“Global Management of Creativity in the Digital Age”

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In the past, for a firm global management meant optimizing the production and commercialization activities in an international business context. With the rise of the creative economy and the emergence of a digital age characterized by complex product-service systems, this global game has changed. Nowadays firms have to manage creative activities around the world.

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All activities of the value chain are improved by creativity: Companies need to be creative when they innovate, when they produce, or when they advertise and provide service. Therefore global management of creativity refers to both, the activities a company has to perform and to the building of an efficient networks around the world.

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Beyond this, global management also has a broader meaning, for example in the innovation context. Here, with more efficient markets for technology and increasingly digital products, firms face questions on how to organize. This concerns the possibility of open innovation, implying an increase of alliances and acquisitions that refers back to network building and knowledge management. It also relates to the issue of ambidexterity. Here again, the question is about global management in the sense of balancing the explorative and exploitative activities (innovation and other) of firms, and management that has to be creative also in terms of embracing new possibilities arising from megatrends such as digitalization.

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Therefore global management of creativity is a multi-level concept, and therefore simultaneously a requirement for international innovation management, for creatively coordinating activities and orchestrating assets towards a global optimum, and for organizing geographically globalized value chains and production networks. Leading companies are those which are able to mobilize creativity distributed across and beyond the firm and activities in different geographic places. As an example, Sony Home Entertainment now has a coordinating research unit in London researching cultural, social and other trends to guide development of new global products that interlinks with production units all over the world.

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The aforementioned developments and examples raise a number of questions of high managerial and future relevance:

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What are the implications of a globalized creative economy for managers? How do these differ from management in a knowledge economy, innovation-oriented economies or traditional mass production management in multinational enterprises? Is there a growing need to focus on creativity and does it differ from international innovation management? How can companies adapt to digital creativity (e.g. lot size 1 product and labor markets) and leverage their resources in the best way possible? What are the wider implications of this for international innovation and strategic management?

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The workshop brings together contributions by scholars in the economics and management of innovation and creativity. It comprises empirical and theoretical analyses highlighting different aspects and findings (based on case studies and large-scale quantitative analyses). These should be of value for academics and managers in the fields of innovation management, international management and management of creativity, since creative management today takes place in an increasingly globalized world. It is intended to document the outcomes of the workshop in a dedicated book for an audience of both, informed scholars and interested managers. Possible topics to be addressed at the workshop include:
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• International and global management of creativity and related innovation processes
• Transformation of creative ideas to successful exploitation and global diffusion
• Role of organizations and institutions in the global management of creativity
• The creative economy in an international business context
• Frameworks for analyzing creativity in organizations in an international context
• Creativity as a fuzzy front end in a globalized world
• Creativity in open innovation and crowdsouring
• The impact of internationalized R&D structures on creativity
• Managing creativity in public research labs across national boarders
• Reverse and frugal innovation: the new international creativity management source
• Fab labs as creativity bubbles to scout
• Creativity management and sustainability in the globalized village
• Applications in the context of smart cities, the entertainment industry and video game production
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Here you can find the final program.
Here you can find travel information.

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