Unpacking the social media–driven innovation capability: How consumer conversations turn into organizational innovations

Given the scale and scope of consumer conversations on social media, it is both possible and challenging for organizations to identify valuable ideas from those conversations that could lead to successful innovations. We examine how a large retailer developed a new capability to leverage public social media conversations for innovation through a process of filtering, assessing, converting, and deploying. By inductively developing a process model of how the retailer managed to convert consumer conversations on social media into organizational innovation, our study sheds light on the microfoundations of this important capability.     

What could possibly go wrong? A multi-panel Delphi study of organizational social media risk

The growth of social media has crossed the boundary from individual to organizational use, bringing with it a set of benefits and risks. To mitigate these risks and ensure the benefits of social media use are realized, organizations have developed a host of new policies, procedures, and hiring practices. However, research to date has yet to provide a comprehensive view on the nature of risk associated with the use of social media by organizations. Using a multi-panel Delphi approach consisting of new entrants to the workforce, certified human resource professionals, and certified Information Technology auditors, this study seeks to understand organizational social media risk. The results of the Delphi panels are compared against a textual analysis of 40 social media policies to provide a comprehensive view of the current state of social media policy development. We conclude with directions for future research that may guide researchers interested in exploring social media risk in organizations.     

Internet technology in support of the concept of “communities-of-practice”: the case of Xerox

Work practices usually differ fundamentally from the way that organizations describe their operations in manuals, training programs, etc. This paper focuses on the way that certain work practices are supported at Xerox, and the conclusions of this effort are related to complementary investigations on learning and innovation. Here we propose that the combination of work, learning and innovation should be reconsidered within the framework of informal “communities-of-practice.” Information Technology tends to be used in order to reinforce the old work and study paradigms. This paper suggests a different use of IT, a use especially well suited to intra- and internets, with the aim of supporting informal structures rather than formal procedures. The case of Xerox Corporation is used as an example.     

Why men and women continue to use social networking sites: The role of gender differences

Organizations increasingly use social media and especially social networking sites (SNS) to support their marketing agenda, enhance collaboration, and develop new capabilities. However, the success of SNS initiatives is largely dependent on sustainable user participation. In this study, we argue that the continuance intentions of users may be gender-sensitive. To theorize and investigate gender differences in the determinants of continuance intentions, this study draws on the expectation-confirmation model, the uses and gratification theory, as well as the self-construal theory and its extensions. Our survey of 488 users shows that while both men and women are motivated by the ability to self-enhance, there are some gender differences. Specifically, while women are mainly driven by relational uses, such as maintaining close ties and getting access to social information on close and distant networks, men base their continuance intentions on their ability to gain information of a general nature. Our research makes several contributions to the discourse in strategic information systems literature concerning the use of social media by individuals and organizations. Theoretically, it expands the understanding of the phenomenon of continuance intentions and specifically the role of the gender differences in its determinants. On a practical level, it delivers insights for SNS providers and marketers into how satisfaction and continuance intentions of male and female SNS users can be differentially promoted. Furthermore, as organizations increasingly rely on corporate social networks to foster collaboration and innovation, our insights deliver initial recommendations on how organizational social media initiatives can be supported with regard to gender-based differences.     

Social Network-Aware Interfaces as Facilitators of Innovation

Achieving continuous innovation in organizations requires a balance between exploiting yet acquired knowledge and exploring new knowledge.In addition to having the adequate resources,change and innovation capabilities require specific management support and organizational structures.Recent research has pointed out the importance of social network structure and of the activity of agents that work across domains or disciplines in the innovation-oriented behaviour of organizations.As a consequence,information systems should ideally be able to support the analysis,development and management of such social structure for the benefit of organizational objectives.Current social network interfaces provide an established mental model to workers that can be hypothesized to be adequate for supporting activities that foster innovative behaviour.That behaviour is facilitated through exposing the activities of other workers across organizational structures.This paper reports on the design of a user interface specifically targeted to manage the social aspects of innovation based on some aspects of Hargadon’s model of innovation and knowledge brokering.The emergent nature of interactions in social network sites is used as the metaphor to foster situated cognition.The interface design assessment is described and some metrics for innovative behaviour that could be derived for such an interface are sketched.     

