Empowering employees: A route to innovation
by Pierre Therrien and André Léonard
Human Resources Development
Canada, September 2003
The evolving workplace series, no. 8
Economic
literature stresses that a firm's innovation performance results from complex
and dynamic interactions between its own internal innovation capacity and external
expertise. From an internal point of view, a firm must retain its key workers
and keep them highly motivated to assure continuity in the knowledge accumulation
processthat is critical for continuing innovation. To do so, a firm may use financial
(compensation pay) as well as non-financial benefits (employee involvement practices
and training) to provide a more stimulating environment for its workers.
Using
the Workplace and Employee Survey (WES), this study investigates the link between
such human resource management (HRM) practices and the novelty of innovation by
Canadian establishments. Estimating a probit model that discriminates between
non-innovators, technology users and first-to-the-market innovators, this study
finds that there is a positive relationship between HRM practices and innovation.
Furthermore, if these practices are grouped together, the results show a stronger
relationship between first-to-the-market-innovation and HRM practices.
View
the article in the Daily about this publication.
View
the full publication.
You need to use the free Adobe Reader to view PDF documents. To view (open) these files, simply click on the link. To download (save) them, right-click on the link. Note that if you are using Internet Explorer or AOL, PDF documents sometimes do not open properly. See Troubleshooting PDFs. PDF documents may not be accessible by some devices. For more information, visit the Adobe website or contact us for assistance.
