Assessment of Technological Innovation Climate in Organizations

The ability to develop a work environment climate supporting technological innovation does not occur suddenly or unexpectedly. The objectives of this paper is to assess the technological innovation climate in one of the largest oil and gas company in the world, to compare the results with published standards, and to suggest recommendations to improve the innovation climate in the company. The study used the situational outlook questionnaire to assess nine key dimensions of innovation climate. The results showed that the extent to which each of the nine dimensions is applied were: debate (70%); idea support (67%); challenge/involvement (67%); trust and openness (59%); freedom (57%); idea time (56%); playfulness/humor (52%); risk taking (50%) and conflict (46%). These results were compared with published norms and the results revealed that the company is categorized as innovative in debate, idea time, idea support and trust; categorized as average in challenge and risk taking; and as stagnated in freedom, playfulness and conflict. The comparison using the t-test confirmed the results. Recommendations and details of the actions required for improvement were outlined.