Innovative enterprises are more predisposed to engage in practices of sustainable development.
1. In this research, I am interested in finding out if enterprises that are innovative are more predisposed to engage in practices of sustainable development.
2. If this hypothesis is true, it may confirm that enterprises that are innovative do develop along some pre-determined lifecycles, and it suggests that after becoming innovative enterprises, in their next stage of growth, they are more likely to adopt sustainable development strategies to achieve favourable but balanced financial, social, and environmental bottom-lines.
3. This knowledge may encourage practitioners of organisational development and transformation to focus their efforts in making enterprises innovative than sustainable, and let the natural lifecycles of enterprises push these entities toward sustainability.
Research Purpose
2. If this hypothesis is true, it may confirm that enterprises that are innovative do develop along some pre-determined lifecycles, and it suggests that after becoming innovative enterprises, in their next stage of growth, they are more likely to adopt sustainable development strategies to achieve favourable but balanced financial, social, and environmental bottom-lines.
3. This knowledge may encourage practitioners of organisational development and transformation to focus their efforts in making enterprises innovative than sustainable, and let the natural lifecycles of enterprises push these entities toward sustainability.
Research Purpose
Methodologies could be developed to replicate this switching action in innovative entities currently looking for new avenues of growth.
4. In September 2002, I led a small team on an overseas tour to study and understand the mechanisms that made an individual creative, and a group and an organisation innovative. We were looking for methods that could help public entities in Singapore which were steeped in the culture of continuous improvement to innovate.
5. The trip took us from the east to the west coast of the United States of America. We visited government agencies, like the Pentagon and the US Navy Strategic Studies Organisation; Universities and research centres like Harvard, MIT, George Washington University, Berkeley University, and Cap Gemini Ernest and Young's Centre for Business Innovation; and global companies, like Solectron, General Motors, General Electric, and 3M.
6. Although a large number of entities we had visited were practicing innovation, had innovative cultures, or were creating innovative products and services, these entities were at lost in describing and explaining how they reached this state of development. They were unable to advise aspiring organisations on how they too could be innovative. I believe this research could inform on the changes to this situation six years on and provide the answers to my research questions, which I will present later in the essay.
7. At about the same time I was overseas, the literature on innovation that I studied was found to be fragmented and overly specialised. They covered the peripheral elements of innovation but none was able to provide a complete articulation of what made entities innovative. At the end of the trip, the team was able to postulate that entities that wished to be innovative had to build, manage, and sustain through time at least ten critical cultural factors. I like to find out, through this research, if our findings in 2002 remain valid after six years.
8. More importantly, I hope my efforts could help me uncover newly published research works on innovation that describe and explain the relationships between innovation and sustainability. If the hypothesis of innovative entities having higher tendency to engage in sustainable activities could be established, efforts could be carried out later to study why and how these entities made the switch. Methodologies could be developed to replicate this switching action in innovative entities currently looking for new avenues of growth.
5. The trip took us from the east to the west coast of the United States of America. We visited government agencies, like the Pentagon and the US Navy Strategic Studies Organisation; Universities and research centres like Harvard, MIT, George Washington University, Berkeley University, and Cap Gemini Ernest and Young's Centre for Business Innovation; and global companies, like Solectron, General Motors, General Electric, and 3M.
6. Although a large number of entities we had visited were practicing innovation, had innovative cultures, or were creating innovative products and services, these entities were at lost in describing and explaining how they reached this state of development. They were unable to advise aspiring organisations on how they too could be innovative. I believe this research could inform on the changes to this situation six years on and provide the answers to my research questions, which I will present later in the essay.
7. At about the same time I was overseas, the literature on innovation that I studied was found to be fragmented and overly specialised. They covered the peripheral elements of innovation but none was able to provide a complete articulation of what made entities innovative. At the end of the trip, the team was able to postulate that entities that wished to be innovative had to build, manage, and sustain through time at least ten critical cultural factors. I like to find out, through this research, if our findings in 2002 remain valid after six years.
8. More importantly, I hope my efforts could help me uncover newly published research works on innovation that describe and explain the relationships between innovation and sustainability. If the hypothesis of innovative entities having higher tendency to engage in sustainable activities could be established, efforts could be carried out later to study why and how these entities made the switch. Methodologies could be developed to replicate this switching action in innovative entities currently looking for new avenues of growth.
Researchable Questions
Explain why these make them more likely to engage in practices of sustainable development.
9. To do this research, I need to look for answers for the following related questions. I hope that by answering these, I am able to explore the inner workings of innovative enterprises, describe the organisational dynamics at work, and explain why these make them more likely to engage in practices of sustainable development. These questions are:
- Is there such a thing as an innovative enterprise?
- What are the unique attributes that make these enterprises innovative?
- What does the literature inform on the lifecycles of enterprises?
- Are innovative enterprises more predisposed to engage in practices of sustainable development?
Why are innovative enterprises more inclined to do so?
