دانلود رایگان مقاله تاکتیک برای ایجاد همکاری با جوامع پایین به بالای نوآورانه

INTRODUCTION

Co-creation — a collaboration between producers and users initiated by a firm to generate value for and with customers — has become a prominent feature in practice and in academic discussions. Co-creation enables companies to involve their users in innovation processes, develop valuable solutions for free or at a very lowcost, align theirstrategieswith customers’ needs, and thus become more competitive. With this principle in mind, a variety of companies ranging from big players, such as IBM, Procter & Gamble, Amazon, Dell, and Walt Disney, to small firms invest in co-creation with their customers, guide innovative user communities (IUCs), and develop the capabilities necessary to support these activities. However, a closer look at the co-creation boom reveals that one important aspect has been neglected — collaboration with non-customer groups, such as innovative bottom-up communities. Innovative bottom-up communities (IBCs) are those communities that develop innovative alternatives to products and services offered by companies, which,forsome reasons(e.g., a lack of supporting infrastructure, high costs, or remote locations), are not affordable for certain groups of people or do not respond to their needs. Therefore, in contrastto UICs in which customers are engaged in innovation co-creation focused on existing company products, IBCs are composed of non-customers who create innovative alternatives to a company’s products. These bottom-up initiatives take place around the world, and they often succeed in areas where traditional companies fail or find their efforts to be unprofitable. In addition,they often go beyond specific company target groups.

CONCLUSION

Extant studies have largely overlooked opportunities for companies to co-create value with atypical actors, such as diverse bottom-up organizations. This paper takes one of the first steps toward improving our understanding of this issue. First, the paper discusses the potential of co-creation with IBCs and the major misunderstandings of companies in this regard. Second, it details how the co-creation process might be organized in terms of managerial practices. In particular, it discusses the major challenges of co-creating with bottomup communities and the lessons learned from a ten-year experience with such co-creation. The framework of co-creating with IBCs (see Table 2) developed in this paper may be of particular interest to managers who desire a consistent view on co-creating value with bottom-up communities. While companies like Amazon, Apple, Airbnb, IBM, Finnair, and Relay Rent already rely on some of these elements, the proposed framework presents numerous detailed and long-term tactics. It also offers a discussion of similarities and differences between co-creating with IBCs and co-creating with customers worldwide.