Project Innovation: Where are We Now, Where do We Need to Go Jonas - - PDF document

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Project Innovation:

Where are We Now, Where do We Need to Go

Jonas Söderlund BI Norwegian Business School Highlights from presentation at ”Projektnäring” Stockholm November 15 2019

Project Future

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“The Corporation” “The Project” Sustainable competitive advantage Transient competitive advantage Strategy Projects Permanence and survival Temporariness and death Divisions Temporary organizations Entry (year of birth) Exit (year of death) Going concern Deadlines Evolution/revolution Lifecycle Logic of appropriateness Logic of consequentiality Corporate profit and growth Societal costs, benefits and impact Top managers, founders Project managers, engineers Organization man Project man Collectivism Rugged collectivism Shareholders Stakeholders Private sector Public sector

Project History

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?

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Motala…

• “the cradle of Swedish manufacturing industry“
• Canal development and production
• Bridge design and production
• Railway design and production
• Locomotives
• Ship design and production
• Complex machinery
• Complex engines

”den svenska verkstadsindustrins vagga…”

?

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Baltzar Bogislaus von Platen

Born 1766 in Dornhoff, Germany. Died 17 December 1829 in Kristiania (Oslo). In 1822 he had the pleasure to attend the completion of the Västgöta part of Göta Canal, but the Östgöta part, between Vättern and the Baltic Sea was completed as late as 1832, three years after his death. 1827 he was appointed ”riksståthållare” in Norway.

Thomas Telford (1757-1834)

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Projects are key to innovation…

• New products
• New processes
• New knowledge
• New technologies
• New systems

Project Innovation

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“The fundamental impulse that sets and keeps the capitalist engine in motion comes from the new consumers’ goods, the new methods of production or transportation, the new markets, the new forms of industrial

• rganization that capitalist enterprise

creates.” This process of Creative Destruction “incessantly revolutionizes the economic structure from within, incessantly destroying the old, incessantly creating the new.”

Joseph A. Schumpeter, Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy, (1943)

Innovation is about “creative destruction”

“An Innovation is a new idea, which may be a recombination of

• ld ideas, a scheme that challenges the present order, a

formula, or a unique approach which is perceived as new by the individuals involved.”

Van de Ven, Central Problems in the Management of Innovation (1986) Management Science

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What does that mean?

Project Innovation Product Innovation Process Innovation

Söderlund, 2012, Projekt och tid.

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Project Innovation

• Project innovation is the novel ways and new

combinations of how we organize and manage projects and how we use projects to ensure new ideas and improvements of product and process innovation.

• It involves both the way we do projects and how

we ensure that projects contribute to the ongoing influx of new ideas and knowledge.

Pattern:

• We need to pay more attention to project
• innovation. Project innovation is often more

important than product and process innovation, at least it is a forerunner to both of them.

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”Nokia’s success rests on its ability to continuously develop new phones with new features that customers need, that they were rapid in responding to changing lifestyles, and were much more interested in the actual use

• f the phones than its competitors. They were

early with gaming technology and applications that could help people in their everyday life. The phone became more than a phone.”

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What does that mean? Line Innovation

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Re-organization

Success Factors

• Customer satisfaction
• Project orientation
• Competence development

Support functions

Vision & Strategic direction

Projects

Competence Networks

The Customer

demands results delivered

• with the right quality
• at the right time
• at the right price

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Bredin and Söderlund, 2011, HRM in project-based organizations, Palgrave.

Pattern:

• Line innovation is always critical to project
• innovation. Analyze the line and you will find

sources to project innovation.

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Beyond the Line

Interdependence Knowledge Development

∆K Iss

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Interdependence Knowledge Development

∆K Iss

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The studio system is an organizational arrangement used during the Golden Age of Hollywood. It was dominated by a small number of “major” studios in Hollywood between the 1920s and 1950s: (a) producing movies primarily on their own filmmaking lots with creative personnel and actors often using long-term contracts and permanent employment relations, and (b) dominating exhibition through vertical integration, i.e. the

• wnership or effective control distributors and cinemas,

guaranteeing additional sales of films. By 1954, with television competing for audience and the last of the operational links between a major production studio and theater chain broken, the historic era of the studio system was

• ver.

Pattern:

• Modern forms of project innovation call for

approaches that go beyond the line: Beyond the line organization, as well as beyond the

• rganizational boundary line.

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What does that mean?

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Source: STD, 2019

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Swift transition Knowledge cycling Organization Individual

Organizational activities fostering rotation Individual activities fostering rotation Organizational activities fostering mobility of knowledge Individual activities fostering mobility of knowledge

Organizational activities ensure

• pportunities for

individual skill development Individual skills ensure

• rganizational

processes and capability development Swift transition ensures sustainable knowledge cycling Knowledge cycling ensures value creation and knowledge development through swift transition

Pantic-Dragisic & Söderlund, 2019, Swift transition and knowledge cycling, Research Policy. Forthcoming.

