Opening up healthcare innovation: Innovation solutions for a 21st century healthcare system

Healthcare systems in the early 21st century face a crisis. Rising demand and expectations are increasingly out of step with the funding models available. Without radical innovation it seems unlikely that we can sustain the kind of healthcare which we associate with highly developed societies.

Going with the flow: A systems approach to how an Academic Health Science Centre creates value through collaboration

This briefing looks at the case of Cambridge University Health Partners, the management organisation of the Cambridge Academic Health Science Centre (AHSC). An AHSC is a partnership between one or more universities and healthcare providers focusing on the tripartite mission of research, clinical care and teaching.

Japanese Management 20 years on: The contemporary relevance of Japanese management practices

This report discusses the contemporary relevance of Japanese management practices to managers, policymakers and academic researchers. In the 1980s, a period marked by strong performance of the Japanese economy and the emergence onto the global stage of a number of leading Japanese corporations, managers and management academics in the UK and other Western countries studied Japanese management with great interest.

Why Lean Matters: Understanding and implementing Lean in public services

In the current economic climate all organisations are under pressure to reduce costs and become more efficient. This is particularly true of the public sector which has borne the brunt of a large number of job losses.

One set of management practices that can be useful in helping with, reducing cost and improving both efficiency and the quality of products and services is lean management (Lean).

Uncovering Innovation Processes: In the Hotel Industry

The hotel industry is a valuable contributor to the UK economy. Over 10,000 businesses are engaged in the UK hotel industry which contributes some £18bn to the UK economy. Despite this, however, official measures, such as the UK innovation Survey (UKIS), part of the EU Community Innovation Survey (CIS), present the hotel industry as having very little engagement with all types of innovations.

The Complexity Challenge

In many companies, complexity has been places on the 'too difficult to deal with' pile of challenges. It is often hard to pinpoint the exact source or cause of the complexity, which can easily become systemic. Many organisations suffer from complexity creep as complexity find its way into a company's products, its business systems and processes, organisation design, corporate strategy and manager behaviours.

Management innovation in the UK consulting industry

Despite a lack of detailed studies on the subject, many commentators have suggested that innovation in the consultancy sector is under pressure. In the words of The Economist, "the consulting industry desperately needs a 'New Big Idea' ". As its most basic, this report refutes that argument.

Using business models to shape business success

Business models provide an effective way for business leaders to understand and shape an organisation's activities, capture elements of organisational strategy, bring them together in a coherent and cohesive manner, and provide important strategic insights into a firm's business.

Open Collective Innovation: The power of the many over the few

The innovation context is changing. The production of knowledge is accelerating. Knowledge creation is now a globally distributed activity. Globalisation has massively increased the range of markets and segments - putting pressure on innovation search routines to cover much more territory. The proliferation of the internet and emergence of large-scale social networks necessitates the development of new approaches to innovation. The involvement of active users in innovation is accelerating.

The Knowledge Management Challenge: Mastering the Softer Side of Knowledge Management

Knowledge is a vital organisational resource; however capturing and transferring tacit knowledge, internalised experience, skills or cultural knowledge - softer forms of knowledge - can be particularly challenging as they are not easily explained or codified.

Creating a Culture of Innovation: Why Corporate Culture is Key to Radical Innovation in Firms

In the increasingly competitive globalised business world, radical innovation is central to the prosperous growth of firms and economies. Indeed radical innovation can create and destroy markets, render corporate giants extinct and transform small start ups into multinational superstars.

The Growth of Services: Towards a better understanding of service measurement, performance and innovation

Towards a better understanding of service measurement, performance and innovation

In an increasingly globalised world economy, firms in the developed world are encouraged to move up the value chain in order to remain competitive.

The Uncertain Middle: Innovation lessons for low carbon energy technology from demonstration projects and trials

Publicly funded demonstration projects and trials are widely used to reduce some of the uncertainties and other development issues associated with new technologies. Driven by the need to develop low carbon energy technologies, publicly funded demonstration projects and trials (DT) have been increasingly used to support innovation in the energy system.

The Ten Myths of Manufacturing: What does the future hold for UK manufacturing?

There's a commonly held view that manufacturing is in terminal decline. This perception seems to be particularly dominant in developed economies, where employment levels in manufacturing have fallen significantly in recent years. Yet the decline of manufacturing is often over stated and in many cases simply misconceived. Take the UK for example, manufacturing added over £150bn to the UK's economy in 2006, generating 50% of the country's exports and accounting for 75% of its R&D expenditure...

