Managing innovation: a typology of theories and some practical implications for New Zealand firms

The quality of a firm's innovations is determined by a variety of factors. One such factor is the performance of the firm's innovation system. This in turn is partially determined by how well the innovation system is managed. Despite plenty of scholarly activity in this field of study, a comprehensive, generic framework for managing innovation is still lacking. Combining oldfashioned management theory with modern-day innovation concepts, a new conceptual framework for the management of innovation is put forward in this paper. Its scope of application is much broader than that of contemporary theory in the sense that it addresses not only aspects of the innovation process, but also strategy, metrics, supportive organization, leadership, and innovation tools. In the first of a series of papers the current paper, through exploratory quantitative research, sheds light on how well New Zealand managers/CEOs are managing innovation within their firms. The results indicate that while there are many encouraging signs, there is also ample scope for improvement. New Zealand firms lack strong leadership in creating 'innovation friendly' cultures and seem reluctant to define appropriate innovation metrics and regularly assess their organizational innovation performances.