Organization design and its impact on the digital innovation process and the digital innovation outcome

266 Pages·2020·13.688 MB·English

by  Robert Eirich

Robert Eirich
Organization design
and its impact on the
digital innovation
process and the digital
innovation outcome
Schriften zur
Unternehmensentwicklung
Reihe herausgegeben von
Max J. Ringlstetter, Wirtschaftswiss. Fakultät, Kath. Universität
Eichstätt-Ingolstadt Wirtschaftswiss. Fakultät, Ingolstadt, Germany
In dieser Schriftenreihe werden aktuelle Forschungsergebnisse im Bereich der
Unternehmensentwicklung präsentiert. Die einzelnen Beiträge orientieren sich an
Problemen der Führungs- bzw. Managementpraxis. Im Mittelpunkt stehen dabei
die Themenfelder Strategie, Organisation und Humanressourcen-Management.
Herausgegeben von
Prof. Dr. Max J. Ringlstetter
Kathol. Universität Eichstätt-Ingolstadt
More information about this series at http://www.springer.com/series/12214
Robert Eirich
Organization Design and
its Impact on the Digital
Innovation Process and
the Digital Innovation
Outcome
Robert Eirich
München, Germany
Robert Eirich, Catholic University Eichstaett-Ingolstadt, Ingolstadt Supervisor:
Prof. Dr. Max Ringlstetter Co-reviewed by: Prof. Dr. Harald Pechlaner
ISSN 2628-7382 ISSN 2628-7404 (electronic)
Schriften zur Unternehmensentwicklung
ISBN 978-3-658-30804-9 ISBN 978-3-658-30805-6 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-30805-6
© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Fachmedien
Wiesbaden GmbH, part of Springer Nature 2020
This work is subject to copyright. All rights are reserved by the Publisher, whether the whole
or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of
illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way,
and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software,
or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed.
The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this
publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are
exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use.
The publisher, the authors, and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in
this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher
nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to the material
contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains
neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Responsible Editor: Carina Reibold
This Springer Gabler imprint is published by the registered company Springer Fachmedien
Wiesbaden GmbH part of Springer Nature.
The registered company address is: Abraham-Lincoln-Str. 46, 65189 Wiesbaden, Germany
Introductory Remarks
Innovations have been and are still seen as the driving force of successful com-
panies. With Clayton Christensen’s work on the innovator’s dilemma in the late
1990s, the need for disruptive innovation has been anchored in business mangers’
mind (Christensen 2013). Companies since then try to find smart ways of adopt-
ing new technology or business models to meet customers’ future needs. Through
the digitalization and the speed of new products and services or completely
new business models entering the market, the search for disruptive innovations
has been even more intensified in recent years. Hereby, the questions of how to
organize for those innovation challenges has been discussed, often with different
focuses.
In the light of digital innovations, those discussions have been revitalized as
a lot of companies have started to organize differently for the digital innovation
challenges ahead. Innovation vehicles such as digital innovation hubs, digital
labs, think tanks, digital incubators popped up in the last 3–5 years across dif-
ferent countries and industries. Every company which claims to be innovative at
least started some “new” innovation format to ensure that digital innovation will
be created. Major objective of most companies in terms of digital innovation is
maintaining competitive advantage. A lot of different opinions about the success
of those digital innovation vehicles are discussed in the research and business
world. Those discussions do not yet provide a clear picture on how to be success-
ful from an organization design perspective. Thus, the question of whether there
is a holy grail on how to best organize a company’s innovation activities to see
positive results on the digital innovation outcome and the digital innovation pro-
cess has fascinated me.
Hence, the objective of this work is to empirically reveal different configu-
rations which lead to a positive digital innovation outcome. For managers, this
v
vi Introductory Remarks
analysis is supposed to provide a clear perspective on the prime implicants for
specific output variables and to improve decision-making for digital innovations.
For research, it bridges the gap between two different fields—innovation man-
agement theories and organization (design) theories—providing insights for both
streams and giving others a starting point to rethink existing frameworks when it
comes to digital innovation.
Like the innovation process, writing a dissertation at some point is facing
resistance even if it is just self-doubt about the own approach and results. To
overcome those obstacles, I could count on the support of different people to
whom I would like to express my gratitude to.
First, I would like to thank my PhD supervisor, professor Max J. Ringlstetter
who gave me the opportunity to pursue this project and who has always been a
great source for challenging my approach and my results. Second, I would like to
extend my gratitude to Professor Harald Pechlaner as my co-supervisor, his inter-
est in my topic and his support especially at the end of the project.
From the LSR team, I would particularly like to thank Walburga Mosburger
who has been supportive in any situation throughout my PhD journey. Moreover,
Dr. Björn Schäfer holds a big share in the success of this dissertation project—
