Maturity Model for Innovation Project Management in Industrial Enterprises: A Case Study of the Aerospace Sector in Brazil

1. Introduction

In a competitive market scenario of a globalized economy where market conditions often change, whether by new consumer needs, new competitors, changes in market or economic policies, manufacturing companies need, not only to become competitive but also to stay competitive to ensure their survival.

According to Rozenfeld and Forcellini (2006), the main forces that influence the competitive pursuit of speed, efficiency and quality in innovation development are increasing markets internationalization, increasing the diversity and variety of products, shortening product life cycle on the market, changing competition patterns between organizations and consumer expectations for quality and technology.

What makes companies competitive is their ability to develop and create products, services, or even adjust them to the customer’s needs; or new processes in a fast way and at a competitive cost. In this way, innovation is the ability to continually find opportunities for new products and markets and to develop more efficient processes to produce them and is understood as crucial by the companies (Robert, 1995).

Afterwards, Bansal and Grewatsch (2020) contribute to this discussion by broader understanding of how to achieve more assertive innovations due to high failure rate of new products, according to the authors’ view, if companies ever want to develop truly sustainable products instead of starting with customer needs, companies should start with the salient megatrend. In doing so, companies not only anticipate customers’ future needs, but they can also actively shape the future, rather than merely reacting to the present.

Ismail et al. (2015) propose that many companies are satisfied with what works and therefore don’t make innovations. They also point out that the company’s survival depends on its ability to stay ahead of the technology curve and embrace changes in order to remain competitive. Lastly, they say that no company can keep up with the growth pace if it is not willing to do something radically new.

However, to innovate without agility is synonymous with not seizing the detected opportunities, losing the protagonism or being overcome by the competition. Feitor et al. (2005) emphasize the business agility importance, they conclude in their study that the organization’s success depends not only on how much it knows about the external environment, but also on how the company uses and leverages its internal resources to anticipate and meet the customer’s and market’s needs.

With the industry 4.0 emergence, high-tech enterprises are able to actively identify indicators sets that help to assess management systems’ reliability relationship with their consumers and suppliers through algorithms in order to offer the best design and solutions for the user and connect the resource providers (Batova et al., 2020). For the aerospace industry, more and more enterprise information systems (EIS) are being used, mainly, to solve specific problems or improve organizational performance with artificial intelligence (AI) techniques with increasingly optimized costs through the concepts such as cloud computing, utility computing, edge computing, and grid computing (Wang, 2017).

Emphasizing the innovation-driven management approach importance, Rozenfeld and Forcellini (2006) address that success in generating innovation doesn’t depend fundamentally on the professional’s genius working in this process or large financial contributions, and goes beyond “in recent decades, successful companies’ and countries’ cases, regarding product and technology development, have shown that the performance of this process is directly impacted by the management model and practice adopted”.

Despite the uncertainty inherent in any launch, it is possible to manage the products’ development in search of better performance and learning through a methodology directed to the innovation management (Rozenfeld and Forcellini, 2006); therefore, innovation capacity must be understood as a differential which according to the management maturity level will provide greater competitive advantage.

The need for innovation by companies is reflected in the industrial research of technological innovation carried out by Instituto Brasileiro de Geografia e Estatística (IBGE), a Brazilian federal government institution, every three years, which is used for the development of public policies in order to promote Science, Technology and Innovation (ST&I).

The last published survey (IBGE, 2020), which continues the series started in 2000, had the participation of 116,962 Brazilian companies (public and private sector), followed by the participation of 17,171 Brazilian companies (IBGE, 2016) and the last survey analyzed had 17,479 Brazilian participating companies (IBGE, 2013). When evaluating the general product and process innovation rates and identifying the innovations that generated new products to the market or a new process for the respective sector in Brazil, such as, the innovations realization rate, it was found that it increased from 55.9% (IBGE, 2013) to 65.7% (IBGE, 2016) and the end to 67% (IBGE, 2020) so the companies are increasingly making innovations.

When analyzing the expenditures directed to the innovative activities in the Brazilian ecosystem of all companies that carried out innovations over the entire period, referring to the three surveys (Fig. 1), it is detected that there was a significant reduction in investments directed to the machinery and tools acquisition from 46.8% (IBGE, 2013) to 31.5% (IBGE, 2020) and, on the other hand, there was a significant increase in expenditure on internal Research and Development activities, from 29.8% (IBGE, 2013) to 37%, 4% (IBGE, 2020), in this way, it can be understood that in this evaluated period and in the companies considered, R&D efforts are increasingly receiving financial resources and, therefore, being the main one of the innovation projects.

