Interdisciplinary Innovation: strategic creation or self-organising success? A Cross Sector Experience
Project Team
Dr Alan Blackwell (Crucible/Computer Laboratory)
Dr Lee Wilson (Social Anthropology)
Read the full report from this project:
Radical innovation: crossing knowledge boundaries with interdisciplinary teams
Blackwell, A.F., Wilson, L., Street, A., Boulton, C. and Knell, J. (2009).University of Cambridge Computer Laboratory Technical Report UCAM-CL-TR-760.
Project Summary
The central aspiration of this project is to generate new insights about the principles and practices that inform successful interdisciplinary innovation in different parts of the economy and society, and to encourage collisions between different worlds that stimulate innovation. We are concerned with identifying when and where interdisciplinary collaboration has been successful in stimulating innovation, and how the outcomes of such collaboration can be measured. It is increasingly taken for granted that interdisciplinarity is an enabler, or even a requirement, of innovation and this appears as a common nostrum in popular management literature.The value of both interdisciplinarity and innovation is presumed in contexts that include academia, technological research and development, the arts, business practice and public policy. This research project undertakes a comparative study, across these various domains, of what beliefs and practices are associated with the constructs of interdisciplinarity and innovation. Our starting assumption is that we expect to find greater diversity of interpretation than is generally acknowledged. We also expect to find a dynamic and generative relationship between the two constructs.
As well as a broad cross sector focus, we take a broad interdisciplinary perspective, drawing on expertise in anthropology, economics, design, management theory, and professional strategy and innovation consulting. The Crucible network for interdisciplinary design has developed a research approach in which senior practitioners from very different fields participate in workshops emphasising deep reflective encounters, through a concrete focus on professional case studies in the presence of academic facilitators from multiple disciplines. In the past, these workshops have investigated innovation in a more commercial context, through the study of professional design disciplines such as product design, furnishing, automotive design, etc.
For this project, we will construct similar encounters between those who are most responsible for the implementation of interdisciplinary innovation – from the different professional disciplines of academic research management, technology consulting, government policy, and strategic ideas leadership. The results will provide direct policy comparisons and guidance, and may also form the basis for further in-depth case study research.
Research Questions
- Whether certain parts of the innovation infrastructure appear more inclined to interdisciplinary innovation than others, and with what implications for the practice and success of their innovation practices. o The degree to which the key sector actors seeking to influence the pace and character of innovation in the UK are operating with common mindsets around interdisciplinary collaboration and innovation. o Whether certain disciplines are converging in the pursuit of innovation and with what implications for investment and funding practice. o The extent to which new technology, and web-based tools, are becoming more important to the conduct of interdisciplinary innovation and collaboration.
- How far the barriers to interdisciplinary innovation vary across different sectors. Given the recent emphasis on interdisciplinary innovation within Higher Education research centres and institutions does their emerging practice suggest that new forms of innovative practice are taking root, and with what implications for the broader UK innovation system?
- How far have more instrumental approaches to problem solving, what have been dubbed the ‘analytical approach’ – hindered the development of interdisciplinary innovation . Lester and Piore stress the importance of interpretative processes in the innovation process - which in turn require the creation of ‘interpretative spaces’ within the public realm and private enterprise to help foster a genuine exchange of ideas and or course interdisciplinarity.
- This raises the question of whether successful interdisciplinary innovation in the UK is occurring because such ‘spaces’ are being nurtured and sustained, or despite their absence? If interdisciplinary innovation has thus far been in part a self-organising success, how can it be more strategically pursued by NESTA and other public agencies and key actors?
Participating Organisations and Researchers
This proposal is hosted by CRASSH, the Cambridge Centre for Research in the Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities, in collaboration with Crucible – the Cambridge network for Research in Interdisciplinary Design.
Alan Blackwell is co-Director of Crucible, and a Reader in Interdisciplinary Design at the Cambridge University Computer Laboratory. He has an academic background in engineering, comparative religion, computer science and cognitive psychology. Before entering the University he had 12 years experience as a designer and technology strategy consultant, including several years as leader of a multidisciplinary product development team at the Hitachi Europe Advanced Software Centre. He has directed interdisciplinary funding and evaluation programmes for EPSRC, and is a Director of Living East, the Cultural Consortium for the East of England.
John Knell is one of the UK's leading thinkers on the changing face of work and organisations and is co-founder of Intelligence Agency. John has worked with a wide range of corporate clients, including Microsoft, Tesco, Astra Zeneca, Eversheds, Lloyds TSB, Manpower, and Siemens. Intelligence Agency’s current clients include Arts Council England, The Cabinet Office, Creative London, Demos, The Design Council, Esmee Fairbairn, and Sky. John’s recent client work has ranged across high level public policy work, strategic reviews and strategy development, thought leadership development, top team facilitation, and a wide range of public speaking and event facilitation activities. Recent and current work includes ongoing intellectual and policy input into Arts Council England’s public value inquiry; Mission, Models, Money recently published a new think piece from John – entitled ‘The Art of Living’ – which explores what a more intelligent arts funding system might look like; and Creative London commissioned John to design and deliver a thinking seminar series on the future of London as the world’s creative hub, which culminated in the recent publication of a provocation, co-authored with Kate Oakley, entitled ‘London’s Creative Economy: An Accidental Success?’.
Charles Boulton is an independent consultant of 25 years experience, focusing on innovation practice in the private and public sectors, in companies of all sizes, across many industry sectors. He started in systems engineering working with teams of mechanical, electronic and software engineers, physicists and mathematicians at Cambridge Consultants before moving to management consultancy with Arthur D Little in Brussels since when he has established his own practice. Recent work has included helping corporate teams drawn from technology development, sales and marketing, service and support and business planning to develop tools, practices and processes for both incremental and radical innovation. This work has addressed products, processes and business models, especially in the new-found corporate enthusiasm for ‘open innovation’. Other work has included helping corporate venturers to develop strategies, partnerships and portfolios of collaborative projects.
Lee Wilson's current research encompasses the effects of institutional practice on modes of knowledge production and transmission in different cultural contexts, including Sundanese martial arts in West Java and academics in UK HEIs. This work focuses upon issues pertinent to collaborative encounters between parties involved in the production of knowledge in whatever form this may take, and attempts to deliberately collapse the boundaries between different subject positions (for example, that of the researcher and the subject/object of research) in the research process via theoretically informed critical ethnographic engagement. Under the auspices of CRASSH this research is commensurate with a perceived need for disciplinary innovation and change and a desire to generate encounters that both challenge familiar epistemological frameworks and explore the diversity of knowledge practices and production.