The effects of social media based brand communities on brand community markers,value creation practices,brand trust and brand loyalty

Social media based brand communities are communities initiated on the platform of social media. In this article, we explore whether brand communities based on social media (a special type of online brand communities) have positive effects on the main community elements and value creation practices in the communities as well as on brand trust and brand loyalty. A survey based empirical study with 441 respondents was conducted. The results of structural equation modeling show that brand communities established on social media have positive effects on community markers (i.e., shared consciousness, shared rituals and traditions, and obligations to society), which have positive effects on value creation practices (i.e., social networking, community engagement, impressions management, and brand use). Such communities could enhance brand loyalty through brand use and impression management practices. We show that brand trust has a full mediating role in converting value creation practices into brand loyalty. Implications for practice and future research opportunities are discussed.     

Combining social media affordances for organising collective action

Social media provide new opportunities for supporting the dynamics of collective action (CA), allowing for the mobilisation of people into debates and involving them in new forms of collective decision making. Although current studies focus on opportunities offered by social media for collective action, there is still a need to deepen the understanding of how social media support the organisation of CA and to study the effects of individual actions performed on social media in complex organisational settings. We here explore how social media are used to manage CA by the Italian political movement Movimento Cinque Stelle, using the concept of affordances as the conceptual framing. Based on the qualitative case analyses, our study contributes to the knowledge base by identifying a typology of nine affordances supporting CA and exploring how the combined actualisations of some affordances of the typology create antecedents of the fundamental processes of CA. On the basis of the study analysis, we suggest a model to describe how social media support CA through affordances, their combinations, and the creation of antecedents and then formulate implications for research and practice.     

The effect of social media use on work‐related learning

The increasing use of social media at work offers organizations new opportunities for employee learning on the job. This study investigated the relationship between social media use and learning activities undertaken by employees. It was expected that social media use relates to higher levels of learning and that this relationship is stronger when employees perceive higher levels of an organization culture that stimulates dialogue and inquiry. A total of 590 respondents of three multinationals based in the Netherlands completed a survey. As expected, results showed that the more often employees used social media in their job, the more often they participated in learning activities. Contrary to expectation, this relationship was not influenced by culture of dialogue and inquiry. Instead, the perception of a culture of dialogue and inquiry directly related to learning on the job. The findings suggest that organizations could consider stimulating the use of social media among employees to support work‐related learning.     

Crisis communication,learning and responding: Best practices in social media

As noted by Seeger (2006) the notion of best practices is often use to improve professional practice; to create research and functional recommendations to use in a specific situation. This essay describes best practices in crisis communication specifically through the use of social media. It provides suggestions and approaches for improving the effectiveness of crisis communication and learning with and between organizations, governments and citizens. Seven best practices for effective crisis communication using social media are outlined.     

A theoretical acceptance model for computer-based communication media: Nine field studies

This research study develops and tests a theoretical acceptance model to explain users’ acceptance of computer-based communication media. The model, which is referred to as TAM_CCM, originated from the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) and conforms to the context of Computer-based Communication Media (CCM). It explains perceived usefulness and actual system use in terms of system characteristics (information process support and facilitating conditions), social influence (subjective norm and rules on media use), and user characteristics (experience and computer self efficacy). The model was tested using empirical data collected at nine organizations (N = 425), of which four had media rules and five had no similar rules. The TAM_CCM model was strongly supported accounting for 74% of the variance in usefulness perceptions and up to 74% of the variance in behavior intention to use. System characteristics (information process support), social influence (subjective norm and rules on media use), and user experience significantly influenced user acceptance of computer-based communication media. These advanced theory findings on computer-based communication media adoption and the research approach contribute to future research aimed at incorporating the TAM into specific contexts.     