A broad benefits portfolio from the innovation projects is detected, not restricted to the company’s permanence in the market by 81.5% of the companies; such as: increasing market share (68.4%), opening new markets (37%), improving product quality (80.1%), increasing productive flexibility (71.8%); compliance with new legislation (51.3%), labor costs and production reduction (58%) and lower raw material, energy and water consumption (52%).

The innovations are beneficial to the companies and also to their employees. De Negri and Salerno (2005) carried out a survey with 72,000 Brazilian companies together with the Institute of Applied Economic Research (IPEA), a Brazilian federal government institution. In it, the articulation of the Brazilian industry database focuses on innovation, technological standards, performance and its competitive strategies, instead of the traditional company vision like size and economic sector. It shows that innovating and differentiating products is also extremely beneficial to employees. When comparing the companies that innovate and differentiate products with the ones that don’t, they have a 23% higher remuneration, a higher education level (25.5%) and a greater average employment time (32%).

In addition to benefiting companies and their workers, policies aiming at innovations also provide considerable progress to countries that adopt them. Scientific and technological progress in China has provided the improvement in the quality and efficiency of growth in the past four decades of economic reform and opening up through innovation-oriented development strategy, to maintain the leading role in future, there is already reflection for urgent needs to adjust the previous “Development Innovation Oriented” to “Innovation-led Development”, with a focus on encouraging and supporting “lead innovation” and cultivate the market for these products as a public policy (Lei et al., 2012).

Chesbrough (2003, 2006) covers the innovation process through two typologies, the closed or traditional and the open innovation. In the closed model, successful innovations require broad and total control. Therefore, companies must generate their own ideas and develop, implement, market, distribute, finance and maintain them.

The open innovation developed by Chesbrough (2003, 2006), defends the joint action from multiple sources in the innovation process, making use of the company’s internal competencies not only to carry out R&D, but also to search, select and access opportunities and assets external to the company through the interaction between established organizations and external partners. This model sees innovation as a result of the cooperation networks performance that is not only punctual, but also offers knowledge, ideas and patents for the new products and processes generations that are existing in modern business environments (Wolf et al., 2022).

In an increasingly connected and networked world, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) recognizes the value of the open innovation in addressing the most pressing challenges to solve many problem types and advancement in the number of outcomes continues to grow, challenge design is also becoming more sophisticated as expertise and capacity (personnel, platforms, and partners) grow and develop (Gustetic et al., 2015).

It can be summarized that the innovation produces positive results for the company’s business, for its employees and countries as well as enable the society’s evolution. In many economy sectors, and especially in the industrial sector, innovations are made a reality through projects that, according to the Project Management Institute, which defines project as a temporary venture, is an effort that has a definite beginning, middle and end aimed at developing a unique product or service (Project Management Institute, 2017).

In this direction is the main question that guides this work: How to define a model that evaluates excellence and considers the main factors that have a direct influence on the innovation projects management and which at the highest level strongly favors and supports innovation in current and future industrial enterprises?

In this research effort, we developed a maturity model designed to manage innovation projects, integrating these two areas: project management and innovation management and the development of a related tool that was developed to systematically assess the project management maturity in industrial enterprises for academic and practical purposes.

The scientific purpose is to extract data on the current state of manufacturing companies and their strategies in innovation project management to obtain the factors that enable potential success. The practical purpose of this work is to enable a company to systematically evaluate its project management aimed at innovation and to reflect on its strategies.

As a limitation of the research effort, it is intended to target industrial companies and that, for startups and academic spin-off companies, a differentiated approach is needed, which is outside the scope of this work to also analyze and propose corrective actions with companies that participated in this research in order to increase maturity in the face of the identified opportunities.

The paper is structured as follows: Starting, we discuss the existing maturity models in the project management and innovation field and derive the contribution of this work. Then, we describe the framework to develop the innovation project management maturity model and show the results deployed in the model and in the first findings from a preliminary evaluation carried out in industrial companies. Finally, we conclude discussing the main findings, make a critical analysis from the feedback received and define future research.

2. Literature Review

The relevance of the Projects and Innovations areas is reflected in the academic environment through a significant increase in scientific publications; Figs. 2 and 3 show the evolution of the publications in the period 2014–2020 (full years) that used the Scopus database with the terms “Innovation” and “projects”, respectively.

