Narrow Results

This paper examines the proposition that bootlegger entrepreneurs can be identified by their creativity. This is done with the help of a standard psychological test. Bootleg researchers can be identified by applying the test because they are very creative people. With this test a firm might be able to discourage or encourage employment of potential candidates for its R&D department. Thus, a firm can indirectly control the number of bootleg innovations produced in the firm or simply avoid wasting time consuming management resources, as bootleg entrepreneurs can be difficult to manage at times. The result of this research adds new evidence to current literature.

This study aims to contribute to the research on bootlegging by investigating (i) whether employees’ risk propensity explains why some secretly organise innovation, whereas others do not, and (ii) how direct management support for compliant innovative behaviour affects this relationship. Answers to these questions are relevant because managers experience bootlegging in their organisations but do neither know from which employees they can expect creative deviance nor how to regulate it. Drawing on risk behaviour theory, risk propensity is supposed to foster bootlegging behaviour, and different forms of management support moderate this relationship by changing the salience of opportunities and the threats inherent in “going underground”. The empirical results provide ample support for the direct impact of risk propensity. This effect becomes weaker when managers provide more support in the form of resources and feedback, whereas encouragement to innovate strengthens the relationship.

It has been suggested that "bootlegging" can lead to a special type of bottom-up innovation. Some recent research indicates that bootlegging is being carried out in over 75 per cent of laboratories in technology-based firms. It should therefore have a significant impact on innovation. However, it might be assumed that, by its very nature, it cannot be managed and hence the potential more effectively realised. By definition, it is an activity which does not fit within the normal programmed activity and, in some cases, is actually undertaken against the expressed wishes of the organisation. Using a simple framework which was developed to consider aspects of R&D project management and innovation strategy, it is argued that bootlegging can arise for many different reasons, such as "curiosity", to attack technical problems which have resulted in the disbandment of a project, or to assess markets which the organisation does not believe are viable or is not prepared to consider. If this is the case, one can conclude that the innovative performance of many organisations could be improved if more attention was paid to managing the process.