Path dependent stochastic models to detect planned and actual technology use: A case study of OpenOffice

Context

Adopting IT innovation in organizations is a complex decision process driven by technical, social and economic issues. Thus, those organizations that decide to adopt innovation take a decision of uncertain success of implementation, as the actual use of a new technology might not be the one expected. The misalignment between planned and effective use of innovation is called assimilation gap.

Objective

This research aims at defining a quantitative instrument for measuring the assimilation gap and applying it to the case of the adoption of OSS.

Method

In this paper, we use the theory of path dependence and increasing returns of Arthur. In particular, we model the use of software applications (planned or actual) by stochastic processes defined by the daily amounts of files created with the applications. We quantify the assimilation gap by comparing the resulting models by measures of proximity.

Results

We apply and validate our method to a real case study of introduction of OpenOffice. We have found a gap between the planned and the effective use despite well-defined directives to use the new OS technology. These findings suggest a need of strategy re-calibration that takes into account environmental factors and individual attitudes.

Conclusions

The theory of path dependence is a valid instrument to model the assimilation gap provided information on strategy toward innovation and quantitative data on actual use are available.     

Cost-effective analysis of in-place software processes

Process studies and improvement efforts typically call for new instrumentation on the process in order to collect the data they have deemed necessary. This can be intrusive and expensive, and resistance to the extra workload often foils the study before it begins. The result is neither interesting new knowledge nor an improved process. In many organizations, however, extensive historical process and product data already exist. Can these existing data be used to empirically explore what process factors might be affecting the outcome of the process? If they can, organizations would have a cost-effective method for quantitatively, if not causally, understanding their process and its relationship to the product. We present a case study that analyzes an in-place industrial process and takes advantage of existing data sources. In doing this, we also illustrate and propose a methodology for such exploratory empirical studies. The case study makes use of several readily-available repositories of process data in the industrial organization. Our results show that readily available data can be used to correlate both simple aggregate metrics and complex process metrics with defects in the product. Through the case study, we give evidence supporting the claim that exploratory empirical studies can provide significant results and benefits while being cost-effective in their demands on the organization     

Innovation in the Application of Digital Tools for Managing Uncertainty: The Case of UK Independent Film

This research investigates innovation in how film producers use social digital tools to engage consumers, reduce demand uncertainty and respond to the challenge of digital disruption that affects the traditional film value chain. Through three empirical case studies of film production and exploitation, we examine examples of innovation in product, service, distribution, marketing and process, each having important implications at the organizational level. Our findings show that innovations in one area have important implications for other areas, distribution impacting on concepts of product and service, for example. We also show that internal firm micro‐process dynamics impact directly on external interactions between the firm, consumers en masse and partner firms. Our research thus lies at the nexus of innovation, social media and uncertainty management, and questions the boundaries found in innovation ‘types’ or dominant taxonomies in traditional R&D frames.     

Introducing social media for knowledge management: Determinants of employees’ intentions to adopt new tools

Although an increasing number of organizations implement social media as means to enhance internal knowledge exchange, employees are in many cases not motivated to make use of new technologies. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to identify antecedents of employees’ intentions to adopt social media for knowledge exchange. Measured factors were derived from expectancy theory and technology acceptance model. To identify factors influencing the willingness to seek and contribute knowledge using social media, in this study N = 315 employees within one organization were surveyed. The results clearly support the predictions: the interplay between the importance and deficits concerning knowledge exchange, perceived usefulness of social media for knowledge exchange, and experience in social media use jointly affected the intention to apply social media for knowledge exchange after their implementation.     

Digitally enabled disaster response: the emergence of social media as boundary objects in a flooding disaster

In recent times, social media has been increasingly playing a critical role in response actions following natural catastrophes. From facilitating the recruitment of volunteers during an earthquake to supporting emotional recovery after a hurricane, social media has demonstrated its power in serving as an effective disaster response platform. Based on a case study of Thailand flooding in 2011 – one of the worst flooding disasters in more than 50 years that left the country severely impaired – this paper provides an in‐depth understanding on the emergent roles of social media in disaster response. Employing the perspective of boundary object, we shed light on how different boundary spanning competences of social media emerged in practice to facilitate cross‐boundary response actions during a disaster, with an aim to promote further research in this area. We conclude this paper with guidelines for response agencies and impacted communities to deploy social media for future disaster response.     

