The Swiss engineering master's degree

The module aims to explain the operational planning and management of innovations to students on the basis of an integrated innovation management model, as well as introducing them to the relevant concepts. This will enable students to establish links to various company-internal and company-external interfaces as part of innovation projects and to correctly interpret and influence these. In this module, students will be trained as “innovation managers” in a broad sense.

Prerequisites

none

Learning Objectives

• The module has the following learning aims:
• The students are able to evaluate innovation management concepts in practice, to develop these and to implement adaptations
• The students are able to apply organisational ambidexterity as a management principle along the spectrum between everyday business (exploitation) and renewal (exploration)
• The students are able to communicate various subject areas in innovation management to third parties
• The students can estimate possible disruptive potential and develop suitable measures to harness this potential or to react to it
• The students can analyse and evaluate the innovation process within a company, identify its deficits and gaps, develop improvements on this basis, and implement these
• The students can develop an implementation plan for an innovation project as a risk-reduction process and take on responsibility for the implementation of this plan
• The students are familiar with more agile approaches as a stage gate for the development of products (services and material goods) and can judge which approach is to be selected for which development

Contents of Module

The Innovation and Change Management module deals with the following topics:

• Foundations: definition and contents; types of innovations, commercial and economic importance of innovations
• Innovation system: international, national, regional innovation systems and the most important innovation promotion instruments
• Innovation cycle: innovation management model with innovation routine, dynamic capabilities and strategic areas of activity. Relevance to general management and its methods
• Innovation strategy: strategic fit, strategic alternatives, success factors, imitation strategies, related diversification, co-creation, new venture
• Innovation structure: innovation-friendly process and development organisation, change-capable organisation profiles, open vs. closed innovation
• Innovation culture: innovation-friendly corporate culture, initialisation, conception, mobilisation, implementation and embedding of change, Corporate Entrepreneurship
• Innovation controlling: indices, indicators, BSC approaches, creation and success participation for innovation initiatives
• Definition of terms, structure and history of the innovation process, demarcation of routine and innovation processes
• The dilemma of innovative companies (incremental, radical and disruptive innovations) and possible solutions for this
• Structuring of the corporate innovation process as a phase model
• Structuring of the initiative and selection phases in the innovation process
• Structuring of the implementation phase in the innovation process (development of new products as a risk-reduction process)
• The challenge of the “escalation of commitment” during the implementation phase in the innovation process
• Intangible property law and strategies for the protection of ideas

Teaching and Learning Methods

Physical presence: teaching discussions, didactic case studies, practical exercises, presentations
Self-study: study of literature, preparations and follow-up, classroom teaching, group projects

The students apply what they have learned with the aid of practical examples by identifying innovation-relevant problems and selecting and correctly using appropriate tools and methods to solve these problems.

Literature

Notes will be provided.

The following literature recommendations should also be taken into account:

• Chesbrough, H. W. (2007): Why Companies Should Have Open Business Models. MIT Sloan Management Review, 2007, S. 22 – 28. Cooper, R. (2001): Winning at new products. New York: HarperCollins.
• Drucker, P. (2003): The Disciplin of Innovation, in Harvard Business Review on the Innovative Enterprise.

• Goffin, K., Mitchell, R. (2017): Innovation Management. Effective Strategy & Implementation. 3rd edition. Macmillan Education Elt. London.

• Moss Kanter, R. (2006). Innovation: The Classic Traps. Harvard Business Review, November, S. 73 – 83.
• O’Reilly, Ch., Tushmann, M. (2017) Lead and Disrupt. How to Solve the Innovator’s Dilemma. Stanford Business Books. Sarasvathy, S., Dew, N. Velamuri, S., Venkataraman, S. (2005): Three Views of Entrepreneurial Opportunity", in Handbook of
• Entrepreneurship Research - An Interdisciplinary Survey and Introduction, ed. Acs, Z. and Audretsch, D., Springer Science and Business Media.
• von Hippel, E. (1988). The Source of Innovation. New York: Oxford University Press (USA).