Pattern:

• Modern forms of project organizing call for a closer

partnership with other providers of line resources and line management services. They play an increasingly critical role for project innovation.

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Execution or Learning?

Execution Learning

Exploitation projects Exploration projects

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Ambidextrous Projects What does that mean?

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Execution Learning

Type A Type B Type C:

The ambidextrous project

Pattern:

• Projects need to execute and deliver on their

promises – and they need to capitalize on their

• potentials. Learning is essential to any form of

project-based organizing. You live as long as you

• learn. Project ambidexterity becomes increasingly

important.

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Project Success

Project Success

Efficiency success

• Schedule
• Budget
• Specifications

Client success

• Client

satisfaction

• Client

benefits

• Extent of use

Business success

• Sales
• Profits
• ROI

Capability success

• New

technology

• New core

competency

• New
• rganizational

capability

People success

• Individual

learning

• Skill

development

• Personal

development

Adapted from Shenhar and Dvir, 2011, Reinventing project management.

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What does that mean?

Objectives Control Evaluate Evaluate Control Objectives

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Pattern:

• Learning needs to be controlled. And control needs

to be nurtured - through goals and objectives as well as monitoring during project execution.

Deadlines

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Fast and Lagom!

What does that mean?

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Deadlines…

• …produce a ’rationalistic break’ – breaks the spell.
• …stimulate rethinking and fast goals-means-analysis,

conscious reflection.

• …can be contrasted to conventional control mechanisms

such as roles.

• …express what must be done, not what could be done,

upper limits versus lower limits.

Lindkvist, Söderlund and T ell, 1998, Organization Studies

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Pattern:

• Deadlines are critical to any project. If you forget

about deadlines – you are dead, the project is

• dead. It loses much of its energy and momentum.

Temporary Organizations

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Temporariness

• Temporary collaboration to trigger creative

processes and experimentation

• Knowledge cycling (moving in, moving out, moving
• n) (Borg and Söderlund, 2015; Dragisic-Pantic and

Söderlund, 2018)

• Building swift trust (Meyerson et al., 1996) to ensure

project collaboration among specialized individuals.

• People need to be good at ”project collaboration.”

Pantic-Dragisic & Söderlund, 2019, Knowledge cycling in technical consulting, Management Learning; Borg and Söderlund, 2015, Liminality competence, Management Learning.

Structure and Design Affiliation and team

Temporary Permanent Temporary Permanent

Söderlund, 2000, T emporary organizing.

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What does that mean?

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Pattern:

• Projects are different. Projects are not routine, not

repetitive, they are ‘extra-ordinary’. No project is

• identical. This is a problem, but it is also a force

that needs to be maintained. Make projects permanent and much of that force is lost.

Learning from the Periphery

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Now

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Back in Time

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Pattern:

• Projects open up for ‘open innovation’ and external
• learning. Learn from the periphery and you will

succeed.

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Temporary Organizing and Lasting Impact

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Comme des Garçons’ founder and head designer Rei Kawakubo will create this autumn’s guest designer collection at H&M. Rei Kawakubo, famous and admired for her creativity and artistry, will design a women’s and a men’s collection, with some pieces for children too. Accessories and an exclusive unisex fragrance will also be included in the collection. “I have always been interested in the balance between creation and

• business. It is a dilemma, although for me creation has always been

the first priority. It is a fascinating challenge to work with H&M since it is a chance to take the dilemma to its extreme, and try to solve it”, says Rei Kawakubo, Comme des Garçons. “Rei Kawakubo has been at the top of our wish list for a long time and we are thrilled that she has chosen to collaborate with us. We have tremendous respect for Kawakubo’s fashion philosophy of questioning fashion’s ingrained patterns, and admire her artistic approach to

• design. We are particularly excited that the collection will be

launched in Japan, Kawakubo’s native country, at the same time as the launch of our new store there”, explains Margareta van den Bosch, creative advisor, H&M.

