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This paper builds on the principles and insights from improvisational theater to unpack the nature of collective improvisation and to consider what it takes to do it well and to innovate. Furthermore, we discuss the role of training in enhancing the incidence and effectiveness of improvisation. We propose that two common misconceptions about improvisation have hindered managers' understanding of how to develop the improvisational skill. First, the spontaneous facet of improvisation tends to be overemphasized, and second, there is a general assumption that improvisation always leads to positive performance. Our goal is to clear up the conceptual confusion about improvisation by laying out the various aspects of preparation that are required for effective improvisation. In our theoretical model, we delineate how the improvisational theater principles of "practice," "collaboration," "agree, accept, and add," "be present in the moment," and "draw on reincorporation and ready-mades" can be used to understand what it takes to improvise well in work teams and to create a context favoring these efforts. Our findings support a contingent view of the impact of improvisation on innovative performance. Improvisation is not inherently good or bad; however, improvisation has a positive effect on team innovation when combined with team and contextual moderating factors. We also provide initial evidence suggesting that the improvisational skill can be learned by organizational members through training. Our results shed light on the opportunities provided by training in improvisation and on the challenges of creating behavioral change going beyond the individual to the team and, ultimately, to the organization.

The literature on `exit' and `voice' countries (Anglo-American versus continental European economies and Japan) points to performance differences between these two generic systems of innovation. However, little has been done so far to study differences among voice countries. This paper suggests that four `voice' countries, Austria, Finland, the Netherlands, and Germany, with stable long-term trust relations between economic actors and a relatively consensual style of decision making, show substantial differences in innovative performance. I argue that this is due to both sector specialization and the institutional environment. This is because the capacity to escape from historical patterns of industrial specialization depends in part on the set of institutions in a country. They provide important resources for innovation, such as capital and skilled personnel. Indirectly, innovations are affected by the system of economic governance, which is more or less corporatist in these four countries. However, a corporatist regime can be responsive or rigid, depending on the degree of exposure to external challenges and crises (regime effect). Furthermore, the same responsive or rigid regime can result in different types of innovation, depending on whether firms have to operate in a competitive, highly exposed sector or in a sheltered one (sector exposure effect). The first tentative empirical results show that the regime effect dominates over the sector exposure effect.

This article aims at assessing the innovative performance of Italian SMEs through the analysis of the many dimensions which together define firms' innovative capability. The European Innovation Scoreboard (EIS) classifies Italy as a moderate innovator. However, when disaggregating the data, it is possible to observe that Italy performs below the European average, when considering Innovation Enablers (e.g. Human Resources, R&D and Financial Support) and Firms' Innovation Activities, and above the European average, when focusing on the the Output of innovation, i.e. its economic effect on exports and sales. Thus, it seems that Italian SMEs have been able to exploit agglomeration economies, due to the fruitful activity of industrial districts, and have been the actors of a success story, which combines growth and innovation. Finally, the article identifies and briefly examines three key questions: the impact of capital structure on innovation, the role of public funding in addressing R&D strategies and the potential benefit of the cooperation between firms and universities.

To develop innovations in large, mature organizations, individuals often have to resort to underground, "bootleg" research and development (R&D) activities that have no formal organizational support. In doing so, these individuals attempt to achieve greater autonomy over the direction of their R&D efforts and to escape the constraints of organizational accountability. Drawing on theories of proactive creativity and innovation, we argue that these underground R&D efforts help individuals to develop innovations based on the exploration of uncharted territory and delayed assessment of embryonic ideas. After carefully assessing the direction of causality, we find that individuals' bootleg efforts are associated with achievement of high levels of innovative performance. Furthermore, we show that the costs and benefits of bootlegging for innovation are contingent on the emphasis on the enforcement of organizational norms in the individual's work environment; we argue and demonstrate empirically that the benefits of an individual's bootlegging efforts are enhanced in work units with high levels of innovative performance and which include members who are also engaged in bootlegging. However, during periods of organizational change involving formalization of the R&D process, individuals who increase their bootlegging activities are less likely to innovate. We explore the implications of these findings for our understanding of proactive and deviant creativity.

