About this event
Most innovation occurs inside firms, yet little is known about the organizational forces that shape it. We study the role of middle managers in within-firm innovation using uniquely rich administrative data from a global manufacturing firm that tracks workers’ ideas from invention to patenting and commercialization. Exploiting quasi-random manager switches across teams, we show that managers with prior invention experience substantially increase both the quantity and quality of workers’ innovative output. Within two years, teams exposed to the most innovation-experienced managers roughly double their production of patent-granted inventions relative to teams experiencing little change in managerial experience, with no evidence of differential pre-trends. The effects emerge quickly, persist over time, and extend along the entire innovation pipeline, from invention, to patenting and commercialization. Our findings also shed new light on the underlying mechanisms: innovation-experienced managers transmit knowledge through close collaboration, foster a more innovation-supportive climate that encourages experimentation and persistence after failure, and improve project screening by disproportionately increasing high-quality outcomes.
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This event will take place in SAL 2.04, 2nd Floor Conference Room, Sir Arthur Lewis Building, LSE, 32 Lincoln's Inn Fields, London WC2A 3PH.
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SAL
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