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The purpose of this study is to investigate the performance effects of pure innovation strategies (creative and imitative) versus the combination of the two innovation strategies (combination innovation strategy) and to determine whether implementing the combination innovation strategy produces an incremental performance benefit over the pure innovation strategies.

We used archival data from the Korea Innovation Survey (KIS) completed by a large sample of South Korea manufacturing firms and some financial data provided by the South Korea Science and Technology Policy Institute (STEPI). We used hierarchical multiple regression analysis to analyze the data from 486 firms.

The findings indicated that firms implementing any of the three innovation strategies of creative innovation, imitative innovation and combination innovation outperforms noninnovators. Results also show that while firms implementing the combination innovation strategy perform better than those implementing imitative innovation strategies, they do not significantly differ in performance from firms implementing the creative innovation strategy. Moreover, we find no performance difference between creative innovation and imitative innovation strategies.

The study highlights the importance of combination innovation strategies for manufacturing firms that rely on imitative innovation strategies to gain competitive advantage in the market. However, it demonstrates that firms that are successful in using creative innovation strategies must use their resources in exploiting that advantage.

Although extant studies have demonstrated the importance of both creative innovation and imitative innovation strategies in enhancing performance, it is not clear whether implementing both strategies at the same time has incremental value for firms. This study focusses on empirically examining the performance implications of creative innovation and imitative innovation strategies, and whether the pursuit of a combination innovation strategy (simultaneous pursuit of both innovation strategies) provides any incremental benefit is unique.

City governments know well that culture is a powerful tool they can use to promote local development. Those governors also know that there are different ways to pursue that process. Two main strategies considered here are: instructional strategies, which promote cultural services among local inhabitants, and instrumental strategies to promote economic development creating big cultural spaces and large events. This chapter shows the impact of cultural strategies on the attraction of creative residents (creative class), as well as on income differences among Spanish municipalities.

Our main hypothesis is: in comparison with instructional strategies, instrumental strategies have a positive impact on local creativity and economic development. Using secondary data from the Spanish census, cultural strategies in a local area are analyzed, and are included in multiple regression models to test this idea.

These analyses show that, first, instrumental strategies have a positive impact on creative class localization; second, these strategies have a positive impact on local income regardless of the presence of a creative class, and moreover, the impact of a creative class on local income depends on the orientation of cultural strategies. This implies that the impact of creativity on local development is contextual according to the nature of local cultural strategies.

The purpose of this research is to study creative strategy and execution as opposed to all elements of marketing and advertising standardization. It explores the standardization model (e.g. global, glocal, local, and single case strategy) by examining the international advertising strategies that multinational corporations (MNCs) from North America, Europe, and Asia used in their advertising campaigns targeting two culturally different markets: the United States and China.

A content analysis of 210 print advertisements compares the extent of standardization in creative strategy and execution across product country of origin (Japan, Korea, Belgium, France, Germany, Great Britain, the Netherlands, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United States). Western versus non‐Western cultural cues are also coded and examined.

Overall, MNCs are more likely to adopt the glocal strategy than any other strategies in their international campaigns. Specifically, EU‐based MNCs tend to pursue the global strategy, whereas the North America‐based MNCs seem to favor the glocal strategy and Asia‐based MNCs tend to use local strategy. Western and non‐Western cultural values are found to manifest in the American and Chinese ads similarly, indicating a trend of increasing similarity in international advertising in face of global consumer culture.

The results of this content analysis provide a fuller picture in understanding the long‐standing issues of standardization in international advertising because of an approach to analyze creative strategy separately from execution. However, content analysis is inherently limited in inferring causality between observed patterns and mechanisms/variables that account for the patterns. Also, the time frame for sample selection, which is set as a year prior to the 2008 global financial crisis, is another limitation of the study.

There is an ongoing trend of using “one‐creative, multiple‐execution” strategy in international advertising. MNCs may distinguish advertising creative strategy from execution when developing their international advertising campaigns.

First, this study addresses the issue with a clear conceptual definition of standardization and differentiates the strategic and tactic standardization. Second, this is the first attempt to explore the standardization model using a sample of 51 multinational brands from North America, Europe, and Asia. The authors find that MNCs are practicing some standardization advertising strategy, but to varying degrees. Third, this study identifies and empirically tests two external factors – culture and convergence of external markets – that influence standardization.

Reliance on individual talent and motivation renders creative professional service firms (PSFs) highly dependent on their ability to attract and mobilise the right individuals. This paper aims to build an integrated framework showing firstly how creative industry PSFs can differ in their strategy for growth, and secondly how these alternative strategies for growth can influence the firm's approach to organising and the type of talent required.

The findings are based on a series of interviews with managing directors, senior management and practitioners of architectural organisations in a single country, combined with an extensive literature review.

The authors' framework illustrates how the proposed growth strategies for creative PSFs are aligned to alternative professional talent profiles – a product portfolio strategy where the firm structures for efficiency aligned to a managerial talent profile, and an artistic competency strategy where the firm structures for creativity aligned to a technical talent profile.

The usual limitations apply in terms of generalisability of findings from case studies.

The authors' proposed framework represents a novel attempt to help management of creative PSFs to align their growth strategies with human resource practice to achieve the firm's objectives, and provide valuable practical advice to managers on achieving this “fit”.

By linking the firm's strategy and structure to identify the organisation's human resource requirements, the authors provide a novel framework for how creative PSFs can attract and retain the type of talent profile and motivational characteristics best suited to perform consistently and contribute to achieving the firm objectives.

