups

associated with a university where peer

innovation communities: trust, mutual learning, and action

Documents