Stakeholders\' relationships as microfoundation of open innovation: perspective of brazilian companies

• Ano de defesa: 2020
• Autor(a) principal: Meireles, Fernanda Rosalina da Silva
• Tipo de documento: Tese
• Tipo de acesso: Acesso aberto
• Idioma: eng
• Instituição de defesa: Biblioteca Digitais de Teses e Dissertações da USP
• Palavras-chave em Português: Consistência temporal; Justiça; Justice; Open innovation; Reciprocidade; Reciprocity; Relacionamentos com os stakeholders; Stakeholder's relationships; Temporal consistency
• Link de acesso: http://www.teses.usp.br/teses/disponiveis/12/12139/tde-23062020-205212/

As the innovation process, specifically open innovation, does not occur in isolation, the interactions and interface between relevant stakeholders is an interesting object of study. While seeking collaboration and access to valuable resources, an organization needs to establish relationships with its stakeholders, an element rarely explored in the perspective of open innovation. By focusing on this, the present study aims to explain the relationship between different stakeholders\' relationships and open innovation. Based on the microfoundations of the Stakeholder Theory and the open innovation literature, three hypotheses were proposed. To test these hypotheses, a quantitative approach was adopted, with secondary data collection from ISE and INPI, examining 710 observations of Brazilian companies, with data from 2008 to 2017. The hypothesized relationships were tested by the longitudinal multinomial logistic model and the longitudinal logistic model. Summarily, the results demonstrated that stakeholders\' relationships based on positive reciprocity are positively related to open innovation (H1), as well as stakeholders\' relationships based on justice (H2). Besides, covering the typologies of justice, it has been shown that stakeholders\' relationships based on distributive justice (H2a) and stakeholders\' relationships based on interactional justice (H2b) are also positively related to the development of open innovation. However, stakeholders\' relationships based on procedural justice (H2c) were not related to open innovation. Regarding stakeholders\' relationships based on temporal consistency (H3), relationships based on temporal consistency of reciprocity (H3a) proved to be positively related to open innovation; in turn, relationships based on the temporal consistency of justice (H3b) were not related to the development of open innovation. From these results, the significant role of positive reciprocity, distributive justice, interactional justice, and temporal consistency of positive reciprocity in the relationships with stakeholders became evident, demonstrating its direct and positive relationship with the development of open innovation. Considering the study\'s contributions, the following are highlighted: (i) identification of the types of stakeholders\' relationships that collaborate for the development of open innovation; (ii) use of a synergistic perspective, which covers the network of open innovation relationships as a whole; (iii) empirical contribution to the Stakeholder Theory microfoundations by statistically proving the relationship between different classifications of stakeholders\' relationships and open innovation. In summary, the main contribution of this study was to provide a model that explains the development of open innovation, emphasizing the importance of the different types of relationships developed with stakeholders, thus answering the request for studies that advance in understanding the role and motivation of the actors involved in this type of innovation and in comprehending the relationship network of open innovation as a whole. In addition to advancing the theoretical aspects, this research provides guidance for the managers of organizations focused on the generation of open innovation, demonstrating to which attributes and characteristics to direct efforts and resources in the relationship with stakeholders.