Abstract. The present study endeavours to explain the differences of technological performances among nations. In particular, the paper analyses the relation between type of government of nations, and their technological and socioeconomic performances. Results suggest that high levels of technological performance of nations seem to be associated with executive with parliamentary monarchy and monarchy, whereas nations with mixed executive tend to have lower innovative outputs. A possible reason is that, in general, some typologies of executive (e.g., Monarchy) support the political stability of countries with fruitful socioeconomic developmental paths over the long run. Overall, then, the structure of executives of nations may be one of contributing factors to explain dissimilar patterns of technological performances and economic growth of nations over time and space.Keywords. Technological performance, Innovative outputs, Leadership, Executive, Government, Technology, Socioeconomic performance, Political stability.JEL. O11, P16, P51.

Due to global warming and shrinking fossil fuel resources, politics as well as society urge for a reduction of green house gas (GHG) emissions. This leads to a re-orientation towards a renewable energy sector. In this context, innovation and new technologies are key success factors. Moreover, the renewable energy sector has entered a consolidation stage, where corporate investors and mergers and acquisitions (M&A) gain in importance. Although both M&A and innovation in the renewable energy sector are important corporate strategies, the link between those two aspects has not been examined before. The present thesis examines the research question how M&A influence the acquirer's post-merger innovative performance in the renewable energy sector. Based on a framework of relevant literature, three hypotheses are defined. First, the relation between non-technology oriented M&A and post-merger innovative performance is discussed. Second, the impact of absolute acquired knowledge on postmerger innovativeness is examined. Third, the target-acquirer relatedness is discussed. A panel data set of 117 firms collected over a period of six years has been analyzed via a random effects negative binomial regression model and a time lag of one year. The results support a non-significant, negative impact of non-technology M&A on postmerger innovative performance. The applied model did not support a positive and significant impact of absolute acquired knowledge on post-merger innovative performance. Lastly, the results suggest a reverse relation than postulated by Hypothesis 3. Targets from the same industry significantly and negatively influence the acquirers' innovativeness.

With the development of information technology, enterprises are facing new challenges and opportunities in talent introduction, training and management. Since the epidemic era, the economy of enterprises in the information field has been severely hit, among which small and medium-sized enterprises are the most seriously affected, and enterprises are facing new challenges and opportunities in talent introduction, training and management. The innovation ability and performance of information talents are crucial to the development of enterprises and society. The rapid development of information technology has put forward higher requirements for the demand for information talents, so it is very important to establish a scientific and effective innovation performance evaluation mechanism for cultivating and selecting excellent information talents. This paper summarizes the research results and experience in the innovation performance evaluation of information talents at home and abroad, analyzes the existing problems of the existing evaluation mechanism, and proposes the Innovative Performance Evaluation Mechanism for Information Talents (IPEMI-Talents), which includes improving the evaluation index system, innovative evaluation methods, The effectiveness of IPEMI-Talents was verified by strengthening the application of evaluation results and improving the fairness and transparency of the evaluation mechanism. The innovation performance evaluation mechanism for information talents is of great significance to improve the innovation ability and comprehensive quality of information talents.

General innovation performance of the EU is improving, yet progress is too slow and performance gaps still remain wide within European Union. Therefore, there is a growing interest in circumstances which influence this situation. In their previous research, the authors of this paper have already proved that cultural diversity affect the innovative capacity of societies, hence the goal of thisstudy was to explore how important, in the context of other determinants of firms' innovative performance, are socio-cultural determinants. The results revealed that they are less relevant than technological and economic determinants but affirmed to be more significant than political, legal and ecological ones. In order to reach the conclusions, a review of scientific literature, comparative judgement of EU performance and correlation analysis were used.