The bibliometric analysis consists of combining the math and statistical analysis of the patterns that appear in the publications and documents, in this way, it refers to a quantitative analysis of written communication, with the citation analysis, which this work also considers.

The citation analysis is based on the premise that authors cite articles that they consider important in the development of their research, so frequently cited works are likely to have a greater influence on those less cited.

Through extensive literature search, used as an initial reference with theme, keywords associated with this work are innovation, projects, management, industry and maturity model.

To ensure academic relevance, we limit the bibliometric research of this work to making available the full articles and texts from peer-reviewed journals contained in online databases published in the last 5 years (2015–2020) on the bases Web of Science, Scopus and Integrated research base of the Aeronautical Technological Institute in Brazil in which were found 268 documents, and it was reviewed, among technical articles, government research and, when available, the most relevant citations.

The documents were processed by Patent Insight Pro software and 2200 keywords were found which after several refinements, for instance, consider repeated words, those with 95% of the same characters, achieved 250 keywords and even individual word analysis, that were removed from those not related to work, reached 79 main keywords; based on the network analysis, a statistical analysis between main keywords was performed. In Fig. 4 the associations among the most cited keywords in all articles analyzed can be visualized.

Figure 4 demonstrates the establishment of a strong association between the maturity model, innovation capacity development projects and process management; there is also a strong association between innovation process with development projects, technology transfer, innovation capacity, and culture of organization, finally, a strong association between development projects with technology transfer, innovation process, process management and maturity model; such associations, highlight and reinforce, the holistic view of this work, which involves models of maturity, project management and innovation.

The maturity concept was initially established by the psychologist Argrys (1968) as cited in Costa and Ramos (2013), according to the author, for individuals to become mature people, gradual changes are required over time as they acquire skills, which need to be achieved through planning and actions taken to obtain these competencies.

Applying the aforementioned maturity concept to the business environment, it was understood to the extent that a specific process is explicitly defined, managed, measured, controlled and effective (Paulk et al., 1993). We investigate and understand the difference between readiness and maturity in the matter that readiness assessment takes place before engaging in the maturing process whereas maturity assessment aims for capturing the as-it-is state whilst in the maturing process (Schumacher et al., 2016).

Paulk et al. (1993) argued that greater maturity leads to more consistent and repeatable processes and reduces the differences between planned and achieved results giving rise to better performance. This understanding is in line with the Kerzner (2001) concept, which defines maturity as the development of systems and processes that are inherently repetitive and guarantee a high success probability thus seeking to reach a level where management practices are institutionalized in the organization, therefore consistent execution no longer depends solely on the attitude of specific professionals.

Companies use maturity models to assess the current situation, derive and prioritize improvement measures and then monitor and control the implementation progress (De Bruin and Rosemann, 2005; Becker et al., 2009).

In the industrial sector field, several authors have studied maturity models which have been generally proposed study themes where we can see in Fig. 5 the publications in the periods 2014–2020 (full years) that used the terms “maturity models” or “readiness” in the Scopus database.

Among the models directed to the industrial sector we have found, for instance, in advanced manufacturing (Schumacher et al., 2016), integrated evaluation of management systems (Domingues et al., 2016), production management systems (Powell et al., 2013), sustainability (Correia et al., 2017), operational procurement in the construction industry (Xing et al., 2011) and energy management in industrial organizations (Finnerty et al., 2017).

As the model proposed integrates the concepts of project and innovation management fields, through bibliometrics that uses citation level evaluation in the research bases, it was found that the most relevant maturity models associate in both fields.

Maturity models for project management indicate that the main models are: Capability Maturity Model (CMMI Product Team, 1991), Project Management Maturity Model – PMMM (Kerzner, 2001, 2002, 2011), Organizational Project Management Maturity Model – OPM3 (Project Management Institute, 2003) and Maturity Model in Project Management – MMGP (Prado, 2002, 2004, 2008, 2014); based on the research, three maturity models that were selected and used as reference for their application in Innovation Management are: PDP NET Model (Rozenfeld and Forcellini, 2006), ICMM Model (Essmann and Du Prezz, 2009) and I2MM Model (Müller-Prothmann and Stein, 2011). The models are summarized in Table 1. Other models and tools were found and analyzed but do not provide any detail regarding the structure and content and are therefore, not listed in the same way.