This paper aims to investigate the relationships between student creativity, various opportunity search strategies, and the viability of business ideas developed during an entrepreneurship education module.

The paper sets out hypotheses on the associations between individual creativity, opportunity search strategies and the viability of business ideas generated. A group of 117 students provided the sample data by participating in pre‐programme and post‐programme surveys. Explorative factor analysis was employed to examine latent variables, and factor structures were confirmed by confirmatory factor analysis. Structural equation modelling was then used to test the resulting hypotheses.

The results show that creativity is not directly associated with the viability of the business idea. Creativity does, however, strengthen the creative opportunity search strategies and the use of opportunity identification strategies based on knowledge acquisition. Accordingly, the influence of creativity on the viability of the business idea is fully mediated by those opportunity search strategies that are creative and based on knowledge acquisition. They both have a positive effect on the perceived viability of the business idea.

The study illustrates the co‐existence of art and science in the process of recognising entrepreneurial opportunity, which involves individual action and reflection in order for a viable business idea to be developed.

Although creativity is perceived as a valuable element of the generation of business ideas, it has to be accompanied by opportunity search activities in order to generate viable business ideas. The findings emphasise the role of creative behaviour in devising the business idea and also of incorporating creative thinking into business planning.

The paper contributes to the theoretical understanding of how individual creativity affects the viability of business ideas as well as the way in which students search for business opportunities.

This study employs creative strategies to contentanalyse Super Bowl commercials from 2001 to 2009, focusing specifically on message strategies. The findings aim to answer four research questions. What are the message strategies commonly employed in Super Bowl commercials? What are the trends of the message strategies employed in Super Bowl commercials over time? What are the relationships between the message strategies and the commercial likeability? What are the specific roles played by the high- vs. low-involvement product categories?

As a company that has continuously achieved business innovation, Apple in the United States has successfully applied strategic knowledge creation to produce a series of products that integrate various digital devices as well as diverse contents and applications, such as the iPod, iPhone, and iPad, based on a corporate vision of a digital hub concept. At the same time, the redefining of corporate boundaries that expanded Apple’s business in a horizontal direction from the Macintosh PC business to the delivery of music, smartphones, and tablets is also an indication of the evolution of a corporate vision involving Apple’s strategic transformation. This chapter presents the strategic and creative processes that enabled practitioners, including the late Steve Jobs, to demonstrate “strategic innovation capability” by “holistic leadership” at every level of management at Apple and successfully achieve a business ecosystem strategy through “creative collaboration” across diverse boundaries within and outside the company.

The aim of this study is to investigate the differential effects of pure and creative imitation on customer equity and the moderating roles of market contingency (i.e. competition intensity) and institutional contingency (i.e. enforcement inefficiency).

A lab experiment with 181 subjects and a survey of both senior and middle managers from 149 pharmaceutical firms in China were conducted.

Pure imitation decreases customer equity, but creative imitation increases it. Competition intensity attenuates the negative effect of pure imitation and the positive effect of creative imitation, whereas enforcement inefficiency only attenuates the negative effect of pure imitation.

The findings have significant implications for managers seeking to implement product imitation strategies in emerging economies. They can help managers understand the effects of two kinds of imitation strategies on customer equity. Furthermore, this shows that product imitation strategies should be aligned with various market and institutional contingencies to achieve better performance.

The authors distinguished between pure and creative imitation. Whereas previous studies have investigated the effects of pure and creative imitation on financial and market performance, the focus was on their differential effects on customer equity and the moderating roles of environmental contingencies at the market and institutional levels.

The purpose of this paper is to assess the importance of knowledge and its management in the creative professional service firm (PSF). The other purpose is to explore the role of communities of practice (CoPs) in knowledge management (KM) strategies.

A single-case study approach was adopted with five open-ended semi-structured interviews conducted with middle and senior management having mainly an architectural background. The data were complemented with participant observation and reflection on experience together with conversations with work colleagues.

The findings suggest that having an appropriately balanced strategy of personalisation/codification of knowledge through CoPs contributes to the competitiveness of the firm.

The paper provides a useful exploration of KM in creative PSFs, but the results may lack generalizability because of the small scale and qualitative nature of the research. The research is limited to one firm in one country. Future research is needed to test the findings in other creative PSFs and in other countries.

The paper provides guidance to managers in creative PSFs on the need for positioning CoPs at the heart of the firm’s KM strategies.

The paper tests a theoretical framework on how to link strategy with KM strategy in creative PSFs.

A creative identity, the incorporation of creativity into self-definition, is associated with creative outcomes. Given the importance of creativity to organizational success, understanding creative identity and in particular creative identity work (the formation and maintenance of creative identity) can be useful in understanding creatives within organizations. To be considered creative, individuals need to not only produce unique artefacts, but these artefacts need to be assessed by legitimate judges as being creative. Judges may be within an organization (e.g., senior researchers within a laboratory) or may be external to an organization (e.g., award judges in international advertising competitions). Underpinning creative identity work is the creative assessment, however this assessment is ambiguous and contextual. In other words, what is considered creative in one context or by one judge may not be considered creative in another context or by different judges. The ambiguity of the creative assessment makes creative identity work a precarious undertaking. Based on two case studies – a R&D laboratory and an advertising agency – this research explores the strategies which creative individuals employ in their creative identity work in response to the ambiguity of the creative assessment. This research contributes to the growing area of creative identity research by unpacking three specific strategies used as part of identity work of creatives: defending, emotional distancing and differentiating. These strategies assist the creatives in maintaining a coherent sense of who they are within the organizational context despite the unpredictability of the creative assessment.