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Taming wicked civic challenges with an innovative crowd

Author

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  • Brunswicker, Sabine
  • Bilgram, Volker
  • Fueller, Johann

Abstract

Civic challenges such as urban mobility and energy problems offer new corporate innovation opportunities. However, such challenges are wicked and difficult to tame. They require novel solutions that account for and integrate contradictory perspectives within the local innovation ecosystem of firms, governments, and citizens. This article presents a successful civic innovation crowdsourcing project case study, in which multinational firm Bombardier encouraged a global civic crowd to co-create visionary solutions to the challenge of future mobility in crowded cities around the world. Bombardier recruited a global crowd of 900 individuals and facilitated the citizen development of more than 215 solutions of unique firm value. We explore the process and outcome of this crowdsourcing project and derive actionable design principles for a three-phased civic innovation crowdsourcing process including: (1) crowd construction, (2) crowd knowledge acquisition, and (3) crowd knowledge assimilation. This process enables the crowd to integrate members’ diverse and contradictory knowledge proactively at both the team and individual levels. Additionally, the crowd is able to balance extension of existing local solutions and exploration of path-breaking technologies and solution concepts.

Suggested Citation

  • Brunswicker, Sabine & Bilgram, Volker & Fueller, Johann, 2017. "Taming wicked civic challenges with an innovative crowd," Business Horizons, Elsevier, vol. 60(2), pages 167-177.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:bushor:v:60:y:2017:i:2:p:167-177
    DOI: 10.1016/j.bushor.2016.11.001
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Prpić, John & Shukla, Prashant P. & Kietzmann, Jan H. & McCarthy, Ian P., 2015. "How to work a crowd: Developing crowd capital through crowdsourcing," Business Horizons, Elsevier, vol. 58(1), pages 77-85.
    2. Lars Bo Jeppesen & Karim R. Lakhani, 2010. "Marginality and Problem-Solving Effectiveness in Broadcast Search," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 21(5), pages 1016-1033, October.
    3. Haridimos Tsoukas, 2009. "A Dialogical Approach to the Creation of New Knowledge in Organizations," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 20(6), pages 941-957, December.
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    2. Carè, Stella & Trotta, Annarita & Carè, Rosella & Rizzello, Alessandro, 2018. "Crowdfunding for the development of smart cities," Business Horizons, Elsevier, vol. 61(4), pages 501-509.

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