The Interaction of Social Media and Open Innovation in Organisations
Role of the Industry Representative
The purpose of an industry representative is “Social Media Manager” due to the project’s essential requirement. A consultant is responsible for planning, implementation, management, and monitoring for the organization’s social media strategies (Kruse, 2019). He has a 10-year experience as a social media strategist like brand awareness, excellent knowledge for social platforms, Search Engine Optimization, content management, sales, and web traffic metrics.
Summary of the questions presented to the Industry Representative
Our purpose was to seek the connection between open innovation and the involvement of social media to obtain that particular innovation solution. Hence, the questions were asked to resolve answers for a concept called “open innovation” and its connection with social media.
- Explore the importance of social media and the marketing industry to open innovation.
- How the literature study presented in the proposal identifies justification towards connection with open innovation.
- Is the feasibility of the proposed methodology, including the “deductive approach,” resolves research questions?
- Explore real industry applications for using social media as an open innovation tool.
- What are the benefits of using open innovation for companies?
- Explain three innovation funnels using social media and their benefits to the industry?
Summary of Recommendations from Industry Representative
Due to his expertise as a social strategist for ten years, the following recommendations were made by industry representatives for each question as per the recorded responses.
- “I feel Social Media and marketing industry support open innovation through five simple aspects. Firstly, it improves the interaction with consumers and other people involved in companies internally as well as externally. The second aspect is the complete association towards the feedback for generated ideas. I feel the next aspect of social media in brand management, promotional activities and marketing propose innovation results prior to its implementation. The fourth and fifth aspect of social media is offering business intelligence to implement effective innovation strategies; while, new experienced employees could immediately help in open innovation efforts.”
- “The literature review in the proposal is always beneficial. For instance, it helps to identify a relevant resource that will showcase topic knowledge for what is already known and what is required to be known. Hence, the study is in-depth research for open innovation, its’ connection with social media, as well as discussion for innovation tunnel ideation. However, a brief overview of more tunnels should also be presented to judge better technique.”
- “The deductive approach is feasible enough because it does resolve the questions. However, I should explore why the deductive approach seems much better. So, in this approach, first, a scientific investigation over social media and open innovation will be undertaken. Next, after studying other resources, the hypothesis is designed followed by testing of that particular theory. This concept is particularly seen in the proposal because theories indicate the connection of open innovation and social media whereas, and uses to open innovation.”
- “There are three important industry applications that use social as open innovation tools, including ideation generation tool, research and development department tool, as well as a commercial tool for reaching towards the consumers over platforms. Basically, innovation funnels are their usage in companies is actual industrial applications.”
- “There are several benefits of using open innovation inside companies. The first advantage includes the creation and development of new products or services inside companies. Consumers very quickly lose their focus on a product due to fellow competitors and their better selling price. Besides, the next benefit is employee engagement for a particular project which is lacking in the current environment. For example, people are not precisely satisfied if they are not given enough credit as employees or not asked for an opinion.
Hence, open innovation is adopted by companies for increasing employee engagement and efficiency. Third, open innovation offers the organization to be active and competitive with others inside the industry. For instance, the research and development expertise provides the company to check their experience for making mistakes, which will not be repeated twice after analysis. Thus, social media experts use open innovation in their company to improve their overall performance.”
- “The first funnel is ideation defined as new ideas for the creation and development of a product. The second funnel is R&D, which is a process that monitors and gather information and comparative analysis for a company’s process with their fellow competitors in the marketplace. The third funnel is commercialization, defined as the use of multiple social media platforms that convey a message for the brand to consumers. You can understand their definition of how each is helpful to the industries uniquely.”
Reflection on Recommendations
After getting useful feedback and recommendation from an industry representative, following changes to the research proposal will be made in the areas:
- Justification of Topic and Question
The topic does not require any alterations or modifications; however, questions require more scope and detail. For example, discovering the benefits of open innovation to the industry should also be a very primary focus. One more question for innovation funnels and present literature for it into real companies should also be presented for in-depth research.
- Importance to the Industry
As per the research study, three innovation funnels are proposed through the use of social media, including ideation, Research, and Development, as well as commercialization (Mount and Martinez, 2014). However, the importance of the industry is not fully explored in the proposal. According to one study, business to business innovation implement three phases towards open innovation including Front end implemented before product conceptualization; product development phase; and phase after launch and commercialization (Kärkkäinen, Jussila and Väisänen, 2013). The proposal only demands the connection between social media and open innovation. But the actual implementation and industry insights must be presented for the better research hypothesis. As per research and survey of firms in Tasmania and Australia, it is found that knowledge flow through open innovation influences business performance, and human resource management in a positive direction (Corral de Zubielqui, Fryges, and Jones, 2019). Therefore, the purpose is to identify these connections in the proposed study.
- Feasibility
As per remarks, the feasibility methodology does not require any changes because the deductive approach is a better way for the identification of research questions. Furthermore, resources are available on different platforms, including books, peer-reviewed articles, journals, websites, and industry reports.
References
Corral de Zubielqui, G., Fryges, H., and Jones, J., 2019. Social media, open innovation & HRM: Implications for performance. Technological Forecasting and Social Change, 144, pp.334-347.
Kärkkäinen, H., Jussila, J., and Väisänen, J., 2013. Social Media Use and Potential in Business-to-Business Companies’ Innovation. International Journal of Ambient Computing and Intelligence, 5(1), pp.53-71.
Kruse, K., 2019. Social Media Manager Job Description: A Complete Guide 2020 | Kruse Control Inc. [online] Kruse Control Inc. Available at: <https://www.krusecontrolinc.com/social-media-manager-job-description-a-complete-guide-2019/> [Accessed 19 March 2020].
Mount, M., and Martinez, M., 2014. Social Media: A Tool for Open Innovation. California Management Review, 56(4), pp.124-143.