Exploring competency needs of an innovation leader - A qualitative study capturing the perspectives of innovation management practitioners on competencies and personal certificati

Abstract: The innovation management profession is maturing, and standards and procedures for best practices are needed. Further, the current literature underscores the vitality of understanding the necessary knowledge and skills essential within the profession for continued development, and certifications for innovation management professionals are addressed as a possible way of providing standards to the profession. However, a knowledge gap exists concerning a universal competency framework for innovation leaders and innovation management professionals. The purpose of this study is to address this current knowledge gap by exploring the perceived competency need of an innovation leader. Moreover, an additional purpose is to examine the effects of personal certification for innovation leaders. A systematic literature review was conducted to create an initial competency framework for innovation leaders as of the current state of the literature. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with active innovation leaders to clarify the competency needs of an innovation leader and explore the effects of a personal certification for these professionals. Two subquestions emerged due to the respondents’ ambiguity regarding their role perception and what they perceived as their necessary competency needs. These questions aimed to explore the role perception and the organizational influence on the innovation leaders’ roles. In general, there were no unified, precise results on exactly what the competency needs are for an innovation leader. Instead, it was concluded to be contextually determined where organizational factors such as the type, purpose, and level of innovation maturity within the organization influenced the demands of the role. The studied third-party personal certification was concluded to infer effects such as increased self-confidence, improved innovation knowledge, and an increased legitimacy and credibility to their role. Moreover, a general result was that the fuzziness of the role created a desire for many to validate their innovation knowledge for themselves and their surroundings. Accordingly, certifications were concluded as a potential means to validate and clarify their role.