The development of innovation systems and the art of innovation management - Strategy, control and the culture of innovation

The success of strategies of changing or establishing innovation systems is indicated by scientific and technological innovations, the number of new products and patents, the prosperity of regions and firms and the creation of new jobs. However, there is also a less visible outcome of the innovation process in regard to knowledge creation, redesign of cultural software of what is understood as innovation and in new management concepts to maintain and generate organizational innovativeness. The papers in this issue contribute to the identification of blockages to innovation and means of overcoming them related to the latter issue. The first blockage to innovation is the human capital dilemma of insufficient trained persons in innovation management; a second is the paucity of effective organizational mechanisms to realize the full potential of innovations that have been achieved in one environment to transfer them to where they are needed in another. The capacity to integrate innovation mechanisms and carry out technological and organizational transfer is the issue here. With a focus on the less invisible indicators of innovation a new understanding of the management of innovation is possible. © 2005 Taylor & Francis Group Ltd