Assessing organizational innovativeness – evidence from corporate narratives
Corporate Communications: An International Journal
ISSN: 1356-3289
Article publication date: 5 October 2015
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is twofold: to quantify the communication of organizational innovativeness (OI) on a large scale; and to examine the relationship of communicating OI and the corresponding investments in research and development (R & D) of multinational corporations (MNCs).
Design/methodology/approach
In total, 3,043 annual reports from 326 MNCs are examined utilizing quantitative content analysis, which focusses on fixed selected terminologies, in the years 1998-2008.
Findings
Scholars assume that the capacity for OI is becoming the single most important task in organizational survival. Even though in the sample the investments in R & D are not increasing, even slightly declining, the communication of OI is increasing. Using mixed-effects regression analysis, the findings indicate that the corporations that are investing in R & D are also communicating these efforts correspondingly.
Practical implications
This is the first study that measures the communication of OI using quantitative content analysis.
Originality/value
The results indicate that not only do the communication efforts of an organization’s OI have a perceived increasing importance. They also suggest that OI itself has become more important for organizations from a strategic point of view.
Keywords
Citation
Ackermann, M.S., Stephan, M. and Penrose, J.M. (2015), "Assessing organizational innovativeness – evidence from corporate narratives", Corporate Communications: An International Journal, Vol. 20 No. 4, pp. 399-414. https://doi.org/10.1108/CCIJ-04-2014-0026
Publisher
:Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2015, Emerald Group Publishing Limited