In critical analysis of the models, those that refer to the project management field, we have PMMM model (Kerzner, 2001, 2002, 2011). It is necessary to use a complex questionnaire of four hundred and fifty-five questions and the results of the projects and the evaluation. Maturity level by expertise area contributing to the PMMM model are not discussed for state-of-the-art project management such as scope, schedule, risk management and others.

The OPM3 (Project Management Institute, 2003) model despite bringing some innovations, compared to the models that preceded it, has received some criticism. According to Costa and Ramos (2013) its use is quite complex and depends on the software acquisition, Harrison (2006) addresses the many questions (151) and the evaluation of various maturity elements in a single question, with only the “yes” or “no” answer options being described as negatives.

Soler (2004) also points to the large extent of project domain best practices to the other program and portfolio domains through a repetitive bureaucratic questionnaire, lacking a measurable degree associated with maturity assessment, as established by other maturity models, which hinders understanding and establishing measurable goals for improving organizational maturity and concludes that due to the complexity of OPM3, it is difficult to apply and hence the spread.

In the MMGP model (Prado, 2002, 2004, 2008, 2014), we detect that there is no mapping of the maturity level by knowledge area directed to project management; many questions in the questionnaire associate the project management success in meeting a given proposed scenario that has no level association; the questions that assess maturity level five have only two alternatives, how to meet or not the proposed scenario; many terms used are subjective and always associating high maturity with time of practice in the projects’ execution and not associating increasingly complex activities, finally, refer to a high maturity level with types of business culture, which does not necessarily exist this correlation.

In the innovation management field, the PDP NET (Rozenfeld and Forcellini, 2006) model does not have an instrument for collecting data (questionnaire) needed for maturity assessment. It is not trivial to use the model as a diagnostic tool when transforming the indicated levels, grouped into areas, into one questionnaire in order to classify the areas at the established levels (Reame Junior et al., 2007).

The PDP NET (Rozenfeld and Forcellini, 2006) model uses broad terms that do not give clarity in what identifies maturity levels, using terms such as “high-level conversation” or “think about portfolio”, also highlights an opportunity to clarify what is expected of knowledge areas to maturity levels, for instance, is used at level two in the project management knowledge area where it performs all project management activities, and in addition to being very broad and subjective it is not possible to evaluate different companies based on this criterion. Finally, PDP NET describes an activity management level without indicating the need for indicators, which are considered only at the next level.

The ICMM model (Essmann and Du Prezz, 2009) offers in its structure few monitoring and benchmarking possibilities that are not enriched with best practices (Kohler et al., 2013) and the evaluation questionnaire. Despite having five possible concepts for evaluation, the questions have specific criteria only for levels 1, 3 and 5, which for level 2, as recommended by the author, should be considered by the participant as a conceptual mix of items 1 and 3; and for level 4 the conceptual mix of items 3 and 5, giving subjectivity to these levels.

Finally, the I2MM (Müller-Prothmann and Stein, 2011) model is very specifically directed to the product development process under the focus of quality management and development phases with no interface with the project management area; essential for resources to be effectively managed and the innovation product to be available, for instance, on time and the right cost.

The comparison with existing maturity models in other domains provides a design strategy and functionality enabling the starting point for the recommended model. The maturity model, aimed at managing innovation projects proposed in this article, aims to not only extend the existing concepts, models and tools, through the maturity assess activities that the enterprise can carry out, not being restricted to how projects are executed, but also to the evaluation of strategies, planning and development of innovation projects.

We also aim at transforming the concepts into items that can be measured in real business environments. Finally, we provide the details about the structure and data which built the model so that companies can apply the proposed method.

3. Research Methodology

This work has a broad view on the innovation project management influence in industrial companies under the prism that it is essential and ensures the competitiveness and the long-term growth in business and is one of the main levers for profitability and increasing growth.

Aligned with this concept, we understand that innovation project management involves integration with the strategy, planning, development and implementation. This directly involves strategic business vision with engineering, projects management, production systems and other main actors that make up the innovation system throughout the value chain. Among these are supplier’s development, marketing (brand building and brand development), sales and operation and others which aren’t necessarily within the internal enterprises’ borders; for instance, Research and Development.

The methodological framework used in the model construction is based on the systemic Becker’s step-by-step model (Becker et al., 2009), which is directed to the maturity models development as a strong theoretical basis.

