Organizational Innovation: A Case of Boat Race Omura

What if we apply V­shape recovery cases to so­called the theses of Al Chandler (1962), i.e., both the unique process of organizational innovation and the common traits of innovators? This research question is what we would like to answer theoretically. Despite the lowest in 2003, Boat Race Omura in Nagasaki has recorded the highest revenue of all 24 race sites in fiscal year 2020. During the long recession of government-­controlled gambling sports all over Japan especially since 2001, BR Omura has renewed both its operation and management systems. But its process of organizational innovation was not always logically planned. Instead, after the election of the Mayor of Omura City in 2002, a late senior officer Kenji Endo, who might have been promoted, had been unintentionally designated by late Mayor Matsumoto for the head of the BR Omura to renew itself. Based on the two V­-shaped recovery case studies, that is, BR Omura and Huis Ten Bosch in Sasebo, we have extracted two distinct points which are different from Al Chandler (1962): one is not to focus on natural persons who are often called heroes/heroines but on the interactions during the process among persons relevant; and the other is to include dead persons who seem to be some among innovators