Building a strategy toolkit: Lessons from business

In an increasingly competitive business environment, the ability to spot and seize new opportunities, to plot a path of successful growth for an organisation, and to use resources effectively and efficiently, becomes paramount. Managers have a number of management tools at their disposal to help meet the challenges that they face.

Plastic Electronics: Putting the UK at the forefront of a new technological revolution

What does plastic electronics mean? Why are plastic electronics so valuable? Plastic electronics create possibilities for a wealth of low cost, high functionality products and smart materials; it could also mean a change of business models and the creation of new sources of customer value.

Outcome-based Contracting: Changing the boundaries of B2B customer relationships

Outcome-based contracts (OBC) work effectively by only delivering specified outcomes then and only then does the customer pay. Rather than paying for activities and tasks the customer can benefit by knowing the outcome they require without the ins and outs of the process.

Agility in Services: Capabilities for Difficult Times

Before the recent recession we all experienced a period of rapid external change. Services on offer were operating in an agile and dynamic environment with increasing global competition mainly driven by emerging economies and new technologies.

Risk management gets personal: Lessons from the credit crisis

This recent credit crunch and ensuing global economic downturn has highlighted shortcomings with the management of many firms, and in particular with the risk management decision making in many organisations.

Radical Innovation: Making the Right Bets

Our research reveals that organisations, here in the UK and elsewhere, must face up to the complex challenges associated with exploring and developing radical ideas and innovations if they are to continue to be successful in the long term.

Racing For Radical Innovation: How motorsport companies harness network diversity for discontinuous innovation

The motorsport industry is a good example of how creativity, engineering, manufacturing and support services can be combined to produce world class innovations. As such it offers potential lessons for other organisations seeking to become more effective at the kind of radical innovation that provides sustainable competitive advantage.

Capability vs. Productivity: Identifying the weaknesses in the UK Retail Industry

This publication explores data collected from over 1,000 UK retail businesses and is part of a broad study looking into productivity in the UK retail industry and looks into the capabilities of these businesses in detail to investigates the relationship between capabilities and productivity.

High Value Manufacturing: Delivering on the Promise

What does high value manufacturing mean to manufacturers? How might UK manufacturing firms realise the vision of high value manufacturing?

Leadership of Business Schools: Perceptions, Priorities and Predicaments

UK business schools have grown rapidly over the last forty years.

Dancing With Gorillas: How SMEs Can Go Global By Forging Links With MNCs

For SMEs, interaction with the local subsidiaries of multinational corporations (MNCs) provides tremendous opportunities for collaborative innovation which may form the basis for internationalisation, providing resources not normally available, and bestowing credibility and legitimacy which would otherwise be difficult to achieve.

Adapting to the China Challenge: Lessons from experienced multinationals

The rise of foreign direct investments into China has created the largest array of international mergers and acquisitions, alliances, joint ventures and partnerships ever witnessed. The research presented in this report has examined UK, European and US firms operating in China. Many of these firms have success stories of selling and producing in the world’s fastest – growing market helping firms benefit from this experience for firms elsewhere.

Is discontinuous innovation on your corporate radar? Twelve search strategies that could save your organisation

In a fast moving world, one of the biggest challenges facing organisations is dealing with discontinuous innovation (DI). Most organisations understand that innovation is an organisational imperative. They learn to listen to customers and constantly evolve their existing products and services, continuously improve their processes, so that they are not left behind by competitors.

The Future of Business School Faculty

The UK business schools are threatened by a potential shortage of faculty. Not only that but business schools face significant challenges within retention and development with data suggesting that there are worrying shortfalls in amounts of PhD students graduating and taking up faculty positions.

The Future of HR: How Human Resource outsourcing is transforming the HR function

This report takes a closer look at the prospects for the Human Resource Outsourcing (HRO) market – a key segment of the business process outsourcing market.

The Importance of meetings: How the structure of meetings affects strategic change in organisations

Meetings play a vital role in the formulation of strategy and strategic change within organisational life. What is the likelihood of proposals for change being made? It all depends on how the proposals are received in the organisation, it also depends on the type of strategy meeting and how it is conducted.

The International Success of British Companies: An Industry Perspective

This report examines the international success of British companies. It does this by measuring international success using global market share and international revenues; combining these in a matrix to create a visual representation of those industries in which British companies are internationally successful or not.