Following the procedure, a multi-methodological development approach is carried out, because it uses the aspects of quantitative and qualitative research in the research process steps, being divided into two parts: the proposed method construction and its application, the first part starts with qualitative interviews with specialists (action research) and subsequently, through statistical analysis to select the sample and apply the survey questionnaire online, the model is built in a participatory and collaborative way with the specialists and the second part refers to the practical application through data collection (questionnaire) with companies in the Brazilian aerospace sector.

The research procedure can be divided into six distinct phases. An initial phase creates a complete understanding of project management and innovation management fields through extensive systematic literature research aiming for a model structure that is practical and applicable to companies’ reality. The second step refers to the evaluation of domain complexities and a gap analysis of existing maturity models applicable to assess innovation project maturity and then were conducted interviews with eight innovation project management, all have Project Management Professional (PMP) certified by the Project Manager Institute, in enterprises assisted in determining the underlying problem validation of this research effort as a solution to the problem when doing innovation projects in practice as follows:

•	Companies do not evaluate their own capabilities in innovation projects managing that prevent them from taking any coordinated action.
•	Companies fail in their innovation projects, whether in their strategy, capability lack or in their results.

After in-depth discussions, the themes that have a direct influence on innovation projects were congruent, and the initial list of 79 keywords were expanded and aggregated into 59 concepts that are unevenly grouped into five organizational dimensions for further analysis in the next phase, which are: strategy, process of innovation, product development, project management, innovation environment and finally metrics and results. From interviews with the experts, it was found that not all items seem to have the same importance for the development toward a mature company in innovation project management.

The third phase is identified by collaborative specialists’ participation in order to refine and validate the contribution importance of maturity items defined in the innovation projects management.

A survey was carried out by consultants and managers (managers/directors) or practitioners (analysts/engineers), also all PMP certified by the Project Manager Institute (PMI), who made their judgments under the questionnaire that was sent the link from direct access to the online platform to 450 questionnaires to project managers linked to the innovation area in different industrial sectors which resulted in 162 responses (represent margin of error 6% and confidence level of 90%).

In this research a standardized questionnaire was sent consisting of a one-ended question per item in which each question requires an answer to a Likert-scale, reaching from “not important” (rating = 1) to “very important” (rating = 4), for instance, the question for the item “Technological Roadmap” reads as shown in Table 2. All questions were structured to assess the importance level of the concepts considered in the previous phase in the defined groups, considering the innovation projects success in which they must be decisive and favor the achievement of the organizations’ targets in order to mitigate any comprehension problems, a brief description of each item was also done.

We defined the items that reached the minimum average importance of 3.00 out of 4 (75% of importance) which will be considered in the model.

After we received the answers the data were processed, resulting in a total of 29 maturity items that are unevenly grouped into five organizational dimensions.

Once the development is completed, the fourth phase is the weighting factors definition and indicators and how to perform the respective calculations and statements. The fifth phase is the model transformation into a practical and easy tool aimed at its application in real organizations environments in order to have a maturity model that facilitates its practical application and supports its dissemination.

Finally, in the last and sixth phase the model was applied in two industrial companies in order to validate it and receive feedback for future improvement. The research process is represented by Fig. 6.

As expected results of this research effort, we can, in detail: (i) Have the model defined pointing out that the proposed methodological integration has a relevant result through the evaluations received by the specialists and; (ii) Result of the application, which shows the reality of the companies participating in the assessment carried out using the indicators developed that will be presented in the next section.

4. Results

4.1. Innovation project management maturity model

The model is based on a structure with two evaluation perspectives, the first one being called maturity levels and the second called dimensions.

The maturity levels are the conceptual references that guide the whole model. Among the five maturity levels, each item undergoes where level 1 describes a complete lack of attributes or even an informal process in which the organization has made no effort to implement a management model and where the professionals involved are not held responsible for maintaining any pattern, to level 5, representing state-of-the-art management according to the attributes required.

The dimensions represent the main areas that have an impact on successful strategic planning, development and execution of innovation projects that are deployed in key components called maturity items in this phase, which also defined many maturity items grouped in five dimensions to start the next phase.

The maturity model proposed has the following characteristics: (i) it unfolds the process of managing innovation projects in knowledge areas which are the dimensions, (ii) dimensions are deployed according to objectives through key components called maturity items, (iii) it offers the detailing according to the practices and activities by the maturity levels through self-explanatory texts, (iv) application simplicity with easy understanding of the proposed practices and (v) maturity levels representation by charts, and extended to all maturity items for all dimensions.

