An effective employee-driven innovation (EDI) manual process supporting innovativeness

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to define the factors of innovativeness in the context of employee involvement and study how these factors could be affected by an employee-driven innovation (EDI) process.

Design/methodology/approach

This study follows a quantitative approach through a survey. The survey data were collected from a case organisation, where employees designed an innovation manual in a participatory process to support their daily innovativeness.

Findings

According to the results, the EDI manual process can assist the organisation in developing their ideation and organising structures. The employees felt that their ideas were appreciated more after the innovation manual process. Understanding about innovation and innovativeness was also increased. In between two survey rounds, the focus of the most urgent development targets had shifted from internal idea management practices towards customer ideas, cooperation and appreciation of different ideas. This indicates that the internal innovation system has to work before it is reasonable to involve other stakeholders.

Originality/value

The study presents an empirical example of an employee-driven process in the context of public sector healthcare. It increases understanding about the importance of employee involvement in the innovation manual development process and how this process affects the factors of innovativeness.

Citation

Parjanen, S.M., Saunila, M., Kallio, A. and Harmaakorpi, V. (2021), "An effective employee-driven innovation (EDI) manual process supporting innovativeness", European Journal of Innovation Management, Vol. 24 No. 4, pp. 1315-1334. https://doi.org/10.1108/EJIM-12-2019-0358