Knowledge Management focuses on identifying, sharing, storing, and exploiting internal knowledge, whereas Open Innovation is more concerned with sources of external knowledge. However, this simple dichotomy between open and closed approaches is unhelpful and not realistic. Instead, it is the interaction between internal and external knowledge that creates dynamic capabilities and the ability to innovate. In particular, we need to better understand the interactions between internal and external knowledge, and how these influence innovation outcomes under different conditions. This edited volume, Managing Knowledge, Absorptive Capacity, and Innovation, provides an opportunity to combine contemporary interests in Open Innovation with the classic notion of absorptive capacity, to better understand how organisations can manage the absorption and exploitation of inbound external sources of knowledge in order to innovate.
Joe Tidd is Professor of Technology and Innovation Management at the Science Policy Research Unit (SPRU), University of Sussex, UK, and Visiting Professor at University College London; and previously at Imperial College, Copenhagen Business School, and Rotterdam School of Management. He was policy adviser to the Confederation of British Industry (CBI), presented expert evidence to three Select Committee Enquiries at the House of Commons and Lords, and was the only academic member of the UK Government Innovation Review. He worked on the programme at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), which identified Lean Production, and with global consultants Arthur D Little, CAP Gemini and McKinsey, and international agencies UNESCO in Africa and WHO in Asia. He has written nine books and more than 90 papers, including Managing Innovation (7th edition, 2020, with John Bessant), has 25,000 research citations (Google Scholar), and is Managing Editor of the International Journal of Innovation Management.