Title: Employee-driven innovation: conceptualisation, scale development and preliminary validation

Authors: Chukwuemeka Echebiri; Marit Engen; Stein Amundsen

Addresses: Inland School of Business and Social Sciences, Inland Norway University of Applied Sciences, Lillehammer Campus, Høgskolen i Innlandet, Postboks 400, 2418, Elverum, Norway ' Inland School of Business and Social Sciences, Inland Norway University of Applied Sciences, Lillehammer Campus, Høgskolen i Innlandet, Postboks 400, 2418, Elverum, Norway ' Inland School of Business and Social Sciences, Inland Norway University of Applied Sciences, Lillehammer Campus, Høgskolen i Innlandet, Postboks 400, 2418, Elverum, Norway

Abstract: Although there has been increasing interest in employee-driven innovation research, the literature is still fragmented. The purpose of this paper is to clarify the construct of employee-driven innovation (EDI) and to develop an instrument that can be used to measure it. We adopted an integrative approach to scale development by incorporating existing scales from concepts related to EDI. Based on a combined exploratory factor analysis (N = 144) and confirmatory factor analysis (N = 144) approach, we identified three dimensions of EDI, emergence and search for ideas, idea generation and idea development and implementation. The instrument showed sufficient reliability and validity (i.e., content, construct, convergent, and discriminant validity).

Keywords: employee-driven innovation; conceptualisation; scale development; validation.

DOI: 10.1504/IJEIM.2021.115050

International Journal of Entrepreneurship and Innovation Management, 2021 Vol.25 No.2/3, pp.233 - 255

Received: 21 Feb 2019
Accepted: 09 Feb 2020

Published online: 17 May 2021 *

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