What is it about?
The research shows that an innovation ecosystem without a central firm leading the innovation can address major challenges. Through collaborative innovation leadership, such innovation ecosystems can achieve substantial innovation outcomes in both the short and long term. The findings contribute to a deeper understanding of how innovation leadership can be organized in ecosystems, enabling a shift from feedback-based learning toward collaborative, integrated innovation, where all participants can take an active role in creating value for society.
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Why is it important?
Many of today’s grand societal challenges span disciplines and organizational boundaries. This makes it extremely difficult for any single company to take the lead without simultaneously creating inefficiencies among other participants in the innovation ecosystem, as the knowledge and experience of individual actors are inherently limited. This article illustrates an approach to overcoming these challenges.
Perspectives
This research supports innovation across individual, team, organizational, and ecosystem levels, enabling innovation ecosystem participants to take the coordinated actions needed to create value for society as well as for all innovation ecosystem participants. In doing so, it emphasizes value creation as a shared and collective outcome rather than a benefit for individual actors alone.
Emerita, Associated Professor Tove Brink
Syddansk Universitet
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Who takes the lead? Societal value creation in innovation ecosystems without focal firms, Journal of Management & Governance, December 2025, Springer Science + Business Media,
DOI: 10.1007/s10997-025-09770-y.
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