Organizing for Change, Innovation, and Creativity

Publisher Summary This chapter develops a model for managing organizational change that leverages the vast literatures on creativity, innovation, and change. It identifies three tensions in creativity and innovation research, and maps the conflicting perspectives onto different types of organizing. Innovation, the development and use of new ideas within an organization, usually implies change. However, managing organizational innovation is challenging for both managers and organizational theorists. One reason this is so challenging is because organizational innovation depends on fostering creativity within and among employees across the entire organization. A second reason is that the familiar model of organizational change—a brief episode of transformation versus continuous evolution—does not adequately harness creativity or innovation, and so fails to explain how organizations can be both creative and innovative. Models for organizational change have been around since the rise of modern management. Yet, organizational change remains deeply problematic, with many organizations either failing to change in time or implementing change very poorly.