Searching and Retaining Innovative Staff: Assessment of the Factors Promoting Employee Innovative Thinking within an Organisational Development Context
Author: Ekaterina Batovrina
Issue: 2016, Vol. 2
Abstract
The development of a knowledge-based economy and the knowledge-based industries forced some employers to change employment requirements. One of the new requirements for employees is innovative thinking which is usually defined as the ability to create, implement and promote new ideas and products. Despite the numerous references to innovative thinking in job advertisements, corporate codes and competency models, its nature and role in staff performance is not fully revealed, each employer invests its own sense and meaning to the concept of innovativeness.
The justification of introducing innovative thinking among the requirements for employees in modern organizations, and the clarification of its features and content, and the identification of vacancies which demand applicants to think innovatively are the main tasks of conducting survey among HR-specialists in Moscow, Russia. The research program was launched by the author in October 2015. The first results of the survey have been already received. The respondents' answers enable to refine the concept of innovative thinking, to find the differences between creative and innovative thinking, and to confirm the relevance of the requirements for innovative thinking of, at least, several categories of staff which are senior managers, project managers, IT and R&D specialists.
The conducted research has also contributed to clarifying the factors that affected development of innovative thinking of personnel within organizations. The most significant one is a culture of personal growth which can be defined as a particular organizational atmosphere that encourages employees to share ideas, to learn from each other, to engage in self-learning and self-development.
This paper is an extension of work originally presented in the “Proceedings of the International Business Conference 2016: Searching for Innovative and Creative Business Solutions”.
Keywords: creativity, innovative thinking, innovativeness, development of innovative thinking, personnel requirements, a survey of HR-specialists, a culture of personal growth.
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