Summarizing, the recommended model defines “what” characterizes state-of-the-art in innovation project management according to maturity levels in the respective items in their dimensions and not “how”; which will be left for organizations to analyze and define according to their realities.

Following the collaborative participation of experts and project managers related to innovation in many economic sectors of industry, the final model version proposed considers 29 maturity items which are concentrated in five dimensions.

Table 3 shows the general view of the model with (i) dimensions name, (ii) description, (iii) maturity items associates.

For instance, the item Guidelines Deployment Process was assessed the average importance of 3.79 out of 4 while Technological Roadmap was 3.59 out of 4. The overall average of the evaluations received from all maturity items had as a result the value of 3.53 out of 4 and all maturity items evaluated obtained a result greater than 3 out of 4, which supports the meaningfulness of the model content.

In the next step, the maturity level of each dimension ($M_D)$ results from calculating the weighted average of all maturity items ($M_{\mathrm{\text{Dli}}})$ within its related dimension. The weighting factor ($f_{\mathrm{\text{Dli}}})$ is equal to the average importance score from all 162 specialists for each item. The maturity level is calculated using the following equation.

After calculating the maturity level of each dimension ($M_D)$, the enterprise result is represented by a radar chart which represents a pentagon with five vertices where each coincides with the model dimensions: “Strategy”, “Product Development Process”, “Project Management”, “Innovation Environment” and “Results and Metrics”.

Based on this, the indicator that synthesizes and measures the maturity level in Innovation Project Management (IPM Index) is also calculated, which results from the polygon area coming from the company evaluation under the model divided by the maximum possible area, in this situation when the company reaches the maximum grade in all twenty-nine maturity items. The IPM Index is evaluated between 0% (lowest possible value) and 100% (maximum possible value).

In order to avoid complexity and not have a practical application, the model became a user-friendly tool that can be used by enterprises for self-assessment.

The tool provides the questionnaire; for instance, for the item “Guidelines Deployment Process” in the dimension “Strategy” the question reads as shown in Fig. 7 and “Risk Assessment” in the dimension “Project Management” in Fig. 8, in which the answers are processed and integrated by the software in which the results and the IPM index are calculated automatically generating interactive charts that are presented by dimensions that can be unfolded by their maturity items, and finally stores the history of all the assessments to enable companies analyze their strategies.

In order to evaluate the content and the structure model, as well as to analyze the tool’s practicality, two case studies were carried out in manufacturing enterprises in the Brazilian aerospace sector, which purposefully have different realities, which are presented in the next chapter.

4.2. Case-study in industrial enterprises

For the model application, Brazilian manufacturing companies with relevant roles in the aerospace ecosystem and expressive innovation activities development through projects were chosen and in order to represent the application, two companies with different profile from the same ecosystem will be presented.

Both enterprises were registered in the Aerospace business catalog which was developed by the Institute for Promotion and Industrial Coordination — Instituto de Fomento e Coordenação Industrial (IFI), an institute within the structure of the Department of Aerospace Science and Technology — Departamento de Ciência e Tecnologia Aeroespacial (DCTA) of the Brazilian government.

The IFI role acts as a link between Brazilian institutes and industry. Their mission is to foster, coordinate and support activities and endeavors aimed at the development and consolidation of the aeronautical and space industries in Brazil. It conducts certification/validation and metrology activities in the aerospace industry and technically and legally supports the transfer technologies generated from the institutes to the industries.

The Aerospace Business Catalog (Institute of Industrial Coordination and Fostering [Instituto de Fomento Industrial], 2018) demonstrates the companies’ relationship which are in the Brazilian territory and have the capacity to develop high tech reliable products.

Participating enterprises are identified as “$\beta$” and “$\gamma$” to preserve their identities and avoid exposing their information.

The “$\beta$” enterprise has global presence and is based in Brazil. They develop technologies, electronic solutions and products for the aerospace industry and other sectors, such as durable goods, and have approximately 250,000 employees worldwide.

The “$\gamma$” enterprise is a mid-sized Brazilian company specialized in the development of system and technology engineering directed specifically to the aerospace industry with around 500 employees. They already stand out in innovation development, being awarded as the most innovative company by Finep (Financing Studies and Projects), a public company linked to the Ministry of Science Technology, Innovations and Communications of the Brazilian government.

