Developing a software infrastructure to support systemic innovation through effective management

Organisations are constantly adapting and innovating their systems in order to compete. Given current turbulence of the global market, together with constant technological developments, pressure for modern organisations to innovate their systems is constantly increasing. Despite the obvious importance of systems innovation to continued organisational existence, research suggests that these innovative efforts are ineffectively managed, cumulating in over half failing to achieve their goals. Given this reality, there exists a need for an infrastructure that integrates the core elements of systems innovation to allow its effective management. The objective of this paper is to introduce a software system that supports the operation of the systems innovation process through the provision of such an infrastructure for its effective management. This paper is the cumulation of substantial research and the framework presented in Section 2 has been the focus of a number of publications. Consequently the material in Section 2 is presented as background to the development of the Systems Innovation Management software. The paper concentrates on the process pursued during the design of the software to ensure a strong correlation with the requirements of systems innovation management. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.