Creating Ideas for Innovation: Effects of Organizational Distance on Knowledge Creation Processes

Innovation is to a large extent considered a social and communicative process, and input from other individuals potentially improves the generation of novel and valuable ideas also in the early stages of idea creation and development. Both colleagues inside organizations and external parties have frequently been proposed as important sources of information and knowledge within this part of the innovation process. Other contributions addressing social networks and innovation bring into focus the potentially negative effects that certain network structures may have on innovation, pointing to inconsistencies in received theory. In order to address these inconsistencies, an empirical study of ideation in a Swedish multinational firm was performed, taking into account two different knowledge creation processes – combination and in‐depth analysis – and their inter‐relationships with organizational distance between contributing individuals. Data was collected using a survey and was analysed using regression models. It was found that different levels of organizational distance correlate with different knowledge creation processes. In‐depth analysis occurred more often with employees' close colleagues, whereas the combination of existing ideas and information was more frequent in interaction with employees' close colleagues and with external parties. Both these interaction patterns were also found to be positive for the generation of patents, whereas no such relationship could be seen when individuals interacted with colleagues in other departments in the same firm. The findings have implications for theory on cognitive distance, and also suggest that management needs to facilitate different types of collaboration and networking when aiming to facilitate and support ideation, taking into consideration the type of innovation aimed for, as well as its supporting knowledge creation processes.     

The contributing factors of continuance usage of social media: An empirical analysis

The problem of leveraging social media for establishing and sustaining consistent policies, procedures and methods of online communication can be challenging for busy professionals. To address this issue and to contribute to the literature we develop our research model to gain a deeper upstanding of the factors that influence social media continuance usage. The theoretical background for our research model are technology acceptance model and diffusion of innovation. We collected our data from college students that are enrolled in a large public university located in North America. We analyze our data using confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling. The results of our data analysis show that ease of use, usefulness, and satisfaction of social media have a positive and significant influence on social media continuance usage. Also, our results show that relative advantage, compatibility, information quality, and risk of social media have a positive influence on the usefulness of social media. We discussed the results implications for theory development and practice.     

Implementing mobile learning curricula in a grade level: Empirical study of learning effectiveness at scale

Developing and then scaling up an educational innovation so that it achieves on the dimensions of depth, sustainability, spread and change of ownership is a complex endeavor. In this paper, we present a study of one such innovation which has been developed through a design-based research process in a Singapore school. The innovation features a primary science curriculum integrating the 5E inquiry phases with the use of mobile technology. It has evolved through the various development phases to where the innovation is becoming an integral part of routine classroom practices. With the objective of examining the impact of the curriculum innovation on science teaching and learning, this paper reports some of the results of our scaling efforts, in particular, those relating to changes in classroom practices and the effectiveness brought by the curriculum innovation. Using qualitative data analysis methods, the study discusses the transformation of the classroom practices on teachers' pedagogical approaches, classroom culture, lesson plan design, linkages to informal learning, assessment methods, and parent involvement. Quantitative analysis of the performance of students in science assessments when compared between pre-scaling and scaling phases shows the efficacy of the innovation when scaled up to a whole grade level. Implications are drawn to inform future studies or work on factors for effective scaling up of technology-supported curricular innovations.     

Interpersonal knowledge exchange in China: The impact of guanxi and social media

The employees of professional service firms regularly engage in various knowledge-related activities, including the seeking and sharing of knowledge with other people; we refer to this process as interpersonal knowledge exchange (IKE). Two prominent drivers of IKE in China are the socio-cultural concept of guanxi and social media. We conduct an interpretive investigation into IKE, collecting qualitative data from employees in three Chinese organizations. We explore how guanxi lubricates the social media-based communication practices that are central to IKE in China. We report and generalise our findings into theoretical propositions, discuss the practical implications, and identify opportunities for future research.