Context is king: Facilitation in innovation projects. A comparison between academic and industry projects

Abstract

Over the recent years, the importance of innovation in academic R&D projects has incre-ased. Nevertheless, innovation facilitation in the academic field has rarely been researched. Currently,innovation support focuses on the industrial context. In our study we aim to address this research gapand examine the facilitation of innovation in the academic and the industrial context. In our abductiveempirical case study, we investigate the role, skills, mindset and instruments of innovation facilitators byinterviewing 25 individuals from nine organizations. We discovered different behaviors and perspectivesin dealing with innovation work, depending on the context of the either academic or industry-drivenprojects. Academic innovation projects focus on feasibility, whereas industry-driven projects focus onviability. In both contexts, the facilitators usually intend to include the user perspective (desirability).With our results we contribute to the facilitation literature and show that innovation projects and theirfacilitation depend on their specific context and the mentality of the facilitators. With these results,we strive to improve academic and industry-driven projects with advice for innovation practitioners andfacilitators on helpful tools and important perspectives to fully exploit the innovation potential