Unable or Unwilling? Community-Based Innovation and the Cost of Collective Identity
Robert Bremner · Academy of Management Proceedings · 2018
This paper explores the efficacy of community-based innovation models over time. Grounded in a 10-year comparative case study of two leading civilian drone manufacturers, I propose that community-based search is governed by a rigid collective identity. Consequently, as problems change over time, there is an increasing risk that identity limits search breadth and depth. Relative to proprietary search models, community adaptation is slow and costly. Implications for firms seeking to adopt a community-based model for innovation are discussed.