To ensure the accuracy of the results, both companies have a strong strategy in innovation development through projects.

The companies received a questionnaire by e-mail to allow a reflective assessment of their internal situation according to their time. The maturity self-assessments are a valid and easy-to-conduct method. To mitigate the possibility of knowledge lack, we ensured that the company representative to lead the assessment has a key role in innovation project management.

After the evaluation, responses were entered into the software tool to calculate the maturity levels, IPM Index and create the reports. In Fig. 9, the maturity level is presented in the five dimensions considered for both companies. A radar chart is used to represent the overall results obtained.

In order to increase the understanding of the systemic model, Fig. 10 presents the radar chart of the maturity items that unfolds the strategic dimension according to the company self-assessment, as well as the detail in the five maturity items ($M_{\mathrm{\text{Dli}}})$, which compose the respective dimension with maturity levels of 1 to 5.

The self-assessment results of maturity items ($M$1/$i)$ are related below with their respective weighting factor ($f$1/$i)$.

$M$ 1/1(Guidelines deployment process): maturity level: 4;weighting factor ($f$ 1/1) = 3.79

$M$ 1/2(Analysis of enterprise ecosystem): maturity level:4; weighting factor ($f$1/2) = 3.53

$M$ 1/3 (Portfolio management): maturity level: 5; weighting factor ($f$ 1/3) = 3.77

$M$ 1/4 (Knowledge management): maturity level: 2; weighting factor ($f$ 1/4) = 3.58

$M$ 1/5 (Technological roadmap): maturity level: 2; weighting factor ($f$ 1/5) = 3.59

Thus, using the equation already presented, the maturity of the dimension “strategy” of the company “$\gamma$” is calculated resulting in a maturity level of 3.4 out of 5 as shown below.

The seemingly high maturity level in the dimension “strategy” in the company “$\beta$”, reaching 4.0 out of 5 (see Fig. 4), since the company has a global position and a larger innovation project portfolio, as well as not being restricted to the aerospace sector, requires a more robust process to define and support with a larger quantity and diversity of innovation projects to act and achieve consistent performance in such diverse and highly competitive markets.

In the “product development process” dimension, company “$\gamma$” obtained the highest maturity level reaching 4.8 out of 5. In discussion with the company, it was identified they were specifically directed to the technology development for the aerospace sector, including design, production and integration activities. At its core is the requirements management which is transformed into specifications and then into a prototype leading to a product with extremely low failure level, usually six sigma quality level.

In the project management dimension, the “$\gamma$” company has a maturity of 3.9 out of 5.0. It is understood that the company is more dependent on the aerospace sector and acts with specific demands from this sector, such as fixed contractual orders with fixed deliveries. This requires more of this dimension in which company “$\beta$” achieved the lowest result, maturity level of 3.2 out of 5, also the lowest value of all dimensions for this company.

For the “Innovation Environment” and “Metrics and Results” dimensions, the “$\beta$” enterprise achieved a higher evaluation, respectively 4.4 and 4.5 out of 5.0, and “$\gamma$” enterprise achieved, respectively; 3.2 and 3.5 of 5.0. In the analysis performed, recent efforts were detected in “$\gamma$” enterprise for improvement in these dimensions, for instance, continuous programs implementation that provide training to its employees and uniformity policies that recognizes values and encourages the activities of innovation projects in all areas of the company, reflecting consistency in the results found.

Finally, the indicator that synthesizes and measures the level of maturity in Innovation Project Management (IPM Index) was also developed by the tool. It uses as a reference the polygon area formed after doing the assessment by the maximum possible area (Fig. 9). “$\beta$” enterprise reached 68% and “$\gamma$” enterprise reached 55% out of 100%.