thank you for always challenging my progress and providing feedback on my
work.
Moreover, I would especially like to thank Paul Goldmann who has been the
best source for any academic work challenge which I experienced and to Martin
Schmidt (my university “roommate”) who had to stand my jokes and sometimes
my bad mood. I would also like to thank the rest of the LSR team (Anne-Sophie
Brillinger, Florian Chitic, Elena Eberle, Ole Ibbekken, Vinzenz Krause, Michaela
Lang, Martin Rademacher, Anna-Sophie Risch, Marius Schramböhmer) for
always making the research seminars, Christmas parties and other team events a
blast. It has always been a great time with you!
A big thank you is further dedicated to Franziska Heindl. Thank you for being
a great moral support and for celebrating all the highs together with me as well as
handling some of the lows that go hand in hand with such a project.
Finally, I would like to particularly thank my parents, my grandfather and my
brother Martin who have supported me throughout my whole studies and who
also did during this dissertation project. This work is dedicated to you.
Robert Eirich
Preface
Digital innovation is currently an important or even the dominant topic in the dis-
cussion about the future of society. A lot of people from different disciplines and
schools of thought participate in this discussion. To name some examples: Envi-
ronmentalists who despair because of the increase in power consumption needed
for digital innovation participate in the discussion, theologians contribute with
rather philosophical remarks or computer scientists carry out interdisciplinary
work to come up with new products and services (e.g. software).
Hence, economists and business administration scholars must be included
in that discussion. From a business administration perspective there are differ-
ent forms and opportunities to define digitalization and conduct research in spe-
cific areas. The topic of digital innovation can be found along the value chain in
any industry, starting from the purchasing processes and ending with the mar-
ket positioning of new products or services including life-cycle-costs for the
end-customer.
Independent of the different applications of digital innovation all topics
include something new, hence an emphasis must be put on the innovation part.
Innovation hereby must fulfill a strict additional condition: Not only companies
have to find the innovation attractive, but the customers must be enthusiastic
about the new products or services. This basic business rule applies following a
core mantra in business administration for decades: Innovations are innovative if
the market cheers “Hooray”.
This work in that context does not only focus on different opportunities to cre-
ate new products or services through digitalization. The work indeed investigates
how different innovations and in specific those which are related to digital tech-
nologies can be organized. Although the question of organization is only a part
of the overall topic “digitalization” which covers multiple facets and disciplines,
vii
viii Preface
the topic requires further research as previous work mostly focus on other forms
or a less narrow definition of innovation. Thus, the work helps to establish trans-
parency on different options to organize for the existing digital innovation chal-
lenges.
The dissertation hereby is not using a pure deductive or inductive approach
to derive insights for both research and practitioners. The findings build up on
a complex approach of several research building blocks. Those building blocks
include a traditional literature overview, a small pre-study, a larger survey and a
configurational fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA).
By applying the different techniques, the work contributes to research by test-
ing and expanding existing organization design theories and frameworks to the
new conditions caused by digital innovation. It triggers a comeback of organiza-
tion design theories and gives other researchers a starting point for work on the
new phenomenon. Moreover, the dissertation provides insights on different organ-
izational configurations which lead to positive digital innovation outcomes. The
results give managers guidance on how to allocate scarce resources. Furthermore,
it makes it easier for managers to set priorities and focus on the urgent organiza-
tional topics within the opaque context of digital innovation.
Prof. Dr. Max J. Ringlstetter
Contents
1 Introduction ............................................... 1
1.1 Historic Development of Relevant Research Streams
and Definition of Key Terms .............................. 4
1.1.1 Innovation and Innovation Management ............... 4
1.1.2 Digital Innovation and Digital
Innovation Management ............................ 6
1.1.3 Organization Design ............................... 7
1.2 Objectives of the Research Conducted ....................... 8
1.3 Structure of This Dissertation ............................. 10
2 Basic Theories and Concepts ................................. 13
2.1 Organization Design ..................................... 13
2.1.1 An Overview of the Major Organizational
Design Frameworks ............................... 14
2.1.2 Galbraith Core Organization Design Framework ........ 23
2.1.3 Review of Galbraith’s Organization
Design Framework ................................ 24
2.1.4 The Expanded Galbraith Organization
Design Framework ................................ 36
2.1.5 Design Principles and Organization
Design Alternatives ............................... 45
2.2 Digital Innovation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
2.2.1 Digital Innovation as a New Innovation Type ........... 49
2.2.2 The Innovation Process: Description
and Developments for Digital Innovation .............. 62
2.2.3 Key Measurements for Digital Innovation .............. 65
2.2.4 Digital Innovation in Different Industries .............. 70
ix