Browsing by Author "Katz, Bernard"

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    Alignment of internal and external business & innovation domains
    (Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2017-03) Katz, Bernard; Du Preez, Niek; Louw, Louis; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Engineering. Dept. of Industrial Engineering.
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: The concept of strategic alignment, the “golden thread”, lies at the heart of this research. The idea that all available resources are simultaneously attracted by the magnetic pull of a company’s strategy, like a million small compass needles, is both extremely desirable and incredibly difficult for a company to achieve. This dissertation, however, takes the concept of strategic alignment and pulls it and twists it and eventually shapes it so that it may be applied to the highly uncertain and complex environment of the innovation domain. It has been well established, that in the world today, adaptability is a key competitive advantage. Innovation has long been seen as a differentiator in company competitiveness. However, researchers and companies continue to struggle with the dichotomy between the open, unstructured and creative nature of innovation and the need to maximise the opportunity for innovation success through structure. The structuring of innovation activities was, for a long time, a controversial issue with the idea that strategy kills innovation being a widely expressed concern. Today, the value of an Innovation Strategy, which governs the innovation activities in a company, is widely accepted. This dissertation aims to contribute to the ongoing quest for a structured approach to innovation without harming the essence of innovation, human ingenuity. In working towards achieving this aim the Strategic Alignment Model was recognised as a wellestablished, logical and elegant model to manage the alignment between the overall business domain and a support function domain. Through analysis of the strategic alignment and innovation management literature, the Strategic Alignment Model was adapted to represent the alignment between the business and innovation domains. The adapted model is called the innovation Strategic Alignment Model (iSAM). The iSAM is a unique framework which integrates concepts from the field innovation management such as innovation scope, innovation maturity, innovation governance and innovation models with a well-established strategic alignment approach. No other model in the identified literature provided this link between these two research fields. The structure and content of iSAM was validated with a panel of experts and their feedback is included in various sections of the dissertation. The implementation of the iSAM in a real company requires a structured implementation framework. Such a framework is presented in this dissertation and both the iSAM and the implementation framework are tested through a multi-year case study. A key consideration is that it was not the aim of the case study to generalise the results for other industries or company types, but rather to demonstrate how such a model may be used to understand the alignment between the innovation and business domains and whether or not the model can be practically applied in order to generate alignment recommendations for a real company. Feedback from senior managers in the focus company was that the iSAM made the innovation landscape clearer and that through iSAM a greater understanding of the components of an Innovation Strategy was gained. This dissertation concludes with the summary of findings from the expert validation exercise and the multi-year case study. There seemed to be a general consensus amongst the experts that the iSAM does provide a valuable framework for Innovation Strategy alignment and that the model comprehensively addresses a critical issue facing companies. The experts also highlighted several areas of improvement and future research. These include: catering for variations in the model based on company size, company type and industry and further empirical evidence for some of the defined relationships in the model. From the case study it was concluded that iSAM provides a simple, clear, common understanding of the components involved in Innovation Strategy and innovation alignment, the implementation framework provides practical guidance and applicable tools to assist in determining innovation alignment and in following a change pathway to achieve alignment and the final recommendations provide clear instructions on what a company needs to do in order to ensure alignment is achieved. The case study also reveals several interesting challenges. These include: ensuring the entire management team engages with the model and the implementation approach and ensuring the applicability of the model for a specific company. Finally,it is the hope of the author that this dissertation initiates another small twig, which over time and through the work of other researchers in the field, contributes to the growing knowledge in the innovation domain.
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    The integration of project management processes with a methodology to manage a radical innovation project
    (Stellenbosch : University of Stellenbosch, 2007-03) Katz, Bernard; Du Preez, N. D.; University of Stellenbosch. Faculty of Engineering. Dept. of Industrial Engineering.
    In today’s business environment it is widely accepted that innovation is key to improving the economic performance of companies (Van der Panna et al. 2003) and for achieving and sustaining a competitive advantage in the market place. Based on the definition of radical innovation, a radical innovation project involves a high level of “newness” (Damanpour 1996), which in turn leads to high levels of complexity and uncertainty. However, it is difficult to manage these high levels of complexity and uncertainty within the structured framework of the traditional project management bodies of knowledge (Williams 2005). The following problem was thus formulated: Project management concepts alone, captured in the various bodies of knowledge, are not sufficient enough to successfully manage radical innovation projects. Companies therefore struggle to gain a competitive advantage through innovation, as the implementation of the radical innovation is seldom successful. The thesis presents a methodology termed the “Innovation Implementation Methodology” (IIM), which combines a range of components and concepts that support radical innovation projects. The IIM combines concepts such as knowledge management, project and team integration, project principles, design objectives, prototypes and risk and change management into four main components. Each component provides a different view of the radical innovation project. These views include: • A view of the different levels of detail required, • A view of the roles and responsibilities, • A view of the project structure and team integration, and • A scientific and experimental view.