The role of ambiguity and discrepancy in the early phases of innovation

Innovation literature mainly focuses on eliminating ambiguity and discrepancy from the early phases of innovation. This study questions this implicit assumption, as it may provide an oversimplified view on, how to attain proficiency. Instead of narrowly focusing on reducing ambiguity and discrepancy, we seek to understand if it might be there for a reason. Through a laboratory experiment, we propose ambiguity and discrepancy actually have a function in concept development. Accordingly the paper contributes with a better understanding of, the role ambiguity and discrepancy as triggers of sense making in conceptualisation in the early phases of innovation