Managing entrepreneurship for innovation: a psychological analysis

Innovation is a process involving the generation of effective novelty and the subsequent implementation of this novelty in organisations. Entrepreneurship is a property of human beings which equips them psychologically to play an active role in the innovation process. However, the interaction between the two is not straightforward, and is beset by numerous paradoxes. For instance, an aspect of entrepreneurship that is good for innovation at one point in the process may be bad for it in another. What is needed is a model of the interaction between innovation and entrepreneurship which makes sense of the paradoxes and thus permits optimisation of management of innovation. A taxonomy based on 'dimensions' of novelty production and 'phases' of this process derived from psychological research on creativity offers a good source for developing such a model. This promises insights for 'diagnosing' organisations' strengths and weaknesses with regard to innovation and making specific concrete suggestions for innovation management.