Research Information Type
10. The research will engage two main types of information. These are:
- Primary Information. I will use the original and first hand presentations of speeches, interviews, surveys, memoirs, autobiographies, articles, and books that describe an event to enable me to 'return' to the past to get a closer look at the historical events or time periods that are of interest to this research.
- Secondary Information. Most of the literature used in this research will fall in this category. These are reports, analyses and commentaries which are second-hand interpretations of the actual events. I will use this collective wisdom to examine the phenomenon of innovative entities to draw my own conclusions about what I am searching for.
11. I will access these two types of information through the university’s wide collection of databases available on the on-line library (Picture 1). I have been using ERIC and ProQuest for most my searches and they will continue to be predominantly applied for the rest of the assignment. I have found that the Endnote Programme is useful and it will be the only referencing tool engaged for this piece of research (although I hope that the developers come up with the PDA version given how mobile Singapore students are). The initial keywords used for the searches will be – ‘creativity’, ‘innovation’, ‘innovative’, ‘enterprises’, ‘organisation’, ‘organizations’, ‘characteristics’, ‘non-innovative’, ‘lifecycles’, ‘life cycle’, ‘sustainability’, ‘sustainable development’ and ‘sustainable practices’. Picture 2 shows an example of a search carried out with ERIC using some of these keywords.
Research Information Strategy
12. From this body of knowledge, I like to look for information that:
Provides evidence that innovative enterprises exist as a separate management category. I will do a count of the number of literature written on innovative enterprises. The count will be sliced according to the prestige of these journals and the accumulated number of literatures on innovative enterprises found in these publications. I will limit my initial search to five journals to get a sense if this search needs to be widened. Picture 3 and Table 1 show the results of this search.
- Informs on the unique attributes of innovative enterprises. I will look for literature that informs on the characteristics of innovative enterprises, like organisation cultures, group norms, and work preferences. During the search, I will try to uncover if there are commonalities and differences in these characteristics among enterprises of varying sizes, organisational arrangements, industrial categories, and economic systems. Picture 4 and Table 2 are the outcomes of this phase of the research exercise.
Expounds the lifecycles of enterprises. I will need to study the sciences behind business or enterprise lifecycles. It will be interesting to find out the propositions and oppositions of this management theory. Picture 5 and Table 3 provide a record of the work done for this section.
- Shows innovative enterprises are more predisposed to adopt pr
actices of sustainable development. The availability of empirical evidence in explaining the reasons for this tendency will be extremely useful. I have to inspect their methodologies to determine if their conclusions are believable and cross references will be made to determine their reliability. Picture 6 and Table 4 provide evidence of the preliminary work carried out for this stage of the research.
Conclusion
More information is needed before the exact wordings of my researchable questions could be fixed.
13. The initial work I have conducted suggests that there are many gaps in my knowledge about my research interest. There are many other questions arising in the process of collecting information from the databases, like, ‘why are innovative organisations different from the non-innovation ones?’ and ‘is it important to study the factors that drive enterprises to adopt sustainable practices?’ More information is needed before I decide if I wish to stick with the current set of research questions or rework them.
14. Also, there is a need to re-examine and narrow the research interest as the initial literature review suggests that there are several kinds (technological, social, and organisational) of innovation driven enterprises. My sense is that I may not have to generalise the research.
15. Finally, I have to accept that there may not be sufficient information and evidence in the literature to suggest that innovative enterprises has a higher propensity to adopt sustainable practices and eventually become sustainable organisations. I may have to go beyond desk research to establish the link.
Reflections
14. Also, there is a need to re-examine and narrow the research interest as the initial literature review suggests that there are several kinds (technological, social, and organisational) of innovation driven enterprises. My sense is that I may not have to generalise the research.
15. Finally, I have to accept that there may not be sufficient information and evidence in the literature to suggest that innovative enterprises has a higher propensity to adopt sustainable practices and eventually become sustainable organisations. I may have to go beyond desk research to establish the link.
Reflections
……. but nothing is wasted as I am building on the shoulders of others and those of my own.
16. I feel that the assignment and the associated deadline provide me the space to think about my research interest. It forces me to examine the body of knowledge and the collective wisdom found in the literature, and to question what exactly I am trying to do through my research. It is objective because the facts present the options but is it also heart wrenching because after struggling to get the words onto paper, I realised that I may have to put all these 3,000 plus words aside to start afresh as clarity refines the research interest and the researchable questions.
17. It is this danger of having to go back to the drawing board that really excites me because I have, in the process, not just acquired knowledge but also created new ones. It is from these offshoots that my eventual research may begin. However, nothing is wasted as I am building on the shoulders of others and those of my own. I like to thank you and the University for creating the experience and motivation in me to think critically about these.
17. It is this danger of having to go back to the drawing board that really excites me because I have, in the process, not just acquired knowledge but also created new ones. It is from these offshoots that my eventual research may begin. However, nothing is wasted as I am building on the shoulders of others and those of my own. I like to thank you and the University for creating the experience and motivation in me to think critically about these.
This initial research proposal was first written on 4 Sept 2007.
Copyright 2007. Anthony Mok. All Rights Reserved
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