Innovation culture factors: A level-based synthesis: A level-based synthesis

Innovation culture has been widely discussed by decision makers, policy makers and researchers. In the academic literature, meanwhile, multiple factors that trigger the emergence and consolidation of an innovation culture have been identified. However, such factors have not been standardized or integrated under a common framework. This lack of information not only hinders academic dialogue on characteristic elements of the innovation culture, but also slows down the creation of strategies for the development and empowerment of innovation culture within organizations and governments. To address these issues, this article provides a systematic literature review focusing on the following questions: What factors influence the emergence and consolidation of an innovation culture? How to categorize them according to their context? These questions are answered through the elaboration of matrices that compare, integrate, and synthesize the main traits that affect innovation culture. The investigation reveals, on the one hand, that although there is no consensus on the factors that influence innovation culture, it is possible to identify a set of them that are frequent and that share definitions and measurements. On the other hand, we find that the various factors described in the literature are context dependent and can be categorized into one of three levels: individual level (micro), organizational level (meso), and national –or regional– level (macro). Our research provides an updated characterization of the factors that affect innovation culture and paves the way towards the construction of a general definition. Finally, some conclusions and topics for future research are outlined.
Keywords: corporate culture; innovation management; organizational innovation.