| Synopsis: |
Organizational creativity denotes an organization's capacity to exploit and explore its intellectual capital in activities constituting and leading to sustainable competitive advantage. Even though R&D, innovation, and other forms of activities that strengthen the firm's position in the market are strongly emphasized in management writing, the notion of organizational creativity is poorly exploited as a means for improving organizational performance. Managing Creativity in Organizations addresses the notion of organizational creativity and advocates a more detailed view of organizational creativity. In the first part of the book (Critique), the management literature on creativity is critically reviewed and examined in terms of epistemology and methodological concerns. The second part of the book (Practices) explores the management of organizational creativity in the pharmaceutical industry. Here, issues such as technology, cognition and leadership are introduced as central, yet somewhat under theorized and ignored, resources and practices in the management of organizational creativity.The authors suggest that organizational creativity is a resource of great importance for a series of industries and companies but that the construct of organizational creativity is suffering from a number of theoretical ambiguities and shortcomings. The empirical platform for this book is based on management practices from four companies: AstraZeneca, Carisson Research and Wingardh Architect Firm - all of who have over time demonstrated a significant ability to exploit their organizational creativity. |