In order to demonstrate the positioning of the assessed company on the IPM Index scale, Fig. 11 shows the association between the color scale proposed and value of IPM Index ranges, whose company names are within the triangles as follows:

•	Very low maturity (Red grade): The company has the value up to 16.0% of the Index, for that the chart-built area after assessment done is equivalent to the regular pentagon area whose level is 2.0 in the five dimensions. This range represents that the enterprise has very low maturity in the concepts according to the state-of-the-art defined.
•	Low maturity (Yellow grade): The company has the value between 16.01% to 50.0% of the Index, for that the chart-built area after assessment done is equivalent to the regular pentagon area between levels from 2.01 to 3.50 in the five dimensions. This range represents that the enterprise is in an attention situation regarding the maturity of innovation project management according to the state-of-the-art defined.
•	Relevant maturity (Green grade): The company has the value between 50.01% and 81.0% of the Index, for that the chart-built area after assessment done is equivalent to the regular pentagon area between levels 3.51 and 4.0 in the five dimensions. This range represents that the enterprise has a significant maturity situation of innovation project management according to the state-of-the-art defined.
•	High maturity (Intense Green grade): The company has the value between 81.01% and 100.00% of the Index, for that the chart-built area after assessment done is equivalent to the regular pentagon area between levels 4.51 and 4.0 in the five dimensions. This range represents that the enterprise is very close or has already reached in terms of the maturity of innovation project management according to state-of-the-art defined.

After consolidating the results, we collected feedback from the assessed enterprise about the clarity of the questionnaire, transparency and consistency of the tool and the presentation methods. They were positive throughout and led to broad reflection to identify improvements that will be discussed in the next section as well as suggestions for future work in order to extend the knowledge acquired.

5. Conclusion

This research work aimed to develop a maturity model and a related tool to assess maturity in the management of innovation projects in industrial enterprises.

The model was developed using a multi-method approach, including a systematic literature review, supported by bibliometric study, conceptual modeling and qualitative and quantitative methods for empirical validation. It had the interactive participation of 162 experts, practitioners, researchers and project managers directly related to innovation in several industrial companies.

In contrast to other approaches found out in the literature, the main contribution of this research effort is to evaluate the management of innovation projects from a broader perspective, not only in ways for execution projects, but taking as a perspective the knowledge areas that have an impact on the success in the strategy, planning, development and execution of innovation projects in organizations resulting in a more comprehensive model.

The model transformation into a useful tool also allowed its easy application in practice. Early field experiences show that manufacturing enterprises are able to use the results of their self-assessment as a solid reference point for other strategic measures.

From a scientific point of view, a conceptual maturity model was developed for the innovation projects management. This conceptual model allowed us to collect data on the development of manufacturing companies in various sectors of the economy, to associate pre-existing concepts in the literature that were transformed into factors and unfolded into maturity levels, which were detailed and combined in a unique way, and that are able to influence success and result in effective strategies for innovation projects in industrial companies.

From a practical point of view, the maturity of the innovation project management of two industrial enterprises was systematically evaluated and the applicability of the concept and methodology developed in the real enterprise’s environment was verified that it was done as the first assessment in the aeronautic field of the Brazilian ecosystem.

It allowed a reflection on the strategies of enterprises to approach the state-of-the-art in the management of innovation projects. This goes beyond their execution, as they must also be decisive and support the achievement of the organization’s goals.

The tool is able to collect information electronically and the software automatically calculates the maturity item’s weight in order to have the maturity level of each dimension directly from the questionnaire. It also allows the calculation of the developed indicator, which consolidates and measures the maturity level in the Management of Innovation Projects, called the “Innovation Project Management Index” (IPM Index) to be used as an indicator that allows a comparative evaluation between companies (benchmarking).

The possibility of inserting the action plan in the history of the evaluations carried out and associated with each dimension was received as an improvement opportunity. This way, it will be possible to have all the information in a single tool avoiding additional files and documents.

Finally, the companies understood that it would be relevant to receive their information on the radar chart, in which the results’ average of the other enterprises in the same industry sector would be present; maintaining the confidentiality of business information, in order to have references and assess existing gaps and opportunity for improvement.

Future research will focus on proposing and mapping the industrial economy sectors as to the importance of the maturity items in each dimension and through this make an indicator comparative. Furthermore, it will mainly aim at a broad diagnosis of the maturity of innovation project management in enterprises of the electronic component manufacturing sector, since according to the Brazilian government it is the sector in which most implemented innovations in the latest research were carried out, and also provide benchmarking reference of this sector for the other industrial economy sectors.

In a final comment, the maturity model is not intended to provide an easy path to achieve full maturity in innovation project managing. However, the maturity model can help companies with the difficult task of reflecting on their current competencies to support their decisions through the elaboration of consistent action plans.

Acknowledgment

This research effort was supported by the National Counsel of Technological and Scientific Development (CNPQ) and Coordination for the Improvement of Higher Education Personnel (CAPES) both under the Ministry of Education of the Brazilian government. We greatly thank them for supporting this research.