Leveraging Resistance to Change and the Skunk Works Model of Innovation Articles
Overview
published in
publication date
- October 2009
start page
- 274
end page
- 289
issue
- 1
volume
- 72
International Standard Serial Number (ISSN)
- 0167-2681
Electronic International Standard Serial Number (EISSN)
- 1879-1751
abstract
-
We study a situation in which an R&D department promotes the introduction of an innovation that results in costly re-adjustments for a production department. In response, the production department tries to resist change by improving the
existing technology. We show that firms balancing the strengths of the two
departments perform better. As a negative effect, resistance to change might
distort the R&D department's effort away from radical innovations. The firm
can solve this problem by implementing the so-called skunk works model of
innovation where the R&D department is isolated from the rest of the
organization. Several implications for managing resistance to change and for the
optimal design of R&D activities are derived.