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H&M Designer collaborations

 2004: Karl Lagerfeld  2005: Stella McCartney, Elio Fiorucci, Solange Azagury-Partridge  2006: Viktor & Rolf  2007: Roberto Cavalli  2008: Rei Kawakubo and Comme des Garçons  2009: Matthew Williamson, Jimmy Choo, Sonia Rykiel  2010: Sonia Rykiel, Lanvin  2011: Versace  2012: Versace, Marni, Maison Martin Margiela  2013: Isabel Marant  2014: Alexander Wang

Style icon collaborations

 2006: Madonna  2007: Madonna, Kylie Minogue  2012: David Beckham  2012: Anna Dello Russo  2013: Beyoncé

H&M Design Award Winners

 2012: Stine Riis  2013: Minju Kim  2014: Eddy Anemian

A selection of other collaborations

 2008: Marimekko  2009: Jesper Waldenstam, Liselotte Watkins (H&M Home)  2010: Julie Verhoeven (H&M Home)  2010: Lovisa Burfit (H&M Home)  2011: Elin Kling  2013: National ski competition team

Lasting Impact…

• “We want to have different takes on our
• collaborations. This is different compared

to last year. It’s the first time we’re working with someone doing couture.” (Chief Designer)

• “We want to learn more about beauty and

glamour and sophistication.” (Creative Director)

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Lasting Impact…

• New products
• New customers
• New markets
• New fabrics and material
• New production principles
• New marketing principles
• New service offerings
• New design principles
• New ways of facilitating creativity
• Improved organization and management
• Improved quality management

Projects for Innovation

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Project Innovation Product Innovation Process Innovation

Strategy Operations Learning Projects

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Project Innovation

Project Innovation…

• …often relies on “line innovation”
• …is critical for product and process innovation
• …is an important factor to create outstanding project

execution and to foster project learning

• …calls for better awareness of ”project ambidexterity”
• …requires an “open innovation” mindset where learning

from the periphery is central

• …needs to be connected to strategy and operations to create

lasting impact

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Thank You!

References and Readings

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• Allen, T. (1995): Organizational architectures. MIT School of Management.
• Davies, A. (2017): Projects: A very short introduction. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Lindkvist, L., J. Söderlund & F. Tell (1998): Managing product development projects: on the significance of

fountains and deadlines, Organization Studies, Vol. 19, No. 6:931-951.

• DeFillippi & Arthur (1998): Paradox in project-based enterprise, California Management Review.
• Midler, C. (1995): The projectification of the firm. Scandinavian Journal of Management. 11, 4: 363-375.
• Dragisic-Pantic, S. & J. Söderlund (2018): On the move to stay current: Knowledge cycling in technical
• consulting. Management Learning. Vol. 49, No. 4: 429-452.
• Lenfle, S. & J. Söderlund (2018): Large-scale innovative projects as temporary trading zones: Toward an

interlanguage theory. Organization Studies. Forthcoming.

• Pemsel, S. A. Wiewiora & J. Söderlund (2018): Contextualizing capability development: Configurations of

knowledge governance mechanisms in project-based organizations, Technology Analysis and Strategic

• Management. Forthcoming.
• Shenhar, A. and D. Dvir (2007): Reinventing Project Management. Boston: Harvard Business School Press.
• Söderlund, J. (2000): Temporary organizing: Characteristics and control forms, in Lundin and Hartman (Eds.),

New York: Kluwer Academic Press.

• Söderlund, J. (2002): Managing complex development projects: arenas, knowledge processes and time, R&D

Management, Vol. 32, No. 5: 419-430.

• Söderlund, J. (2005): Developing project competence: empirical regularities in competitive project
• perations, International Journal of Innovation Management. Vol. 9, No. 4: 451-480.
• Söderlund, J. (2008): Competence dynamics and learning processes in project-based firms: shifting, adapting

and leveraging, International Journal of Innovation Management. Vol. 12, No. 1: 41-67.

• Söderlund, J. & F. Tell (2009): The P-Form organization and the dynamics of project competence: Project

epochs in Asea/ABB, 1950-2000, International Journal of Project Management, Vol. 27: 101-112.

• Söderlund, J. & F. Tell (2011): Strategy and capabilities in the P-form corporation: Linking strategic direction

with organizational capabilities, Advances in Strategic Management, Vol. 28, 235-263. Special issue on Project-based organizing and strategic management.

Professor, BI Norwegian Business School Director, Master of Management Educated: Harvard Business School, MIT, and LiU Visiting professor/scholar: MIT, Cranfield, l’Ecole Polytechnique Paris, University Technology Sydney, University of Napoli Federico II Research on: I: P-form (project-form) corporations and capabilities II: Project management, knowledge integration and time III: Living and learning in a project society Research in collaboration with Astra Zeneca, Saab, Volvo Cars, Volvo Aero, Tetra Pak, ABB, Skanska, Scania, and Ericsson.

Jonas Söderlund

Contact: jonas.soderlund@bi.no, Drsoderlund (Skype), ProfSoderlund (Twitter)

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Thanks to…

Torbjörn Wenell, Jan Öhman, Anna Nilsson-Ehle, Lars Lindkvist, Mats Ragnarsson, Karin Bredin, Elisabeth Borg, Sofia Pemsel, Svjetlana Pantic, Jack Järkvik, Lars Stenqvist, Karl Lagerfeld, Christian Berggren, Thomas J. Allen, Aaron Shenhar, Vinnova and Handelsbanken’s research foundation.