The relationship between innovativeness and innovations’ success still remains unclear. This lack of consensus stems from a confusion between customer familiarity with the innovation and synergy with the focal firm's existing set of resources and competencies, to explain performance, as well as from the use of different measurement methods. On the basis of a sample of 114 innovation projects in small and medium-sized french companies, using our own measurement method, we show a U-shaped relationship between customer familiarity and performance, and a negative relation, as expected, between newness to the company and the innovation's performance.

Purpose: – The purpose of this article is to propose a theoretical model explaining information technology outsourcing performance in the public sector as well as a set of empirically testable propositions to improve the understanding of key determinants of success.Design/methodology/approach: – Based on Fountain ' s technology enactment framework, the authors integrated inter-organizational factors, such as trust, knowledge sharing, and quality of outsourcing interfaces, in the model and added organizational culture alignment between service providers and public administration to enhance Fountain ' s original framework.Findings: – The authors proposed 17 empirically testable propositions to establish the relationships between key variables in IT outsourcing projects in the public sector.Research limitations/implications: – The proposed model provides guidance for future research aimed at advancing knowledge of IT outsourcing.Originality/value: – The contribution lies in the development of specific variables, such as trust, knowledge, and organizational culture, which are related to building an outsourcing relationship and are used as determinants of the quality of organizational interfaces between public bureaucracies and IT outsourcing providers.

Present standards guiding the corporate governance of information technology (IT) provide useful frameworks for organizations’ governing bodies to direct the effective use of information technology (IT) within their organizations. However, existing standards still fail to resolve the dilemma regarding the actual allocation of IT roles and responsibilities between governing bodies and IT management, while such an allocation represents a major challenge in many contemporary organizations. To advance on this issue, we explore IT managers’ interpretation of the allocation of IT roles and responsibilities to either the governing body or managerial levels in nine Ibero-American Higher Education Institutions (HEIs). We used the ISO/IEC 38500 and COBIT standards to define a unique set of 212 management and governance activities and responsibilities. We surveyed 30 IT managers in Higher Education Institutions from nine Ibero-American countries and identified the divergence in the allocation of IT Governance and Management tasks between respondents and expert judgments. Using regression analysis, we show that the degree of such divergence depends on organizational contingency factors such as the formalization of IT procedures, centralization, the complexity of the organization, and the size of IT departments. This is the first study in the literature conducting a thorough analysis of IT task allocation between the governing level and the management level. This study is also the first to identify four organizational factors influencing the divergence between respondents and expert opinion regarding this allocation. The findings and propositions presented in this paper have the potential to extend our understanding of the IT governance dilemma in other professional organizations similar to HEIs.

Purpose: Collaborations between public administrations and private sector represent a specific challenge to manage contractual and organizational relationships among partners with different goals, working cultures, norms, rules and processes. Therefore, the main research question of this paper is: What are the antecedents of effective collaboration in public-private IT outsourcing relations? Thus, the purpose of this paper is to identify the determinants of collaborative interface characteristics as scaffolding structures to manage public-private IT outsourcing relations effectively.Design/methodology/approach: Two cases of public-private IT outsourcing relationships in Mexico were used to compare and contrast the main antecedents of collaborative interface characteristics. Case selection was based on the success in each case, as perceived by the collaborating members involved. A successful case and a less successful case of application development for the provision of public services from two state administrations in Mexico were chosen. Data gathering took place via face-to-face interviews.Findings: The quality of the organizational interface depends on the interactions between exchange of knowledge and mutual trust, along with the commitment between partners. Trust, commitment and knowledge sharing interacted to enhance interface characteristics that have an impact on public and political values.Research limitations/implications: This paper used and extended an outsourcing technology enactment model to emphasize the quality of organizational interfaces as a main antecedent for the success of public-private IT outsourcing relations.Practical implications: Effectively designing work practices and contracts implies the development of flexible contracts, objects and routines to adjust project requirements to fulfill better public-private goals. Such flexible contracts and practices are only possible in a trusting environment where participants shape their mutual understanding of the project.Originality/value: The paper contributes to the literature on public-private IT outsourcing relationships by offering a theoretical framework on key antecedents and processes of success of these relationships.

Purpose: This article addresses the role of communication processes in the formulation and implementation of strategic planning. It seeks to delineate a structured approach to define the contents of strategic conversations among internal stakeholders, to achieve actionable outcomes.Design/methodology/approach: This paper employs a theoretical approach, derived from Talcott Parsons’ AGIL framework, to conceptualize the contents of strategic conversations in a systematic way. Several examples are proposed to illustrate this framework.Findings: Conversations among internal stakeholders in organizations, to be deemed strategic, should be orientated towards the formulation and implementation of priorities, procedures, prospective sensemaking and value patterns, as well as the media of interaction connecting them.Originality/value: This paper offers original insights for practitioners and scholars aiming to comprehend strategic value in communication processes, thanks to Parson’s theoretical views, which have been seldom used in the strategic management literature. Our framework has the originality to offer a more comprehensive and systematic view of the topics making conversations strategic in organizations.

The study of aesthetic leadership has recently gained importance in the organizational literature, wherein some authors focused on the perception and manipulation of “beautiful” artifacts and others focused on relational processes, “dwelling in the senses” (Ropo et al., 2017). In contrast to those views, we argue that aesthetic leadership highlights the role of imagination, beyond artifacts and sense perceptions. To give due consideration to imagination in aesthetic leadership, we show how Kant and Arendt’s philosophies can be transposed to organizational studies to formulate three roles for imagination in leadership: 1. Achieve representative thinking in leadership processes; 2. Allow leadership to create social commitment to put those representations into action; and 3. Sustain a capacity of projective agency as the capacity of inventing alternative but feasible futures.